How can I force an application to allow Alt+Tab?

[Jeff jackson]

Hello,

I'm replacing my normal windows shell, but it won't let me alt+tab in it for some reason. To get around this, I have a .bat that runs at startup that enables Windows Keys:

REG add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer /v NoWinKeys /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
 
REG add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer /v NoWinKeys /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f

Alas, it still doesn't work. Is there a way to force the alt-tab allowance?

I can CTRL-ALT-DEL to the Task manager, but any application running in the shell also re-focus and goes full screen. To try and get around this, I downloaded the Microsoft Application Compatibility Toolkit, recalling how I was able to use it to let me alt+tab out of Everquest back in the day when it wouldn't on WinXP. But I really have no idea how to use it.

Bottom line: on my system, if I open up an application, I can't alt tab. If I use task manager to try and switch between the programs, it immediately refocuses to the open app.

Any help is much appreciated,

-J