Copying multiple lines until pagebreak?

[9600bauds]

Hello everyone, I've been making a very basic AutoIt script to read a .txt file and paste it, page by page, into a certain Java application.

The files contain simple pages of text, several lines long. I made the script scan every single text line: If it contains only the characters "@np", which I use as a 'line break', it will turn the page, and if not, it will copy and then paste the line.

The code below has worked for me so far, but since the script pastes the text line by line, it's somewhat slow for long texts... I'm sure there must be a way to paste per whole page, but I haven't been able to figure it out. Any help?

#include <File.au3>
$file = FileOpen("C:\Myfile.txt", 0)
Sleep (3000) ; Gives me three seconds to switch to the app before starting. Should probably use a hotkey, but it works well enough for me!
While 1
$line = FileReadLine($file)
If @error Then ExitLoop
If $line=='@np' Then ; "@np" means a pagebreak, the script will click the "next page" button and continue.
MouseClick('left') ; Since "next page" button can vary in placement, I simply place my cursor on it when running the script.
Else
ClipPut($line)
Send("^v{ENTER}") ; If the line is not "@np", it will be pasted, line by line.
EndIf
Sleep (50) ; Although the script itself works fine without this sleep time, the app starts acting up if I don't wait 50 miliseconds between paste...
WEnd
FileClose($file)

Edit: Here is an example of a file that I use with the program, to clear up any confusion:

I do not like
green eggs and ham.
@np
I do not like them,
Sam-I-am.

Edited March 16, 2013 by 9600bauds

[kaotkbliss]

Just a quick idea

You could possibly do a FileRead() to get all the text into a single variable, then StringSplit() the variable using @np to give you an array of all pages.

Then all you need to do is loop through the array, pasting the pages.

[9600bauds]

Thanks! I managed to make some progress using StringSplit(), but sadly it doesn't work entirely right with longer files...

Splitting seems to really not like new lines, so at the start of nearly every page there is a completely blank line, and sometimes a page will be completely empty while the next one will contain two pages.

Here's what I've got so far.

#include <File.au3>
$file = FileOpen("C:\Test.txt", 0)
Sleep (3000)
$txt = FileRead($file)
$pageArray = StringSplit($txt, '@np', 1)
$totalPages = UBound($pageArray)
For $i = 1 to $totalPages-1
ClipPut($pageArray[$i])
Send("^v{ENTER}")
MouseClick('left')
Sleep(50)
Next
FileClose($file)

[Melba23]

9600bauds,

To eliminate the blank line at the start of each page, you need to include the line break in the StringSplit parameter - I am assuming you use @CRLF here:

$pageArray = StringSplit($txt, '@np' & @CRLF, 1)

You might also note that StringSplit returns the number of split elements in the [0] element so there is no need to use UBound to size the loop.

M23

[9600bauds]

Thanks a lot, everyone! I finally managed to get the script fully working!

It was being a little unconsistent, skipping some pages sometimes, but after a while of tinkering I realized I also had to also include the line break before my StringSplit parameter, otherwise all pages would have an extra linebreak at the end which didn't work well with the app's maximum character limit.

Again, thanks to you all! Here's my finished code.

#include <File.au3>

$file = FileOpen("C:\Myfile.txt", 0)
Sleep (3000)
$txt = FileRead($file)
$pageArray = StringSplit($txt, @CRLF & '@np' & @CRLF, 1)

For $i = 1 to $pageArray[0]
ClipPut($pageArray[$i])
Send("^v")
Sleep(50)
MouseClick('left')
Next

FileClose($file)

Edited March 16, 2013 by 9600bauds

[kaotkbliss]

interesting that you used ClipPut($pageArray[$i]) then Send("^v")

as you might be able to just simply

Send($pageArray[$i])

[9600bauds]

Ah! I used ClipPut because Send() tends to be a much less instantaneous solution.

By using faux copy-and-paste, each page is filled in as fast as possible, rather than "typed in"

Again, thanks for helping!