Using Java Robot to type text strings
The Java Robot class is very useful for automating various tasks that normally require user interaction. However, it lacks a rather simple but useful feature - it cannot type a string of text, just a single key code. I had to implement this when I worked on one of my projects and to my surprise an extensive googling session showed that quite a lot of people are looking for such functionality.
The SmartRobot class below extends the standard Java Robot class adding to "type(String text)" and a few other useful methods:
The code can be downloaded here
The SmartRobot class below extends the standard Java Robot class adding to "type(String text)" and a few other useful methods:
import java.awt.AWTException;
import java.awt.Robot;
import java.awt.event.KeyEvent;
public class SmartRobot extends Robot {
public SmartRobot() throws AWTException {
super();
}
public void keyType(int keyCode) {
keyPress(keyCode);
delay(50);
keyRelease(keyCode);
}
public void keyType(int keyCode, int keyCodeModifier) {
keyPress(keyCodeModifier);
keyPress(keyCode);
delay(50);
keyRelease(keyCode);
keyRelease(keyCodeModifier);
}
public void type(String text) {
String textUpper = text.toUpperCase();
for (int i=0; i<text.length(); ++i) {
typeChar(textUpper.charAt(i));
}
}
private void typeChar(char c) {
boolean shift = true;
int keyCode;
switch (c) {
case '~':
keyCode = (int)'`';
break;
case '!':
keyCode = (int)'1';
break;
case '@':
keyCode = (int)'2';
break;
case '#':
keyCode = (int)'3';
break;
case '$':
keyCode = (int)'4';
break;
case '%':
keyCode = (int)'5';
break;
case '^':
keyCode = (int)'6';
break;
case '&':
keyCode = (int)'7';
break;
case '*':
keyCode = (int)'8';
break;
case '(':
keyCode = (int)'9';
break;
case ')':
keyCode = (int)'0';
break;
case ':':
keyCode = (int)';';
break;
case '_':
keyCode = (int)'-';
break;
case '+':
keyCode = (int)'=';
break;
case '|':
keyCode = (int)'\\';
break;
// case '"':
// keyCode = (int)'\'';
// break;
case '?':
keyCode = (int)'/';
break;
case '{':
keyCode = (int)'[';
break;
case '}':
keyCode = (int)']';
break;
case '<':
keyCode = (int)',';
break;
case '>':
keyCode = (int)'.';
break;
default:
keyCode = (int)c;
shift = false;
}
if (shift)
keyType(keyCode, KeyEvent.VK_SHIFT);
else
keyType(keyCode);
}
private int charToKeyCode(char c) {
switch (c) {
case ':':
return ';';
}
return (int)c;
}
}
The code can be downloaded here
posted by Demiurg at
3:12 PM
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