5ec457ea44
## Summary of the Pull Request **Regression:** PR #48683 changed Shortcut Guide from a process launched per invocation to a persistent background process. Before that change, every activation started a process and evaluated the current foreground app against the latest excluded-app settings. The excluded-app check remained in `Program.Main`, so after #48683 it ran only when the persistent process started. Excluded apps therefore stopped blocking later regular-hotkey and Windows-key-hold activations, and newly saved exclusions had no effect until the process was recycled. This PR restores the pre-#48683 excluded-app behavior by: - starting the persistent Shortcut Guide listener regardless of the startup foreground app; - evaluating the current foreground app against the latest excluded-app settings before each hidden-overlay activation; - applying the same gate to the regular hotkey and Windows-key-hold paths; and - preserving close and hold-surface promotion behavior when the overlay is already visible. ## PR Checklist - [x] Closes: #50030 - [ ] **Communication:** This regression was diagnosed from the issue and recent Shortcut Guide lifecycle changes; it has not yet been discussed with core contributors - [x] **Tests:** Added/updated and all pass - [x] **Localization:** N/A - no end-user-facing strings were added or changed - [x] **Dev docs:** N/A - no public behavior or developer contract changed - [x] **New binaries:** N/A - no binaries or projects were added - [x] **Documentation updated:** N/A - this is a regression fix restoring existing behavior ## Detailed Description of the Pull Request / Additional comments `src/modules/ShortcutGuide/ShortcutGuide.Ui/Program.cs` no longer exits at process startup when the then-foreground application is excluded. The background listener must remain available for later activations. `src/modules/ShortcutGuide/ShortcutGuide.Ui/ShortcutGuideXAML/App.xaml.cs` calls the existing native excluded-app helper for each activation while the overlay is hidden. That helper already reloads `settings.json` and rebuilds its excluded-app list on every call, so no watcher or cache is needed. The result is passed into `src/modules/ShortcutGuide/ShortcutGuide.Ui/Helpers/ShortcutGuideActivationPolicy.cs`, keeping the decision shared by both activation sources and directly testable. The check is intentionally skipped while the overlay is visible. This preserves the regular hotkey's ability to close its guide or take ownership of a guide opened by Windows-key hold. Suppression logging is generic and does not include application names, paths, window titles, or settings content. This is a regression fix rather than a new excluded-app feature or settings-schema change. ## Validation Steps Performed - Built `src/modules/ShortcutGuide/ShortcutGuide.UnitTests/ShortcutGuide.UnitTests.csproj` for x64 Release from the final rebased commit. - Ran the Shortcut Guide test executable: **48 passed, 0 failed, 0 skipped**. - Added cases covering: - regular-hotkey suppression over an excluded app; - Windows-key-hold suppression for taskbar indicators and the full guide; - closing a visible regular guide; and - promoting visible hold indicators with the regular hotkey. - Built a complete local x64 Release payload and confirmed its Runner launched the local Shortcut Guide process and handled open/close activation. Copilot-Session: 8271bded-18e8-474e-8e3b-addd71f67f50
Microsoft PowerToys
Microsoft PowerToys is a collection of utilities that help you customize Windows and streamline everyday tasks.
Installation · Documentation · Blog · Release notes
🔨 Utilities
PowerToys includes over 30 utilities to help you customize and optimize your Windows experience:
Advanced Paste
Always on Top
Awake
Color Picker
Command Not Found
Command Palette
Crop And Lock
Environment Variables
FancyZones
File Explorer Add-ons
File Locksmith
Grab And Move
Hosts File Editor
Image Resizer
Keyboard Manager
Light Switch
Mouse Utilities
Mouse Without Borders
New+
Peek
PowerDisplay
PowerRename
PowerToys Run
Quick Accent
Registry Preview
Screen Ruler
Shortcut Guide
Text Extractor
Workspaces
ZoomIt📦 Installation
For detailed installation instructions and system requirements, visit the installation docs.
But to get started quickly, choose one of the installation methods below:
Download the .exe file from GitHub
Go to the PowerToys GitHub releases, scroll down and select Assets to reveal the installation files, and choose the one that matches your architecture and install scope. For most devices, that would be x64 per-user.
Microsoft Store
You can easily install PowerToys from the Microsoft Store:
WinGet
Download PowerToys from [WinGet](https://github.com/microsoft/winget-cli#installing-the-client). Updating PowerToys via winget will respect the current PowerToys installation scope. To install PowerToys, run the following command from the command line / PowerShell:
- User scope installer (default)
winget install Microsoft.PowerToys -s winget
- Machine-wide scope installer
winget install --scope machine Microsoft.PowerToys -s winget
Other methods
There are [community driven install methods](https://learn.microsoft.com/windows/powertoys/install#community-driven-install-tools) such as Chocolatey and Scoop. If these are your preferred install solutions, you can find the install instructions there.
✨ What's new?
To see what's new, check out the release notes.
🛣️ Roadmap
We are planning some nice new features and improvements for the next releases – a brand-new Shortcut Guide experience, ensuring it's easier to find and install Command Palette extensions and so much more! Stay tuned for v0.100!
❤️ PowerToys Community
The PowerToys team is extremely grateful to have the support of an amazing active community. The work you do is incredibly important. PowerToys wouldn't be nearly what it is today without your help filing bugs, updating documentation, guiding the design, or writing features. We want to say thank you and take time to recognize your work. Your contributions and feedback improve PowerToys month after month!
Contributing
This project welcomes contributions of all types. Besides coding features / bug fixes, other ways to assist include spec writing, design, documentation, and finding bugs. We are excited to work with the power user community to build a set of tools for helping you get the most out of Windows. We ask that before you start work on a feature that you would like to contribute, please read our Contributor's Guide. We would be happy to work with you to figure out the best approach, provide guidance and mentorship throughout feature development, and help avoid any wasted or duplicate effort. Most contributions require you to agree to a Contributor License Agreement (CLA) declaring that you grant us the rights to use your contribution and that you have permission to do so. For guidance on developing for PowerToys, please read the developer docs for a detailed breakdown. This includes how to setup your computer to compile.
Code of conduct
This project has adopted the Microsoft Open Source Code of Conduct.
Privacy statement
The application logs basic diagnostic data (telemetry). For more privacy information and what we collect, see our PowerToys Data and Privacy documentation.