How to click Menu Items without using x,y co-ordinates?

[Mayur]

Hi All,

I am trying to automate Window based application using AutoIt.

For Clicking Menu Items right now I am using MouseClick methods but i observed that its behaviour is different on different machines & different OS so for overcoming this problem can any one have solution to click Menu Items without x,y co-ordinates.

Thanks,

Mayur

[Melba23]

Mayur,

Welcome to the AutoIt forum.

Two ways I have automated menus:

1. If your app has accelerators (the underlined characters in the menus when you press Alt). You can use Send to open the menus initially and then either more accelerator keys to directly access the correct item, or a series of UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT as required to move the cursor as if it were your mouse doing the work.

2. Use the _GUICtrlMenu UDF to find out about the menu. This will eventually give you the actual screen positions of the various menu items so you can then hit them with your MouseClick.

Personally I would go for the first method if at all possible. I have found it a good idea to add a short Sleep between the Send commands to allow the app menu to adjust - if you go too fast it does not have time to open submenus, etc.

I hope this helps.

M23

[Mayur]

Mayur,

Welcome to the AutoIt forum.

Two ways I have automated menus:

1. If your app has accelerators (the underlined characters in the menus when you press Alt). You can use Send to open the menus initially and then either more accelerator keys to directly access the correct item, or a series of UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT as required to move the cursor as if it were your mouse doing the work.

2. Use the _GUICtrlMenu UDF to find out about the menu. This will eventually give you the actual screen positions of the various menu items so you can then hit them with your MouseClick.

Personally I would go for the first method if at all possible. I have found it a good idea to add a short Sleep between the Send commands to allow the app menu to adjust - if you go too fast it does not have time to open submenus, etc.

I hope this helps.

M23

Will you please explain first Method I didn't understand.

I tried second method but i am not able to get handle of menu because AutoIt Window Info doesnot recognises Menu Items.

I used first _GUICtrlNenu_GetMenu method first to get handle of Menu

& Then GUICtrlMenu_GetItemText this method returned blank.

Let me know Your Suggestions.

Thanks,

Mayur

[Melba23]

Mayur,

Many apps have "accelerator" keys to open menus. Open Notepad and press the "Alt" key - on my version I can see small underlines in the menu like this:

File Edit Format View Help

These are the "accelerator" keys for the menu - if you now press "f", the <File> menu opens and you can see that there are more underlined characters in the sub-menu. Once again you can action an item by pressing the "accelerator" key - like "u" for <Page Setup>. So you can Send the keys directly to the app and have the menu open.

Some apps do not have "accelerators" for all the submenu items, or even at all. In this case you might have to Send cursor keys to move to the correct item and then Send "Enter" to action it. To action the <Page Setup> item in Notepad this way would work something like this:

- Determine where the menu bar is situated on the GUI - convert this position to screen coordinates with _WinAPI_ClientToScreen.

- MouseClick on the menu bar to open it.

- Send down "Down" 5 times to get to the <Page Setup> item

- Send "Enter" to action it.

I hope that is clearer.

M23

P.S. When you reply please use the "Add Reply" button at the top and bottom of the page rather then the "Reply" button in the post itself. That way you do not get the contents of the previous post quoted in your reply and the whole thread becomes easier to read.

[Mayur]

Thanks for your help

It Worked.

[Zedna]

Also look at WinMenuSelectItem()