List all windows with win32gui

I'm trying to list all windows of Microsoft Windows 10 with Python and the win32gui module. The problem is that there are also processes listed that don't have a window in my understanding.

When I run this code with only Chrome and PyCharm open

import win32gui

def callback(hwnd, extra):
    if win32gui.IsWindowVisible(hwnd):
        print(f"window text: '{win32gui.GetWindowText(hwnd)}'")

win32gui.EnumWindows(callback, None)

It returns the this:

window text: ''
window text: ''
window text: 'PyCharm'
window text: 'Google Chrome'
window text: 'Einstellungen'
window text: ''
window text: 'Microsoft Store'
window text: 'Microsoft Store'
window text: 'Microsoft Text Input Application'
window text: ''
window text: ''
window text: ''
window text: ''
window text: ''
window text: 'Einstellungen'
window text: ''
window text: ''
window text: ''
window text: 'Program Manager'

I was looking into the GetWindowLong function but I was not able to find anything which would let me clearly differentiate a window.
I would be really thankful for any ideas.

When you enumerate the windows, you also get processes that do not have a window visible to the user. For example if you have a chrome window open, you'll get the handle for each child process as well.

From MSDN on IsWindowVisible()

If the specified window, its parent window, its parent's parent window, and so forth, have the WS_VISIBLE style, the return value is nonzero. Otherwise, the return value is zero.

Reference: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/winuser/nf-winuser-iswindowvisible

Depending on your use case, you have some options:

• You can use GetClientRect() (for work space) or GetWindowRect() (for total window space, including windows effects like drop shadow, etc) and check to see if the window actually occupies space on the screen.

See: http://timgolden.me.uk/pywin32-docs/win32gui__GetClientRect_meth.html (win32GUI Documentation) https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/winuser/nf-winuser-getclientrect (MSDN)

http://timgolden.me.uk/pywin32-docs/win32gui__GetWindowRect_meth.html (win32GUI Documentation) https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/winuser/nf-winuser-getwindowrect (MSDN)

• You can check the window style for the WS_CHILD flag or use GetParent() to see if a window is a child window, and exclude it if so. You may need to wrap the

See: http://timgolden.me.uk/pywin32-docs/win32gui__GetParent_meth.html (win32GUI Documentation) https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/winuser/nf-winuser-getparent (MSDN) https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/winmsg/window-styles (MSDN)

• You could simply check if the window's title has at least one character, this would allow you to have the HWND for child windows that are visible as well.