Thank you

[boromyr]

It works, it's as if I had physically replaced the key, it's also compatible with AutoHotKey and I can remap it again! Thank you!

[Dwedit]

Wow that was fast, I hadn't even created the release yet. Thanks for the feedback.

[boromyr]

You posted it a few minutes before I started looking for it, I filled it out right away! I'll let you know how it goes.

[boromyr]

What do you think about publishing your mod on https://windhawk.net/? It's a collection of mods for Windows, with updates, settings, and community support!

[Dwedit]

This program doesn't apply any detouring, code injection, or hooking to an existing program, it just runs separately. So it's not really a mod in that sense. I don't think it would fit in with a mod loader. But it might be of interest to the people who do install such mods.

[boromyr]

"Have you ever had issues with the Win key with NoCopilotKey? Specifically, while I have NCK open, if I press too quickly and in sequence WIN + a or WIN + s, the system behaves as if I pressed them together as a hotkey, and thus WIN + a opens the traybar panel, WIN + e opens a new explorer window, etc. It's as if WIN remains active after being released."

[Dwedit]

I managed to find a logic error in the keyboard tracking, it was allowing any Windows key press to wait indefinitely for a Left Shift press, instead of cancelling the sequence.

[boromyr]

I installed the new version but the problem still occurs. Can you reproduce it?

[Dwedit]

I can't reproduce the problem where the sequence 'Press Win', 'Release Win', 'Press A', 'Release A' triggers Windows Key + A to be pressed.

If you can make the problem happen reliably, you can try a Debug Build that logs everything to the console. Note that this Console has QuickEdit turned off, so you need to Right Click and select Mark before you can copy to the clipboard. Right Click, "Select All", Right Click will copy the entire console on the clipboard.

This is what I see on the console when I press Left Windows, release Left Windows, press A, then release A:

Press State Transition: 0 -> 1
Timer set
1727799532 SUPPRESSED  Real KB   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
1727799579 INJECTED   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
Timer cancelled
Press State Transition: 1 -> 0
1727799579 INJECTED RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
1727799579 SUPPRESSED  Real KB RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
1727799641  Real KB   PRESS 0x41 A
1727799688  Real KB RELEASE 0x41 A

The log might look slightly misleading because it displays the "Real KB" line after the other actions it took.
So even though the line "Timer Set" appears above "SUPPRESSED Real KB", it is a reaction to a keystroke, and the "SUPPRESSED" message means that after it took all those actions, the keystroke ended up being blocked.

Anyway...

Left column with a number is milliseconds since Windows booted, so you know what is happening at the exact same time.

The group "Timer Set" and "SUPPRESSED Real KB" means that it saw Left Windows Key become pressed, and set a 100ms countdown timer. If Left Windows didn't get released, or a different key get pressed, it would inject the Left Windows key after the 100ms timer expires.

The group "INJECTED", "Timer Cancelled", "1 ->0", "INJECTED", "SUPPRESSED" means that it saw Left Windows Key become released. So the program injected a press of Left Windows, injected a Release of Left Windows, then suppressed the real release of Left Windows. "Timer Cancelled" means that the key became released before 100ms expired. "1 -> 0" means that the key wasn't a left shift press.

(It might be confusing why to inject a key press and key release, then suppress the real key release, but it turns out that Game Bar really doesn't like it unless you do that)

Then finally there's "Real KB PRESS A" and "Real KB RELEASE A". Just tapping the A key.

NoCopilotKey debug build.zip

[boromyr]

Command Line: "T:\LOCALT~2\BNZ.699617ab654eff\NoCopilotKey.exe"
argv[0]: T:\LOCALT~2\BNZ.699617ab654eff\NoCopilotKey.exe
Press State Transition: 0 -> 1
Timer set
6648421 SUPPRESSED  Real KB   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
In TimerProc because it took too long to see all three keys
Timer cancelled
Press State Transition: 1 -> 0
6648546 INJECTED   PRESS 0xA4 VK_LMENU
6648546 INJECTED RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6648546 INJECTED RELEASE 0xA4 VK_LMENU
6648562 SUPPRESSED  Real KB RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6648562 INJECTED   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
6648593  Real KB   PRESS 0x53 S
6648640  Real KB RELEASE 0x53 S
Press State Transition: 0 -> 1
Timer set
6651718 SUPPRESSED  Real KB   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
6651828 INJECTED   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
Timer cancelled
Press State Transition: 1 -> 0
6651828 INJECTED   PRESS 0xA4 VK_LMENU
6651828 INJECTED RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6651828 INJECTED RELEASE 0xA4 VK_LMENU
6651859 SUPPRESSED INJECTED RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6651859 SUPPRESSED  Real KB RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6651890  Real KB   PRESS 0x53 S
6651953  Real KB RELEASE 0x53 S
Press State Transition: 0 -> 1
Timer set
6654750 SUPPRESSED  Real KB   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
6654843 INJECTED   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
Timer cancelled
Press State Transition: 1 -> 0
6654859 INJECTED   PRESS 0xA4 VK_LMENU
6654859 INJECTED RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6654859 INJECTED RELEASE 0xA4 VK_LMENU
6654875 SUPPRESSED INJECTED RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6654875 SUPPRESSED  Real KB RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6654875  Real KB   PRESS 0x53 S
6654953  Real KB RELEASE 0x53 S
Press State Transition: 0 -> 1
Timer set
6655937 SUPPRESSED  Real KB   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
In TimerProc because it took too long to see all three keys
Timer cancelled
6656046 INJECTED   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
Press State Transition: 1 -> 0
6656078  Real KB   PRESS 0x53 S
6656109  Real KB RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6656171  Real KB RELEASE 0x53 S

