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copied!<p>Setting the TopMost property (or adding the WS_EX_TOPMOST style to a window) does not make it unique in the system. Any number of topmost windows may be created by any number of applications; the only guarantee is that all topmost windows will be drawn 'above' all non-topmost windows. If there are two or more topmost windows, the Z-order still applies. From your description, I suspect that flash.exe is also creating a topmost window.</p> <p>Aside from periodically forcing your window to the top of the Z-order, I think there is little you can do. Be warned, however, that this approach is dangerous: if two or more windows are simultaneously trying to force themselves to the top of the Z-order, the result will be a flickering mess that the user will likely have to use the task manager to escape.</p> <p>I recommend that your program not attempt to meddle with other processes on the computer (unless that is its explicit purpose, e.g. a task manager clone). The computer belongs to the user, and he may not value your program more highly than all others.</p> <p><strong>Addendum:</strong></p> <p>For the emergency situation described in the comments, I would look at possible solutions along these lines:</p> <ol> <li><p>How does the third party application normally get started and stopped? Am I permitted to close it the same way? If it is a service, the <a href="http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms685150(VS.85).aspx" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Service Control Manager</a> can stop it. If it is a regular application, sending an escape keystroke (with <a href="http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms646310(VS.85).aspx" rel="nofollow noreferrer">SendInput()</a> perhaps) or <a href="http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms632617(VS.85).aspx" rel="nofollow noreferrer">WM_CLOSE</a> message to its main window may work.</p></li> <li><p>If I can't close it nicely, am I permitted to kill it? If so, <a href="http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms686714(VS.85).aspx" rel="nofollow noreferrer">TerminateProcess()</a> should work.</p></li> <li><p>If I absolutely have to leave the other process running, I would try to see if I can programmatically invoke fast user switching to take me to a different session (in which there will be no competing topmost windows). I don't know where in the API to start with this one. (Peter Ruderman suggests <a href="http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms686347(VS.85).aspx" rel="nofollow noreferrer">SwitchDesktop()</a> for this purpose in his answer.)</p></li> </ol>

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