How to switch to an already running application using WinAppDriver (Python)

Question

I want to switch between MS Store and Chrome browser. how to switch applications using WinAppDriver?

I was looking into https://github.com/microsoft/WinAppDriver/issues/534, found a few suggestions in C# but unfortunately they are not working with python and updated appium/selenium.

Here is my code to connect to the Root

desired_caps = {}
desired_caps["app"]="Root"
session = webdriver.Remote(command_executor='http://127.0.0.1:4723', desired_capabilities= desired_caps)

print(session.current_window_handle)
#it prints current window handle

Next, I am trying to get all the handlers, which is returning Null,

windows = session.window_handles

Answer 1

I found a workaround, find your desired applications WindowHandle, then directly create session using extracted WindowHandle. Traversing from root is not worthy. I found a lot of people are complaining about how to switch I hope this will help a lot!

import win32gui

def findWindowHandle():
    handleList = []
    def findit(hwnd,ctx):
        if win32gui.GetWindowText(hwnd) == "Microsoft Store": # check the title
            handleList.append(hwnd)

    win32gui.EnumWindows(findit,None)
    return handleList

handle = hex(findWindowHandle()[0])
print(handle)


desired_caps = {}
desired_caps["appTopLevelWindow"] = handle
desired_caps["deviceName"]="WindowsPC"
desired_caps["platformName"]="Windows"
session = webdriver.Remote(command_executor='http://127.0.0.1:4723', desired_capabilities= desired_caps)