AutoIt

AutoIt

Developer(s)	Jonathan Bennett & AutoIt Team
Initial release	January 1999
Stable release	3.3.8.1 / January 29, 2012; 3 months ago (2012-01-29)[1]
Operating system	Microsoft Windows
Type	GUI Scripting language Automation
License	Freeware closed source
Website	www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/

AutoIt (pronounced aw-tow-it)^[2] is a freeware automation language for Microsoft Windows. In its earliest release, the software was primarily intended to create automation scripts (sometimes called macros) for Microsoft Windows programs^[3] but has since grown to include enhancements in both programming language design and overall functionality.

With the release of Version 3, the syntax of AutoIt has been restructured to be more like the BASIC family of languages. It is a third-generation programming language using a classical data model, utilizing a variant data type that can store several types of data, including arrays. It is compatible with Windows 95, 98, ME, NT4, 2000, XP, 2003, Vista and Windows 7 (however, support for operating systems older than Windows 2000 was discontinued with the release of v3.3.0).

An AutoIt automation script can be compiled into a compressed, stand-alone executable which can be run on computers that do not have the AutoIt interpreter installed. A wide range of function libraries (known as UDF's, or "User Defined Functions")^[4] are also included as standard or are available from the website to add specialized functionality. AutoIt is also distributed with an IDE based on the free SciTE editor. The compiler and help text are fully integrated and provide a de facto standard environment for developers using AutoIt.

Features

The AutoIt SciTE editor.

• Scripting language with BASIC-like structure for Windows Desktop Environment.
• Add-on libraries and modules for specific applications.
• On-line support forum for AutoIt users and developers.
• Supports TCP and UDP protocols.
• Supports COM (component object modelling) objects.
• Call functions in Win32 DLLs.
• Run console applications and access the standard streams.
• Include files in the compiled file to be extracted when run.
• GUI interfaces, create message and input boxes.
• Play sounds, pause, resume, stop, seek, get the current position of the sound and get the length of the sound.
• Simulate mouse movements.
• Manipulate windows and processes.
• Automate sending user input and keystrokes to applications, as well as to individual controls within an application.
• Scripts can be compiled into standalone executables.
• Unicode support from version 3.2.4.0.
• 64-bit code support from version 3.2.10.0.
• Supports regular expressions.
• Works with Windows Vista's User Account Control.
• Object oriented design through library^[5]

Limitations

• AutoIt is single threaded which makes asynchronous programming, concurrency and parallelism (e.g. communications applications) extremely difficult.

(This can be worked around through the use of such things as multiple processes, Component Object Model etc. but it would be much less onerous if a multithreading API was provided for use within the language itself or its libraries.)

• AutoIt applications sometimes get a false positive report from virus scanners using heuristics, because the application is a self extracting executable.

Usage

AutoIt can be used to produce utility software for Microsoft Windows and automate common tasks, such as website monitoring, network monitoring, disk defragging and backup. It is also used to simulate application users, whereby an application is driven by an AutoIt script in place of manual application control during software testing. It is also commonly used for developing Computer game bots, for automating in-game tasks, although the AutoIt community will not give support for such automation.

Examples

Hello world

; Displays "Hello, world!" in a MsgBox and exits.
MsgBox(0, "Title", "Hello, world!")
Exit

Find Average

;Finds the average of numbers specified by a user.
;The numbers must be delimited by commas.
#NoTrayIcon
#include <GUIConstantsEx.au3>
#include <Array.au3>
 
;region---------------GUI-----------------------
$form = GUICreate("Average Finder", 300, 100)
$label = GUICtrlCreateLabel("Enter the numbers to be averaged separated by commas", 19, 0)
$textbox = GUICtrlCreateInput("", 20, 20, 220)
$label1 = GUICtrlCreateLabel("=", 245, 20, 30, 20)
$ansLabel = GUICtrlCreateLabel("", 255, 20, 50, 20)
$button = GUICtrlCreateButton("Find Average", 100, 40)
GUISetState()
;endregion---------------END GUI-----------------------
 
While 1
        $msg = GUIGetMsg()
        Switch $msg
                Case $GUI_EVENT_CLOSE
                        Exit
                Case $button
                        $answer = _findAvg(GUICtrlRead($textbox))
                        If $answer Then
                                GUICtrlSetData($ansLabel,$answer)
                        Else
                                GUICtrlSetData($ansLabel,"Error. Malformed input.")
                        EndIf
        EndSwitch
WEnd
 
Func _findAvg($nums)
        Local $sData
        Local $ans
        ;Clean up input ----------------->
        $chk = StringRight($nums, 5)
        If $chk = "," Then $nums = StringTrimRight($nums, 1)
        If StringInStr($nums, ",") < 1 Then
                Return False
        EndIf
        ;---------------------------------->
        $sData = StringSplit($nums, ",")
        $ans = 0
        For $i = 1 To $sData[0]
                $ans += $sData[$i]
        Next
        $ans = $ans / $sData[0]
        Return floor($ans)
EndFunc   ;==>_findAvg

History

• December 1998 - Idea of C program that should send keystrokes
• January 1999 - First AutoIt Version (1.0)
• August 1999 - AutoIt v2 and AutoItX
• September 1999 - First AutoIt version with Compiler
• December 2002 - AutoIt v3 (Public Beta)
• February 2004 - AutoIt v3 (Stable)
• September 2006 - Auto3Lib started
• November 2007 - AutoIt v3.2.10.0 released, Auto3Lib incorporated into AutoIt v3
• May 2008 - AutoIt v3.2.12.0 released, incorporating added GUI functionality
• December 2008 - AutoIt (and AutoItX) v3.3.0.0 released
• December 2009 - AutoIt v3.3.2.0 released
• January 2010 - AutoIt v3.3.4.0 released
• March 2010 - AutoIt v3.3.6.0 released
• April 2010 - AutoIt v3.3.6.1 released
• December 2011 - AutoIt v3.3.8.0 released
• January 2012 - AutoIt v3.3.8.1 released

The developers of AutoIt originally released the source code under the GPL license but the practice was discontinued beginning with version 3.2.0 in August 2006. Some of the code from version 3.1 was used to create a fork by the AutoHotkey project,^[6] where now the community is continuing to develop the code as GPL.

Notes and references

See also

• AutoHotkey
• Macro Express
• Automator (for Macintosh)
• KiXtart
• iMacros
• thinBasic
• Visual Basic
• Winbatch
• Expect

External links

• Official Homepage