Basic Setup and Example

This is my first blog; My first topic is Python with Autoit. Most of automation frameworks are now designed with Selenium and Java/Ruby/Python etc.

I picked up python where selenium where limitation is automating the windows object. But there is easy and alternative way to automate windows objects using python code with inherited autoit libraries.

Software Requirement:

    1. Install Python (with any suitable version) - https://www.python.org/downloads/

    2. PyCharm - https://www.jetbrains.com/pycharm/download/#section=windows OR

    3. Eclipse - http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/
    4. Install Autoit https://www.autoitscript.com/site/autoit/downloads/

How to Install:

There are two options we can use:

1.    Independent Autoit plugin for python(Pyautoit):

a.    Go to Python installed location and open the script folder where pip.exe are available (e.g. D:\Python36-32\Scripts)

b.    Open command prompt for above location and run

c.    pip install -U pyautoit 

d.    (page for reference : https://pypi.python.org/pypi/PyAutoIt/0.3

2.    Pywin32 package for Python:

a.    go to https://sourceforge.net/projects/pywin32/files/pywin32/Build%20220/ and download the correct version based on your Python version and install.

b.    or go to http://www.lfd.uci.edu/~gohlke/pythonlibs/ and download the correct version of whl file (e.g. pywin32‑220.1‑cp36‑cp36m‑win32.whl).

c.    Put the pywin32‑220.1‑cp36‑cp36m‑win32.whl file into script folder (e.g. D:\Python36-32\Scripts)

d.    run pip install pywin32‑220.1‑cp36‑cp36m‑win32.whl

e.    Once installation completed there is one pyfile in script folder with name pywin32_postinstall.py.

f.     Run the following command in (Path : where python.exe is present e.g. D:\Python36-32\)

g.    python.exe Scripts\pywin32_postinstall.py –install

h.    Other way to install the Pywin32 : use pip install pypiwin32 (in valid path e.g. D:\Python36-32\Scripts>pip install pypiwin32)

Basic Example

Example 1 (Independent Autoit Plugin Pyautoit)

import autoit

autoit.run("notepad.exe")
autoit.win_wait_active("[CLASS:Notepad]", 3)
autoit.control_send("[CLASS:Notepad]", "Edit1", "hello world{!}")
autoit.win_close("[CLASS:Notepad]")
autoit.control_click("Notepad", "[CLASS:Button; INSTANCE:2]")

Note:  The autoit commands all use lower_case_with_underscores rather than AutoItX's preferred CamelCase. Thus ControlSend becomes control_send, WinClose becomes win_close, etc.

Example 2 (Pywin32)

from win32com.client import Dispatch
Auto = Dispatch("AutoItX3.Control")
 
Auto.Run("notepad.exe",'',5)
Auto.WinWaitActive("Untitled - Notepad")
Auto.Send("This is some text.")
Auto.WinClose("Untitled - Notepad")
Auto.ControlClick("Notepad","Do&n't Save","[CLASS:Button; INSTANCE:2]" )

If Any issue opening Notepad please follow the below mentioned steps:

Open a command prompt window (cmd) as an administrator
Go to AutoItX directory (default on Windows 7 : cd C:\Program Files (x86)\AutoIt3\AutoItX\)
Type these two commands :
regsvr32.exe AutoItX3.dll
regsvr32.exe AutoItX3_x64.dll

Try the above code with following import

How to check installed plugins:

Go to Python installed location and open the script folder where pip.exe are availble (e.g. D:\Python36-32\Scripts) open Command Prompt

Run pip list

Advantages:

No need to write and call independent autoit scripts. all code will be in one language and easy to debug and modify.

THANKS