From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

Hello all,

Programming related :

I've got a simple dialog on which I placed a riched20a control which I have given, among others, the ES_READONLY style. The result is that I cannot
edit the text itself. Which is what I was after.

However, I was rather surprised to discover that some shortcut-keys
affecting text-formatting (ctrl-R, ctrl-L and likely more) still work. :-(

Question : How do I make the text *really* read-only ? *inclusive* text-formatting.

Is that possible at all ? Which style would I need to add/remove / which GWL_* bit would I need to set/clear (I've not seen anything in that regard)
?

Remark: I need to be able to select-and-copy text from it though. Using the mouse or keyboard.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser


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From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

On 25/03/2026 18:49, R.Wieser wrote:

Programming related :

Which language and version?

XP had many languages - C#, VB, C, C++ so pick one and repost.

I know how C# works and you can certainly change the label text and make textBox readOnly.




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From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

ManiFold,

Programming related :

Which language and version?

I think you misunderstood. I'm asking about the RichEdit20 control, as provided by RichEd20.dll. Not about some language-specific wrapper using
it.

I know how C# works and you can certainly change the label
text and make textBox readOnly.

As mentioned, I already made the richedit textbox read-only.

The problem is that I can still change, by pressing a key or two, the text-formatting - which I don't want to happen either.

For the record: The language I'm using is Assembly.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

p.s.
Why did you remove the other two newsgroups (I re-added them) ? You effectivily changed a cross-post to a multi-post (which is bad).


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From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

On Wed, 25 Mar 2026 19:49:26 +0100, R.Wieser wrote:

Hello all,

Programming related :

I've got a simple dialog on which I placed a riched20a control which I have given, among others, the ES_READONLY style. The result is that I cannot edit the text itself. Which is what I was after.

However, I was rather surprised to discover that some shortcut-keys affecting text-formatting (ctrl-R, ctrl-L and likely more) still work. :-(

Question : How do I make the text *really* read-only ? *inclusive* text-formatting.

Is that possible at all ? Which style would I need to add/remove / which GWL_* bit would I need to set/clear (I've not seen anything in that regard) ?

Remark: I need to be able to select-and-copy text from it though. Using the mouse or keyboard.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

ES_READONLY works fine in both rich-edit and plain-text mode.

Did SetWindowLong() actually succeeded? Did the style actually been applied? --- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

JJ,

ES_READONLY works fine in both rich-edit and plain-text mode.

Why ? Why are you saying that (without any kind of explanation) when I
just described how it *doesn't* "work fine" ? :-(

Did SetWindowLong() actually succeeded?

As mentioned, I included the style when defining the control (in the
programs resource-file).

Also, a rich-text box has a EM_SETREADONLY message available.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/controls/em-setreadonly

(Remarkably, it says /absolutily nothing/ about why it should be used
instead of just changing the GWL_STYLE bit)

Thanks for reminding me though : I've tested sending that message, but alas, the effect remains the same : I can't edit the text, but can still edit the formatting (even add bullet-points!).

Did the style actually been applied?

Well, as mentioned I can't edit the text itself anymore, which indicates to
me that it has.

But as it so happens I just tested it using GetWindowLong(). It was.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser


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From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

On 3/25/2026 2:49 PM, R.Wieser wrote:

Hello all,

Programming related :

I've got a simple dialog on which I placed a riched20a control which I have given, among others, the ES_READONLY style. The result is that I cannot
edit the text itself. Which is what I was after.

However, I was rather surprised to discover that some shortcut-keys
affecting text-formatting (ctrl-R, ctrl-L and likely more) still work. :-(

Question : How do I make the text *really* read-only ? *inclusive* text-formatting.

Is that possible at all ? Which style would I need to add/remove / which GWL_* bit would I need to set/clear (I've not seen anything in that regard)
?

Remark: I need to be able to select-and-copy text from it though. Using the mouse or keyboard.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

Convert to jpg, pdf? Overlay with transparent level?
--- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

Zaidy036,

Question : How do I make the text *really* read-only ? *inclusive*
text-formatting.

...

Convert to jpg, pdf? Overlay with transparent level?

Rube goldberg machine much ? (look it up)

Regards,
Rudy Wieser


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From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

On Thu, 26 Mar 2026 10:28:08 +0100, R.Wieser wrote:

JJ,

ES_READONLY works fine in both rich-edit and plain-text mode.

Why ? Why are you saying that (without any kind of explanation) when I just described how it *doesn't* "work fine" ? :-(

Did SetWindowLong() actually succeeded?

As mentioned, I included the style when defining the control (in the programs resource-file).

Also, a rich-text box has a EM_SETREADONLY message available.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/controls/em-setreadonly

(Remarkably, it says /absolutily nothing/ about why it should be used instead of just changing the GWL_STYLE bit)

Thanks for reminding me though : I've tested sending that message, but alas, the effect remains the same : I can't edit the text, but can still edit the formatting (even add bullet-points!).

Did the style actually been applied?

Well, as mentioned I can't edit the text itself anymore, which indicates to me that it has.

But as it so happens I just tested it using GetWindowLong(). It was.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser

Oh, I see what you meant.

Though from my tests in Win2000, WinXP, and Win7, the results are a bit different than yours. Only the line spacing shortcuts (CTRL+1, CTRL+2,
CTRL+5), and Cycle Bullet Style shortcuts (CTRL+SHIFT+L) still able to
change content in read-only mode. All other shortcuts (CTRL+L, CTRL+E,
CTRL+R, CTRL+=, CTRL+SHIFT+=, CTRL+SHIFT+A, etc.) are not able to change content in read-only mode.

That's a RichEdit bug! Mainly because the read-only feature is partially functional.

FYI, RichEdit v2.0 which is used in Win9x/ME/NT4 doesn't have any text formatting keyboard shortcuts yet, so it's likely a bug in RichEdit v3.0+.
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From Newsgroup: alt.windows7.general

JJ,

Though from my tests in Win2000, WinXP, and Win7, the results
are a bit different than yours. Only the line spacing shortcuts
(CTRL+1, CTRL+2, CTRL+5), and Cycle Bullet Style shortcuts
(CTRL+SHIFT+L) still able to change content in read-only mode.
All other shortcuts (CTRL+L, CTRL+E, CTRL+R, CTRL+=, CTRL+SHIFT+=, CTRL+SHIFT+A, etc.) are not able to change content in read-only mode.

I'm running XPsp3, and for me CTRL-R, CTRL-L, CTRL-E and CTRL-R certainly do work in read-only mode.

I just tested, I read-only mode, CTRL-+ (superscript), and it was indeed blocked. Hmmm...

That's a RichEdit bug! Mainly because the read-only feature is
partially functional.

It certainly does seem that the read-only feature is only partly functional (which feels more wrong than not functional at all). I wonder if thats a
normal bug, or a bug-with-seniority (aka: feature). :-)


Bottom line, its not a case of me not knowing and not being able to find the setting for disabeling the text-formatting keys, it looks to be a bug.

Bummer. Now I have to go and subclass that control to catch and filter the WM_KEYDOWN messages. :-|

FYI, RichEdit v2.0 which is used in Win9x/ME/NT4 doesn't
have any text formatting keyboard shortcuts yet, so it's
likely a bug in RichEdit v3.0+.

In my resource-definition I'm specifying "RichEdit20A" (text, not a
constant). Although, thats using an XPsp3 2008 RICHED20.DLL, which contains both the v2.0 and v3.0 versions.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser


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