add a generally usable key listener

Registered by RaiMan

*** created from question https://answers.launchpad.net/sikuli/+question/162577 comment #4
*** posted by FritzzoD https://launchpad.net/~fritzzod
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Yes, please add this feature high-priority. Poster Robert here is on the ball when he asks this question and says "make it just so much powerful if it could listen to keys". Indeed this, these basic features being present, is what will get me to download Sikuli, develop in it, and promote it.

For, do you realize that there seems to be NO cross-platform software to do just general keyboard macro automation? --other than http://www.ironahk.net/ and that site is full of broken links and it would seem development has stopped. And another commercial product I found recently, which also does similar visual recognition BTW, but that requires running your apps thru VNC and is not free & open-source --big drawbacks).

So I hope the developers of Sikuli are not so in love with their cute visual recognition to forget to go back to basics when it comes to desktop automation and include a good keyboard listener.

Yeah, it's nice that Sikuli can visually recognize buttons & such on the screen (indeed that may certainly help to be cross-platform, as every platform & desktop has a different windows API), but, if there is a choice, enough work on that already! Leading alternative http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AutoHotkey has none of that fancy stuff, yet has been a workhorse for years, indeed is the leading open-source solution on Windows, as starting from square-1, it has a good keyboard listener.

And even though graphical recognition is impressive, truthfully it seems much more important that Sikuli is using a major respectable programming language (Python, light-years ahead of the messy one-of-a-kind hack of a language Authhotkey uses, but, on Windows, if you want open-source keyboard automation, that's the only real choice); and plus VERY notable is that Sikuli is cross-platform (which almost no keyboard/macro automation software is).

And if Sikuli just had a keyboard listener (which should be MUCH easier that graphic recognition, and if in doubt, just copy Autohotkey), plus (if it doesn't have these already) the ability to input & output thru shell calls (as calling curl/wget) and save & load & manipulate the clipboard (including WYSIWYG HTML), then you've got yourself a winner! Hundreds of Autohotkey coders (as myself) would likely come flocking over to Sikuli, and that's just from the Windows side.

Blueprint information

Status:
Complete
Approver:
None
Priority:
Undefined
Drafter:
None
Direction:
Approved
Assignee:
None
Definition:
New
Series goal:
None
Implementation:
Implemented
Milestone target:
milestone icon x1.0-rc3
Started by
Tsung-Hsiang Chang
Completed by
Tsung-Hsiang Chang

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