Xinput

I have been looking into a way of getting more out of my 360 controller by writing somekind of app and it turns out that in the October release of the DirectX SDK there was an addition called Xinput that allows added functionality specifically for common controllers (at the mo that means the 360 controller).

Xinput allows a programmer to receive input from the controller and to output to the two rumble devices inside the controller. With this Microsoft is giving a big helping hand to developers. It even has events in for when the controller is unplugged or not detects. Plus it can address upto four controllers. This is exactly what I was looking for.

And I found this in the FAQ:

How do I disable ALT+TAB and other task switching?
You don't!

So there you have it, Alt-TAB should always be supported. Can't think of any games that disable it at the mo, but they do exist.

UPDATE: The documentation isn't detailed, all the samples are in C++, nothing will compile and I don't seem to be able to find the correct DLL to write an application. So not exactly the best of starts.