CODEWITHSUNDEEP
c#office-interop
Sai
Sai

Reputation: 712

Clearing/Emptying office clipboard using C# Interop

I am working on an application which on the click of a button will clear both the system clipboard and the office clipboard.

I have tried System.Windows.Forms.Clipboard.Clear() and the following

static class WinAPI
{
    [System.Runtime.InteropServices.DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
    static extern bool OpenClipboard(System.IntPtr WinHandle);
    [System.Runtime.InteropServices.DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
    static extern bool EmptyClipboard();
    [System.Runtime.InteropServices.DllImport("user32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
    static extern bool CloseClipboard();
    public static void ClearClipboard()
    {
        if (OpenClipboard(System.IntPtr.Zero))
        {
            EmptyClipboard();
            CloseClipboard();
        }
    }
}

Both of them seem clear only the system clipboard. Is there a way to extend this to office clipboard.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 3154

Answers (3)

Gary McGill
Gary McGill

Reputation: 27516

You could copy a single space to the clipboard, if the other methods are troublesome?

Upvotes: 2

Jeroen Mostert
Jeroen Mostert

Reputation: 28759

Per this question, the answer appears to be "no, not cleanly":

There has been no VBA support for manipulating the Office clipboard after Excel 2000. SendKeys is flaky, but it's the only way.

The "SendKeys" referred to is a "solution" where you send the necessary keystrokes or window messages -- assuming one is running, if not, you'll have to start one. There are also other ways to do that, like AutoIt. Unfortunately, all of these solutions are fragile and prone to break between versions of Office, because they rely on internal details of window names and appearances. Before you do this, make sure you're willing to accept the maintenance burden.

A better approach is probably telling whoever wants this application that it can't be done because Microsoft wants clipboard control to remain with the end user -- or, alternatively, that there already is a button for clearing the clipboard, and it exists in Office (Alt, H, FO shows it in my version). That doesn't always work, but when it does it saves you a ton of work.

Upvotes: 2

TheDanMan
TheDanMan

Reputation: 1826

You can try the solution presented here. It's meant for VBA but you can easily convert the code to C#.

Let me know if you need help.

Upvotes: 0

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