correct operation

Command Line: "T:\LOCALT~2\BNZ.6996181c670903\NoCopilotKey.exe"
argv[0]: T:\LOCALT~2\BNZ.6996181c670903\NoCopilotKey.exe
Press State Transition: 0 -> 1
Timer set
6754328 SUPPRESSED  Real KB   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
6754421 INJECTED   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
Timer cancelled
Press State Transition: 1 -> 0
6754437 INJECTED   PRESS 0xA4 VK_LMENU
6754437 INJECTED RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6754437 INJECTED RELEASE 0xA4 VK_LMENU
6754453 SUPPRESSED INJECTED RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6754453 SUPPRESSED  Real KB RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6754468  Real KB   PRESS 0x53 S
6754515  Real KB RELEASE 0x53 S

fast typing

Command Line: "T:\LOCALT~2\BNZ.6996181c670903\NoCopilotKey.exe"
argv[0]: T:\LOCALT~2\BNZ.6996181c670903\NoCopilotKey.exe
Press State Transition: 0 -> 1
Timer set
6797171 SUPPRESSED  Real KB   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
In TimerProc because it took too long to see all three keys
Timer cancelled
6797296 INJECTED   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
Press State Transition: 1 -> 0
6797328  Real KB   PRESS 0x53 S
6797343  Real KB RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6797390  Real KB RELEASE 0x53 S

[Dwedit]

In "Correct Operation" the real KB activity is:

6754328 SUPPRESSED  Real KB   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
6754453 SUPPRESSED  Real KB RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6754468  Real KB   PRESS 0x53 S
6754515  Real KB RELEASE 0x53 S

In "Fast Typing" the real KB activity is:

6797171 SUPPRESSED  Real KB   PRESS 0x5B VK_LWIN
6797328  Real KB   PRESS 0x53 S
6797343  Real KB RELEASE 0x5B VK_LWIN
6797390  Real KB RELEASE 0x53 S

That suggests that you really did press Left Window key + S? Timestamps say Left Windows Key was released on real keyboard after S became pressed.

[boromyr]

Here is the problem, I actually release Win before S, but the debug shows that Win is still pressed when I press S. I tried closing NCK and it doesn't happen anymore, I did repeated tests very quickly without issues. Is there some form of delay in the code or a timer?

[Dwedit]

If the debug log says S became pressed before Win Key became released, then that's what the operating system told it. That's a Win+S press. I can't do anything about that.

Even if the app were to take too long to process a key press, the keyboard events would still arrive in the correct order. I don't believe there is anything that would take longer than 1ms done in the keyboard hook or timer handler.

Are timers used? Yes. After Left Windows is pressed, a 100ms timer begins.
App is looking for a particular key sequence of Left Windows, Left Shift, F23. These would break the sequence:

• Any other key down
• Any key up
• 100ms timer expiring
  When sequence is broken, the suppressed keys get replayed.

In the log you posted:
Left Windows is pressed, key is suppressed (we're looking for Left shift), timer is started
125ms later, timer expires, and Left Windows press is injected
172ms after the keypress, real Left Windows Key is released.
But the injected key still happened in the correct order, so delaying it had no meaningful effect.

[boromyr]

Ok, I believe the problem has been resolved by lowering the timer to 10ms; I compiled the change and it hasn't occurred again. The next few days will give the final verdict, but it seems fine.

I noticed a problem that wasn't present in the first version of NCK; I believe it has appeared in the latest versions. If I hold down copilot/ctrl and press a key to execute a hotkey, for example ctrl + k, pressing k twice should send the same hotkey twice, but it sends k instead. In the video, you can see what happens if I hold down ctrl and press k multiple times in the first half, and in the second half, the behavior of the earlier versions.

20260219-2119-39.1056649.mp4

[Dwedit]

Just tried it in Notepad, I see new tabs appearing when holding down Copilot+N, and tabs closing while holding down Copilot+W.

Does the debug log ever show Right Ctrl being released too early?

[boromyr]

Yes, but I noticed that the problem is only with ctrl+k and I am in vscode, absurd. The debug clearly states that ctrl is released after K, but other toggle shortcuts work correctly. It's a minor and non-blocking bug, probably depends on vscode and not on NCK.
Anyway, I found a balance for the timer; at 30ms the problem reappeared, while at 20ms it seems to be the right middle ground.