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AHK_X11

AutoHotkey for Linux.

MsgBox

MsgBox, AHK_X11 (*)

AutoHotkey is "Powerful. Easy to learn. The ultimate automation scripting language for Windows.". This project tries to bring large parts of that to Linux. This README mostly tells you about the differences between Win AHK and AHK_X11. If you have no prior experience with AutoHotkey, read the docs tailored to this project.

Still, here is a brief peek at the syntax. (click the arrows)

  • Hotkeys and Hotstrings 
    ; hotstrings - expand 'btw' to 'By the way' as you type
::btw::By the way

; hotkeys - press winkey-z to go to Google
#z::Run http://google.com
  • Modify clipboard 
    ; copy text to the clipboard, modify it, paste it back
^+k:: ; ctrl-shift-k
ClipSave = %Clipboard% ; store current clipboard
Clipboard = ; clear the clipboard
Send ^c ; copy selected text
ClipWait, 1 ; wait up to a second for content
; wrap it in html-tags
Clipboard = <i>%Clipboard%</i>
Send ^v ; paste
Sleep 500 ; wait for OS to complete paste
Clipboard = ClipSave ; restore old clipboard content
ClipSave = ; clear variable
Return
  • GUIs 
    ; Easy to make GUIs
Gui, Add, Text,, Enter your name
Gui, Add, Edit, w150 vName
Gui, Add, Button, gSayHello, OK
Gui, Show
Return

SayHello:
Gui, Submit, NoHide
MsgBox Hello %Name%
ExitApp
  • Window management 
    ^!n::  ; Ctrl+Alt+N
IfWinExist, Firefox
{
    WinActivate
    WinWaitActive
    width = %A_ScreenWidth%
    width /= 2
    WinMove, , , 0, 0, %width%, 300
}
  • User interaction 
    ; Yes/No with Question icon
MsgBox, 36, , Continue?
IfMsgBox, No
    ExitApp
InputBox, output, , Say something
TrayTip, You said:, %output%
  • Pseudo Arrays 
    ; Pseudo Arrays
Colors = Red,Green,Blue
StringSplit, ColorArray, Colors, `,
Loop, %ColorArray0%
{
    StringTrimLeft, this_color, ColorArray%a_index%, 0
    MsgBox, Color %A_Index% = %this_color%
}

    As can be seen from the code sample, array logic isn't particularly great with classic AHK syntax, but it works.

AHK_X11 is a very basic but functional reimplementation AutoHotkey v1.0.24 (2004) for Unix-like systems with an X window system (X11), written from ground up in Crystal, with the eventual goal of 80% feature parity, but most likely never full compatibility. Currently about 80% of work of getting there is done, but even at 100%, because of the old version of the spec (at least for now), many modern AHK features are missing, especially advanced expressions and functions (x := y(z), % v), classes, and objects, so you probably can't just port your scripts from Windows. More to read: Project goals

This AHK is shipped as a single executable native binary with very low resource overhead and fast execution time. You can use AHK_X11 to create stand-alone binaries with no dependencies, including full functionality like Hotkeys and GUIs. (just like on Windows)

Please also check out Keysharp, a WIP fork of IronAHK, another complete rewrite of AutoHotkey in C# that tries to be compatible with multiple OSes and support modern, v2-like AHK syntax with much more features than this one. In comparison, AHK_X11 is a lot less ambitious and more compact, and Linux only.

Features:

  • Hotkeys
  • Hotstrings
  • Key remappings
  • Window management
  • Send keys
  • Control mouse
  • File management
  • GUIs
  • One-click compile script to portable stand-alone executable
  • Scripting: labels, flow control: Loop, IfWinExists, etc.
  • Window Spy
  • Graphical installer (optional)
  • Context menu and compilation just like on Windows

Besides:

  • Interactive console (REPL)

AHK_X11 can be used completely without a terminal. You can however if you want use it console-only too. Graphical commands are optional, it also runs headless.

