winbollocks

Originally located here: https://github.com/workturnedplay/winbollocks (unless you got it from a fork, try git remote -v to check)

winbollocks is a small Windows utility that I use on win11, it adds a couple of Win-key mouse gestures for window movement, resizing, and z-order control, independent of where the mouse cursor is inside the window.

It is designed to replicate common X11 / Wayland window-manager behaviors on Windows such as: winkey+LMB drag to move a window, winkey+RMB drag to resize, and winkey+MMB to send a window to back behind all others.

It was built with the help of AI (chatgpt 5.2 and 5.1Mini, Grok 4 and 4.1, Gemini 3 and 3.1 Pro), non-agentic via website/chat only. It works right now as stated below, but the code is a mess(for now) on purpose.

---

What it does

winbollocks installs low-level mouse and keyboard hooks and reacts only to a small, fixed set of input combinations. It also places an icon in the System Tray for quick configuration.

The following behaviors are implemented:

1. Win + Left Mouse Button (drag anywhere to move) While the Windows key (between Ctrl and Alt) is held down:

• Pressing and holding LMB over any point inside a window starts a manual move of that window.
• The window follows the mouse until LMB is released.
• The click does not need to be on the title bar.
• The click is not passed through to the target window.

2. Win + Right Mouse Button (drag anywhere to resize) While the Windows key is held down:

• Pressing and holding RMB over a window initiates a resize operation.
• The screen is divided into a 9-zone grid. Dragging from the edges or corners resizes the window in that specific direction.
• Dragging from the center zone resizes the window uniformly while respecting its initial aspect ratio.
• While resizing, a helpful green-on-black overlay appears on screen, displaying the live dimensions and pixel delta.

3. Win + Middle Mouse Button (send to back) While the Windows key is held:

• Pressing MMB over a window sends that window to the bottom of the z-order.
• The window is not activated. Focus is preserved.

4. Win + Shift + Middle Mouse Button (bring focused window to front) While the Windows key and Shift are held:

• Pressing MMB brings the currently focused window to the top of the z-order.
• This applies only to the focused window; non-focused windows are not affected.
• This is intended for windows that were previously sent to the back using Win + MMB and remain focused but partially obscured.

5. Start menu suppression for these gestures If any of the above Win-key mouse gestures occur:

• Releasing the Windows key does not open the Start menu.
• If no gesture occurs, releasing the Windows key behaves normally.
• This suppression applies only to gestures handled by winbollocks.

---

System Tray Configuration

Right-clicking the winbollocks icon in the system tray provides a few live toggles:

• Activate window when moved: Tries to bring the window into focus when you drag it (uses a thread-attaching focus method to bypass Windows' focus-stealing prevention).
• Fallback: Use Left Mouse Click to focus: If standard activation fails, it injects a physical LMB click to force focus. (Warning: this will click underlying UI elements where your cursor is).
• Rate-limit window moves: Throttles the move events to save CPU usage. It drops events that happen faster than ~10ms apart. This saves CPU but might feel slightly choppier.
• Log rate of moves: Logs telemetry about dropped vs. actual moves (only selectable if Rate-limiting is enabled).

---

Known Limitations

Interaction with elevated (Administrator) windows

When winbollocks is run without administrative privileges, it cannot reliably interact with windows that are running elevated (as Administrator). This is a Windows security boundary (UIPI).

• If a Win-key gesture is initiated over an elevated window, Windows blocks the hook. winbollocks will now detect this Integrity Level mismatch and display a Windows Notification (toast/balloon) warning you that access is denied.
• The program may miss the Win-key release event.
• Recovery: Pressing and releasing the Win key once more resets the internal state.
• Workaround: Running winbollocks with administrative privileges (via runasadmin.bat) avoids this limitation entirely.

Focusing limits: Bringing a window to the front (winkey+shift+MMB) only works on the currently focused window.

---

What it explicitly does not do

• It does not modify system keyboard mappings.
• It does not require administrator privileges (unless you want to manipulate admin windows like Task Manager's window).

The keyboard hook exists solely to track modifier key state (Win / Shift / Ctrl / Alt) and suppress Start menu activation after handled gestures (by swallowing the winkey_UP event and injecting a quick RShift tap). No other key combinations are acted upon.

---

Modifier handling rules

Window movement gestures are triggered only when:

• The Windows key is down
• No other modifiers are active (unless explicitly part of the gesture, like Shift for bringing to front)

This avoids accidental activation during unrelated system shortcuts.

---

Implementation notes (technical)

• Uses WH_MOUSE_LL and WH_KEYBOARD_LL.
• Includes an EVENT_SYSTEM_FOREGROUND hook via SetWinEventHook to track window integrity levels.
• Locks its own working set memory into RAM to prevent being paged out, ensuring zero-lag hook responses.
• Pins its hook processor to a Time Critical thread (THREAD_PRIORITY_TIME_CRITICAL) and High Priority process class.
• Window movement is performed via explicit position updates (SetWindowPos).
• No shell extensions or DLL injection are used.

---

Build

Requirements

You need go.exe of Go language to compile this code into a standalone exe. No internet required to compile, if you have Go already installed.

Compile into .exe

There are several batch scripts provided for convenience:

• build.bat: GUI-subsystem build (no console window, silent in background). Recommended for daily use.
• devbuild.bat: Standard build with a console window attached. Great for debugging and seeing real-time logs.
• run.bat: Wrapper to run the compiled executable safely.
• runasadmin.bat: Wrapper to request UAC elevation and run the executable as an Administrator (required to drag/resize Admin windows).

---

License

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0. See LICENSE for details.

---

Third-party code

This repository includes vendored third-party Go modules under the vendor/ directory so it can be built without internet access. Those components are licensed under their respective licenses.