Is there any way to use key codes with Send?

[Loduwijk]

I am wondering if there is any way to tell the Send function to send a keystroke for the key specified by a certain keycode, similar to the way you can specify ASCII codes.

I am using the AutoIt DLL in VB to make a program that I can use to control any of the computers on my network from any of the other computers on it. I am simply using the main form's KeyDown event to send the keystrokes across the network to the other computer's running instance of the program which will then execute the same keystroke. The KeyDown event obviously specifies the key code to the key pressed.

So basically, what I'm looking to do is something like Send("{KEYCODE N}"), where N is the keycode from 0 to 255, so that I can execute a variable keystroke.

If there's no way to do this, I'll just have to write a function that takes a keycode and generates the text string required to pass to Send. It would be nice if there's a way to just specify a variable keycode though.

Thanks ahead of time.

Edited September 16, 2006 by Loduwijk

[marfdaman]

From the helpfile:

  Quote

To send the ASCII value A (same as pressing ALT+065 on the numeric keypad)

Send("{ASC 065}")

(When using 2 digit ASCII codes you must use a leading 0, otherwise an obsolete 437 code page is used).

[Loduwijk]

Thank you, but I am looking to use key codes, not ascii codes. I said that, but perhaps the way I said so wasn't clear enough.

Where an ASCII code is the way a character is represented in memory on on disk, a key code is the representation of the key you press to perform a certain action.

For example, the ASCII code for "a" is 97, but the key code 97 is for the "1" on the numpad. Every key on the keyboard has assigned its own keycode, even the keys which have nothing to do with ASCII, such as the arrow keys (Left, up, right, down being key codes 37, 38, 39 and 40, respectively, whereas those ASCII numbers are for &, ', ( and )).

I hope that clears it up, though I am doubting now that AutoIt supports key codes, which would be odd since key codes have more to do with sending window messages than ASCII does.

[Loduwijk]

I decided to just go ahead and make a function to convert a keycode into an appropriate text string for use with Send. I thought I'd post it here in case anyone else searches the forum for posts on the same topic like I did before I posted. I might as well save them some time.

This is Visual Basic code to convert a keyboard keycode into a text string representative of AutoIt's Send function's required text string.

I left shift, alt and ctrl out on purpose because I handle them seperately in my program, but you can easily add them in too. The key codes for shift, ctrl and alt, respectively, are 16, 17 and 18.

(There, I just editted that code to use a case structure instead. 'Twas silly of me to just use a huge tree of if statements.)

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Private Function KeyCode2Char(KeyCode As Integer) As String
Select Case KeyCode
Case 8
 KeyCode2Char = "{backspace}"
Case 9
 KeyCode2Char = "{tab}"
Case 13
 KeyCode2Char = "{enter}"
Case 20
 KeyCode2Char = "{capslock toggle}"
Case 32
 KeyCode2Char = "{space}"
Case 33
 KeyCode2Char = "{pgup}"
Case 34
 KeyCode2Char = "{pgdn}"
Case 35
 KeyCode2Char = "{end}"
Case 36
 KeyCode2Char = "{home}"
Case 37
 KeyCode2Char = "{left}"
Case 38
 KeyCode2Char = "{up}"
Case 39
 KeyCode2Char = "{right}"
Case 40
 KeyCode2Char = "{down}"
Case 45
 KeyCode2Char = "{ins}"
Case 46
 KeyCode2Char = "{del}"
Case 106
 KeyCode2Char = "{numpadmult}"
Case 107
 KeyCode2Char = "{numpadadd}"
Case 109
 KeyCode2Char = "{numpadsub}"
Case 110
 KeyCode2Char = "{numpaddot}"
Case 111
 KeyCode2Char = "{numpaddiv}"
Case 144
 KeyCode2Char = "{numlock toggle}"
Case 145
 KeyCode2Char = "{scrolllock toggle}"
Case 186
 KeyCode2Char = ";"
Case 187
 KeyCode2Char = "="
Case 188
 KeyCode2Char = ","
Case 189
 KeyCode2Char = "-"
Case 190
 KeyCode2Char = "."
Case 191
 KeyCode2Char = "/"
Case 192
 KeyCode2Char = "`"
Case 219
 KeyCode2Char = "{"
Case 220
 KeyCode2Char = "\"
Case 221
 KeyCode2Char = "}"
Case 222
 KeyCode2Char = "'"
Case Else
 If KeyCode >= 48 And KeyCode <= 57 Then KeyCode2Char = KeyCode - 48
 If KeyCode >= 65 And KeyCode <= 90 Then KeyCode2Char = Chr(KeyCode + 32)
 If KeyCode >= 96 And KeyCode <= 105 Then KeyCode2Char = "{numpad" & KeyCode - 96 & "}"
 If KeyCode >= 112 And KeyCode <= 123 Then KeyCode2Char = "{F" & KeyCode - 111 & "}"
End Select
End Function

Edited September 17, 2006 by Loduwijk