Trying to use keyboard whilst text box is on screen

Question

In Visual Basic, I try to move 2 Picture Boxes in my pong game using my keyboard ( 'W' and 'S' keys and up and down arrows).

They won't move if there are any buttons or text boxes on the screen, however they will when I remove the the button/text box. I think it might have to do with being able to use the arrow keys to navigate between them but I don't know how exactly to stop that from happening.

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Answer 1

Using these events to move up, down,

Private Sub Form1_KeyDown(sender As Object, e As KeyEventArgs) Handles MyBase.KeyDown
    Select Case e.KeyCode
        Case Keys.Up
            moveUp()
            e.Handled = True
        Case Keys.Down
            moveDown()
            e.Handled = True
    End Select
End Sub

Private Sub Form1_PreviewKeyDown(sender As Object, e As PreviewKeyDownEventArgs)
    Select Case e.KeyCode
        Case Keys.Up
            moveUp()
        Case Keys.Down
            moveDown()
    End Select
End Sub

Private Sub Form1_KeyUp(sender As Object, e As KeyEventArgs) Handles MyBase.KeyUp
    Select Case e.KeyCode
        Case Keys.Up, Keys.Down
            stopMoving()
            e.Handled = True
    End Select
End Sub

Private Sub moveUp()
    Me.Text = "Moving Up"
End Sub
Private Sub moveDown()
    Me.Text = "Moving Down"
End Sub
Private Sub stopMoving()
    Me.Text = "Idle"
End Sub

you can also use the same events to handle up, down on the TextBoxes and Buttons. Add the handlers programmatically

Private Sub Form1_Load(sender As Object, e As EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load
    For Each c As Control In Me.Controls
        AddHandler c.KeyDown, AddressOf Form1_KeyDown
        AddHandler c.PreviewKeyDown, AddressOf Form1_PreviewKeyDown
        AddHandler c.KeyUp, AddressOf Form1_KeyUp
    Next
End Sub

Note: it will only add the handlers to controls directly on your form, not controls inside containers. Though, you can use an extension method to get all children, no matter how buried in containers. See https://stackoverflow.com/a/21388034/832052

Trying to use keyboard whilst text box is on screen

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