Obtaining information about the application that owns the active window

Question

I am sure it's something easy, and I am not looking to the right documentation.

I need to get information about the application that handles the active window. The code I need to write needs to intercept some custom gestures, and return to the application an event that depends from the application itself.

Answer 1

There's the NSWorkspace class from which you can get a dictionary with information about the activeApplication. That application usually owns the "key" window.

Edit: For apps targeting 10.6 or later, activeApplication is deprecated. Here's the new way to go:

NSRunningApplication *activeApplication = nil;
for (NSRunningApplication *app in [[NSWorkspace sharedWorkspace] runningApplications]) {
    if (app.active) {
        activeApplication = app;
        break;
    }
}