Struggling to improve script reliability

[ijourneaux]

I have been struggling to automate an existing application using AutoIt. I have switched to using all Control... type functions as the applcation is usually being run when the workstation is locked (learning experience on my part<grin>).

Unfortunately I am still having problems where the application doesn't seem to want to react to commands I am sending.

Here is a typical situation

Send a command

ControlSend($windowname, "", "[CLASS:Edit; INSTANCE:1]", $s_Filename)

; Wait for control of Save button. Save is Button2

Call("WaitForControl", $windowname, "&Save", "Button2", 200)

Wait for control is a function someone helped me with

Func WaitForControl($sTitle, $text, $sControlID, $iTimeout = 5, $Exit = 'True')
    Local $iTimer = TimerInit()
    
    While (ControlFocus($sTitle, $text, $sControlID) = 0)
        WriteToLogFile(@ScriptDir & $LogFileName, "Wait")
        if (TimerDiff($iTimer) / 1000) >= $iTimeout then 
            WriteToLogFile(@ScriptDir & $LogFileName, "Exit without Focus")
            if($exit = "True") then
                $rc = _INetSmtpMailCom($SmtpServer, $FromName, $FromAddress,  $FromAddress, "IFM Report " & $FileName & " did not print!", "", "", $CcAddress, $BccAddress, $Importance, $Username, $Password, $IPPort, $ssl)
                $hWnd = WinGetHandle("InfoStore Client")
                _ScreenCapture_CaptureWnd (@ScriptDir & "\CurrentScreen_" & @hour & ".jpg", $hWnd)
                ProcessClose ("InfoStore.exe")
                Exit
            EndIf
            ExitLoop
        EndIf   
        Sleep(5000)     
        WriteToLogFile(@ScriptDir & $LogFileName, "Activate - " & $sTitle)  
        If (TimerDiff($iTimer) / 1000) >= $iTimeout/2 Then WinActivate($sTitle, $text)
    
     WEnd
    WriteToLogFile(@ScriptDir & $LogFileName, "Title = " & $sTitle)
    Sleep(3000)
     return 1
EndFunc

25% or more of the time, I never get focus on the control so the script stops.

I have toyed with loops like

Do
    Sleep(1000)
while (WinMenuSelectItem("InfoStore Client", "", "&View", "&Graphs", "SENA Scrolling &3D") = 0)

but it seems clumsy if I also include a loop counter so that I don't get stuck in the do loop. Is there a resource of best practices? Thanks

[MvGulik]

Just trying to eliminate/clear-up something.

Is that 25% independent of the used control's. (same control will both work and fail.)

Or 25% of the used control's fail. (same control will always work or always fails.)

[ijourneaux]

At this point, the two places where are see failures are related (althouhg 75% of the time the scrip executes fine) are when I execute a make a call to WinMenuSelectItem. I may have others but for now those are the ones that fail some of the time.

Before I make the call to WinMenuSelectItem, I check to see if I have control of the window, call WinMenuSelectItem with the appropriate choices then wait until I can get control of one of the controls that appears as a result of the call to WinMenuSelectItem.

At this point I have added a loop to make sure the control appears and if not I try the WinMenuSelectItem again. After a number of failed attempts, I exit the script.

Relatively speaking, this is a fairly simple application. This is a standalong box, with no chance of other appliciation or users getting in the way. The results of the individual commands are simple. This shoudn't be difficult so I must be missing something obvious.

[MvGulik]

Mmm, a WinMenu problem.

I don't think I can help here.

1) Its been a long time I did some coding with them.

2) I also did had some problem with them, but you already seems to have bypassed those timing problems.

[ijourneaux]

Mmm, a WinMenu problem.

I don't think I can help here.

1) Its been a long time I did some coding with them.

2) I also did had some problem with them, but you already seems to have bypassed those timing problems.

It was just over night last night that I noticed the failures were coming on WinMenu. There are two places in the script where I use WinMenu and the script failed atleast once at each location.

Is there an issue with WinMenu and a locked workstation? The problem is that it seems to work some of the time.

Thanks for trying though. Hoefully someone else will have some insight.