Question

I would like to know if it is possible to mute only a specific window. For example I have got Firefox open and two more windows. I want to mute everything related to Firefox but not the whole sound of my computer.

Is this possible? If so, how can it be done?

Answer 1

On Vista/Windows 7:
I expect there to be some API which can change the volume on a per process basis which the audiomanager uses. Should be relatively straight forward to use.

On XP
I don’t think there is any built in functionality for what you want to do. I recommend just not offering that feature on XP. But if you really want to, there are some hackish solutions:

• Usermode API hooking. Intercept the calls to audioapis with your own functions. These change the volume or manipulate the audiosignal so you get what you want. You need to do this differently for any of the several available audio-apis. I guess DirectSound and DirectShow are particularly annoying. And this requires injection of a dll into any process you want to manipulate. And this dll better not require the .net runtime. Search for IAT(import address table) or EAT(export address table) hooking.
• Kernel mode audio hooking. Write a driver which intercepts the audio in the kernel and changes it on a per process basis. No clue how to do that.

But as you can see both solutions aren’t good.