*Click here* to see which commands are implemented and which are missing. Note however that this is not very representative. For example, no `Gui` sub command is included in the listing. For a better overview on what is already done, skim through the full documentation here. Generally speaking, everything important is done. 
DONE      57% (126/222):
+ Else, { ... }, Break, Continue, Return, Exit, GoSub, GoTo, IfEqual, Loop, SetEnv, Sleep, FileCopy,
+ SetTimer, WinActivate, MsgBox, Gui, SendRaw, #Persistent, ExitApp,
+ EnvAdd, EnvSub, EnvMult, EnvDiv, ControlSendRaw, IfWinExist/IfWinNotExist, SetWorkingDir,
+ FileAppend, Hotkey, Send, ControlSend, #Hotstring, Menu, FileCreateDir, FileDelete, IfMsgBox,
+ #SingleInstance, Edit, FileReadLine, FileSelectFile, FileSelectFolder, FileSetAttrib, FileSetTime,
+ IfNotEqual, If var [not] between, IfExist/IfNotExist, IfGreater/IfGreaterOrEqual,
+ IfInString/IfNotInString, IfLess/IfLessOrEqual, IfWinActive/IfWinNotActive, IniDelete, IniRead,
+ IniWrite, Loop (files & folders), Loop (read file contents), MouseClick, Pause, Reload,
+ StringGetPos, StringLeft, StringLen, StringLower, StringMid, StringReplace, StringRight,
+ StringUpper, Suspend, URLDownloadToFile, WinClose, WinGetPos, WinKill, WinMaximize, WinMinimize,
+ WinMove, WinRestore, MouseGetPos, MouseMove, GetKeyState, KeyWait, ControlClick, WinGetText,
+ WinGetTitle, WinGetClass, PixelGetColor, CoordMode, GuiControl, ControlGetPos, ControlGetText,
+ WinGet, Input, Loop (parse a string), ToolTip, If var [not] in/contains MatchList, ControlSetText,
+ PixelSearch, #Include, InputBox, ClipWait, EnvSet, SetKeyDelay, SetMouseDelay, MouseClickDrag,
+ #NoTrayIcon, TrayTip, Random, Shutdown, RunAs, SoundGet, SoundSet, SoundPlay, Sort,
+ StringTrimLeft, StringTrimRight, WinMinimizeAll, WinMinimizeAllUndo, WinSetTitle, WinWait,
+ WinWaitClose, WinWaitActive, WinWaitNotActive, DriveSpaceFree, FileGetSize, FileRecycle,
+ FileRecycleEmpty, SplitPath, StringSplit

NEW       4% (11/222): (not part of spec or from a more recent version)
@@ Echo, ahk_x11_print_vars, FileRead, RegExGetPos, RegExReplace, EnvGet, Click @@
@@ Eval, ahk_x11_track_performance_start, ahk_x11_track_performance_stop @@
@@ #DefineCommand @@

REMOVED   5% (11/222):
# ### Those that simply make no sense in Linux:
# EnvUpdate, PostMessage, RegDelete, RegRead, RegWrite, SendMessage, #InstallKeybdHook,
# #InstallMouseHook, #UseHook, Loop (registry)
#
# ### Skipped for other reasons:
# AutoTrim: It's always Off. It would not differentiate between %a_space% and %some_var%.
#           It's possible but needs significant work.

TO DO     32% (71/222): alphabetically
- BlockInput, Control, ControlFocus, ControlGet, ControlGetFocus, ControlMove, DetectHiddenText,
- DetectHiddenWindows, Drive, DriveGet, FileCopyDir, FileCreateShortcut, FileInstall, FileGetAttrib,
- FileGetShortcut, FileGetTime, FileGetVersion, FileMove, FileMoveDir, FileRemoveDir, FormatTime,
- GroupActivate, GroupAdd, GroupClose, GroupDeactivate, GuiControlGet, If var is [not] type,
- KeyHistory, ListHotkeys, ListLines, ListVars, OnExit, Process, Progress, SetBatchLines,
- SetCapslockState, SetControlDelay, SetDefaultMouseSpeed, SetFormat, SetNumlockState,
- SetScrollLockState, SetStoreCapslockMode, SetTitleMatchMode, SetWinDelay, SoundGetWaveVolume,
- SoundSetWaveVolume, SplashImage, SplashTextOn, SplashTextOff, StatusBarGetText, StatusBarWait,
- StringCaseSense, SysGet, Thread, Transform, WinActivateBottom, WinGetActiveStats, WinGetActiveTitle,
- WinMenuSelectItem, WinSet, #CommentFlag, #ErrorStdOut, #EscapeChar, #HotkeyInterval,
- #HotkeyModifierTimeout, #MaxHotkeysPerInterval, #MaxMem, #MaxThreads, #MaxThreadsBuffer,
- #MaxThreadsPerHotkey, #WinActivateForce

Also planned, even though it's not part of 1.0.24 spec:
- ImageSearch
- Maybe some kind of OCR command
- #IfWinActive (the directive)

Showcase of scripts

  • Vimium Everywhere: Keyboard navigation for the whole desktop
  • Activity monitor: Demonstrates keyboard tracking, window, control listing and more
  • ...did you create something with AHK_X11 that could potentially be useful to others too? Suggestions for this list? Please open an issue or write me a mail!

