Using AutoItX3 in C#

Question

[quote name='Outshynd']
I wrote this for another forum but I figured I'd post it here as well.  Hopefully it'll help some poor, lost soul.


C# is a much faster and more complete language than AutoIt.  That said, it's also far more difficult to do simple tasks that AutoIt does quite well.  You have to write your own MouseMove functions, your own WinActivate functions, your own everything functions (nearly).  This is because AutoIt is a Windows automation tool and C# is an actual programming language.  Well, can we have the best of both worlds?  Sure.

This describes how to add AutoItX (the AutoIt COM Library DLL) to your C# (or other .NET) project and then execute a few simple instructions.

[img]http://www.shynd.com/images/au1.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.shynd.com/images/au2.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.shynd.com/images/au3.jpg[/img]

[url="http://www.nomorepasting.com/paste.php?pasteID=72980"]http://www.nomorepasting.com/paste.php?pasteID=72980[/url]
[code]using System;
using System.Threading;

namespace AutoItXTest
{
    class Program
    {
        static AutoItX3Lib.AutoItX3Class au3;            //our au3 class that gives us au3 functionality
        static Thread thread;                            //our thread
        static bool threadshouldexecute = true;            //only execute thread 2 while this equals true
        static int i = 0;                                //our incrementer

        /// <summary>
        /// The entry point, or main thread / main loop, of our program
        /// </summary>
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            au3 = new AutoItX3Lib.AutoItX3Class();                                //initialize our au3 class library

            au3.AutoItSetOption("WinTitleMatchMode", 4);                        //advanced window matching

            thread = new Thread(new ThreadStart(threadtest));                    //initialize and start our thread
            thread.Start();

            if (au3.WinExists("Untitled - Notepad", "") == 0)                    //if an Untitled - Notepad document doesn't exist
                au3.Run(@"C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\notepad.exe", "", au3.SW_SHOW);    //run notepad
            else
                au3.WinActivate("Untitled - Notepad", "");                        //otherwise activate the window

            string hWnd = "";                                                    //let's use a window handle

            while (hWnd.Length == 0)                                            //try to get a handle to notepad until it succeeds
                hWnd = au3.WinGetHandle("Untitled - Notepad", "");

            while (au3.WinActive("handle=" + hWnd, "") == 0)                    //loop while it's not active
            {
                au3.WinActivate("handle=" + hWnd, "");                            //and activate it
                Thread.Sleep(100);
            }

            while (au3.WinExists("handle=" + hWnd, "") != 0)                    //while the window exists, loop
            {
                //send our incrementing variable, i, to notepad, with a trailing |
                au3.ControlSend("handle=" + hWnd, "", "Edit1", i.ToString() + "|", 0);

                i++;                                                            //increment i

                Thread.Sleep(100);                                                //short sleep so we don't burn CPU
            }

            //if the while loop exited--because there's no Untitled - Notepad--make the other thread stop executing
            threadshouldexecute = false;

            Console.Write("Press [ENTER] to continue...");                        //tell the user to press ENTER to quit
            Console.ReadLine();                                                    //pause until enter is pressed
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// our void function to execute thread #2
        /// </summary>
        static void threadtest()
        {
            while (threadshouldexecute)                                //loop while this thread should execute
            {
                au3.ToolTip("Thread 2\ni: " + i.ToString(), 0, 0);    //display a tooltip with the incrementing variable i in it

                Thread.Sleep(50);                                    //sleep to free up CPU
            }

            au3.ToolTip("", 0, 0);                                    //clear the tooltip after loop is done
        }
    }
}[/code]
[/quote]