Cocoa put window in the foreground

Question

I am building a Cocoa Mac application that runs in the background but has a main window.

To make it run in the background I've set "Application is background only" to "YES".

I built a system tray:

system tray

If you close the main window, you can re-open it by clicking "open".

I have however some issues with the layering of windows:

When I start the application, the main window opens however it appears in the background, behind any other windows or applications I have open at the time.
Clicking on "open" doesn't bring the window to the foreground. It opens it correctly if it was closed, however it stays behind any windows.
Clicking on preferences or about has the same issue. It opens the correct window but it appears behind any other windows.
On my main window there is a textfield. I can click on it, the cursor blinks as if I am ready to type. But when I type it actually types in some other background window! For example if I have TextWrangler open in the background, it will type there instead of the textfield...

Here is my code for handling the "open":

- (IBAction)show:(id)sender {
    [NSApp activateIgnoringOtherApps:YES];
    [window makeKeyAndOrderFront:sender];   
}

Note that IF I set "Application is background only" to "NO" (which means I have a dock icon appearing), then clicking on "open" brings the window to the foreground as expected. And typing in the textfield works as expected.

sidyll sidyll · Accepted Answer · 2011-12-12T18:39:52

Instead of background only, I think you want Application is agent (UIElement) set to YES. Background only is for application not intended to be visible for users.

Cocoa put window in the foreground

2 Answers