Visual Studio: How to stop breakpoint hit from stealing focus?

Solution 1:

This is finally fixed in VS2019. Go to Tools->Options->Debugging->General, down at the bottom is "Bring Visual Studio to the foreground when breaking in the debugger."
Just de-select it and you will no longer be interrupted while multitasking.

Solution 2:

This is a registry setting. See ForegroundLockTimeout at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc957208.aspx. Zero allows applications to steal focus. TweakUI sets this value to 200000 when "Prevent applications from stealing focus" is checked.

For more control, download the Tweak UI utility of Powertoys for Windows XP. In the "General" tab, select "Focus" and check "Prevent applications from stealing focus".

• Google search for ForegroundLockTimeout at http://www.google.com/search?q=ForegroundLockTimeout

• Bing search for Prevent applications from stealing focus at http://www.bing.com/search?q=Prevent+applications+from+stealing+focus

• Applications Stealing Focus on Windows XP at http://mycvs.org/archives/2004/11/16/applications-stealing-focus-on-windows-xp for screen capture of TweakUI.

• Please Don't Steal My Focus, Coding Horror, Jeff Atwood at http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2007/12/please-dont-steal-my-focus.html

  The strange thing is, there are provisions built into the operating system to protect us from badly written, focus stealing applications. The ForegroundLockTimeout registry setting is expressly designed to prevent applications from stealing focus from the user. The OS silently converts that inappropriate focus stealing behavior into friendlier, less invasive taskbar button flashing, which is the subject of the ForegroundFlashCount registry setting.

• How To Prevent Programs from Stealing Focus in Windows XP at http://www.howtodothings.com/computers-internet/how-to-prevent-programs-from-stealing-focus-in-windows-xp