Sending Special Keys to the Current Application

Overview

You can use the Global.DoSendKeys action to send keypresses to the current application. Sometimes, you may need to send special control keys to the application (e.g., Page Down or CTRL + Key). This article explains how to do this.

Important

For web applications, use Navigator.DoSendKeys and HTMLObject.DoSendKeys. Both accept the same patterns listed below.

Special Characters

To send special characters, refer to the list available in the Windows API's SendKeys.Send function:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.windows.forms.sendkeys.send(v=vs.110).aspx

To specify characters that are not displayed when you press a key (such as ENTER or TAB), or keys that represent actions rather than literal characters, use the codes in the following table:

Key	Code
BACKSPACE	{BACKSPACE}, {BS}, or {BKSP}
BREAK	{BREAK}
CAPS LOCK	{CAPSLOCK}
DEL or DELETE	{DELETE} or
DOWN ARROW	{DOWN}
END	{END}
ENTER	{ENTER} or ~
ESC	{ESC}
HELP	{HELP}
HOME	{HOME}
INS or INSERT	{INSERT} or
LEFT ARROW	{LEFT}
NUM LOCK	{NUMLOCK}
PAGE DOWN	{PGDN}
PAGE UP	{PGUP}
PRINT SCREEN	{PRTSC} (reserved for future use)
RIGHT ARROW	{RIGHT}
SCROLL LOCK	{SCROLLLOCK}
TAB	{TAB}
UP ARROW	{UP}
F1	{F1}
F2	{F2}
F3	{F3}
F4	{F4}
F5	{F5}
F6	{F6}
F7	{F7}
F8	{F8}
F9	{F9}
F10	{F10}
F11	{F11}
F12	{F12}
F13	{F13}
F14	{F14}
F15	{F15}
F16	{F16}
Keypad add	{ADD}
Keypad subtract	{SUBTRACT}
Keypad multiply	{MULTIPLY}
Keypad divide	{DIVIDE}

The plus sign (+), caret (^), percent sign (%), tilde (~), and parentheses () have special meanings within SendKeys. To specify one of these characters, enclose it within braces ({}). For example, to specify the plus sign, use {+}. To specify brace characters, use {{} and {}}.

SHIFT, CTRL and ALT

To specify keys combined with a combination of the SHIFT, CTRL, and ALT keys, precede the key code with one or more of the following symbols:

Key	Code
SHIFT	+
CTRL	^
ALT	%

Example

In this example Rapise sends various key combinations to Windows Notepad.

Note: Global.DoSleep is used to slow down test execution and make the test steps visible.

RVL version

JavaScript version

// Launch notepad
Global.DoLaunch("notepad.exe");
// Set focus to notepad
ActivateNotepad();
Global.DoSleep(1000);
// Send text to the application
Global.DoSendKeys("Hello World!");
Global.DoSleep(1000);
// Select all text by passing CTRL+a key combination
Global.DoSendKeys("^a");
Global.DoSleep(1000);
// Send DELETE key
Global.DoSendKeys("{DEL}");
Global.DoSleep(1000);
// Send two lines of text
Global.DoSendKeys("First line{ENTER}Second line{ENTER}");
Global.DoSleep(1000);
// Send a series of characters with SHIFT key pressed
Global.DoSendKeys("+(abcdefg)");
Global.DoSleep(1000);
// Close notepad
Global.DoKillByPid();

To run RVL or JavaScript version of this example, place the following function in User.js.

function ActivateNotepad()
{
    var wnd = g_util.FindWindow("regex:.*", "Untitled - Notepad");
    if (wnd)
    {
        wnd.SetFocus();
    }
}

See Also

• How-Tos