Windows Key Mapper

A program that allows users to create a set of keyboard shortcuts that map to the key codes of their choice.

This program currently supports Windows only. In the future, MacOSX/Linux support may be added.

Building

To build the program, you must have a version of the MSVC toolchain installed. You can build using the Visual Studio CLI tools directly, or you can use CMake.

Building with CMake

cd WindowsKeyMapper
cmake . -B cmake-build
cmake --build cmake-build

Building with cl.exe

Open a Developer Command Prompt, or load the appropriate environment variables.

cd WindowsKeyMapper
mkdir build && cd build
cl.exe /EHsc /W4 /WX ../src/WindowsKeyMapper.cpp user32.lib

Usage

You can run the program directly, or put it in your startup folder so that it starts automatically whenever you log in.

To run the program directly, invoke the executable:

cd WindowsKeyMapper/build
./WindowsKeyMapper.exe

To run the program whenever you log in, move it to your startup folder:
move WindowsKeyMapper.exe "%ProgramData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup"

Adding shortcuts

Currently, the shortcuts are hard-coded into the file WindowsKeyMapper.cpp.

Custom shortcut mappings are represented as MappedKeyboardShortcut objects, which define the custom shortcut as one or more modifier keys in combination with a virtual key code. The function getCustomShortcuts() creates the list of shortcuts to be used.

To add a custom shortcut, you will need to add a shortcut object to the vector defined in getCustomShortcuts():

static const std::vector<MappedKeyboardShortcut> shortcuts = {
    // Maps 'ctrl+shift+P' to media play/pause
    {
        1,                          // an arbitrary unique ID for the shortcut
        0x50,                       // the key code that is used for the shortcut
        MOD_CONTROL | MOD_SHIFT,    // a combination of the modifiers are used for the shortcut
        VK_MEDIA_PLAY_PAUSE         // the key code that should be triggered by the shortcut
    },
    // Add new shortcuts to the initializer list here...
};