Installation

Download the latest binary from the release section (the file called ahk_x11.AppImage). Make the downloaded file executable (how?) and you should be good to go: Just double click it or run it in the console without arguments (without sudo). If this doesn't work, you might have to also install FUSE for now: sudo apt-get install libfuse2

Alternative for Arch Linux users: AUR packageThere's an ahk_x11-bin package and an ahk_x11 / ahk_x11-git package available, kindly maintained by sonofaglitch and Freso, respectively. You can use those. It's recommended to use the former (ahk_x11-bin) because its more portable. The other two compile from source, but note that then if you use the script compilation feature, the resulting binaries will *not* be reusable across different Linux distributions! Alternatively, you can also build the AppImage from source if you have Docker installed (see "Build from source" below)

Prerequisites:

  • X11 is the only dependency. You most likely have them already. Wayland support would be cool too some day.
  • Old distros like Debian before 10 (Buster) or Ubuntu before 18.04 are not supported (reason). Otherwise, it should not matter what system you use.

There is no auto updater yet! (but planned) You will probably want to get the latest version then and again.

Usage

There are different ways to use it.

  1. The graphical way, like on Windows: Running the program directly opens up the interactive installer.
    • Once installed, all .ahk files are associated with AHK_X11, so you can simply double click them.
    • Also adds the Compiler into Open as... Menus.
    • Also adds Window Spy to your applications. It looks something like this.
  2. Command line
    • Either: Pass the script to execute as first parameter, e.g. ./ahk_x11 "path to your script.ahk"
    • Or: Pass code from stdin, e.g. echo $'var = 123\nMsgBox %var%' | ./ahk_x11
    • If you once installed with the graphical installer, the binary is also to be found at ~/.local/bin/ahk_x11.AppImage
    • Once your script's auto-execute section has finished, you can also interactively execute arbitrary single line commands in the console. Code blocks aren't supported yet in that situation. Those single lines each run in their separate threads, which is why variables like %ErrorLevel% will always be 0.
    • When you don't want to pass a script and jump to this mode directly, you can specify --repl instead (implicit #Persistent).
    • Compile scripts with ./ahk_x11 --compile "path/script.ahk"
    • Run Window Spy with ./ahk_x11 --windowspy
    • Hashbang supported if first line starts with #!
    • You can disable graphical commands by manually unsetting the DISPLAY variable. Example: DISPLAY= ./ahk_x11 <<< 'Echo abc' just prints abc to the console (Echo command is a special ahk_x11-only command). The only advantage is faster startup time.

If you run a script that contains e.g. a Hotkey, an icon will appear in your task bar tray notification area. You can right click that icon to quit. If you're not familiar with these basics of AutoHotkey, please read the AutoHotkey Tutorial and Overview from the docs.

Caveats

Remapping mouse

You can't send / remap mouse buttons when triggered by another mouse button's {Down} event. For example:

F1::LButton ; Works!
RButton::Tab ; Works!
RButton up::Send {LButton} ; Works!
RButton::Send {LButton} ; DOES NOT WORK
RButton::LButton ; DOES NOT WORK

Accessibility

Some commands or options related to Controls (e.g. ControlClick or ControlGetPos or WinGetText which is just an accumulation of ControlGetText or WinActivate, , Match by Text...) relies on assistive technologies. While almost all windows support this, this typically needs adjustments on the running system. Read the documentation section on accessibility for instructions.

Focus stealing prevention

Some Linux distros offer a configurable setting for focus stealing prevention. Usually, it's default off. But if you have activated it, window focus changing actions like MsgBox or WinActivate will not work as expected: A MsgBox will appear hidden behind the active window. This can be useful to prevent accidental popup dismissal but when you don't like that, you have three options:

  • disable said setting

  • use the always on top setting of MsgBox

  • hack around it with code 
    SetTimer, MsgBoxToFront, 1
MsgBox, Hello
Return

MsgBoxToFront:
SetTimer, MsgBoxToFront, off
; You might want to adjust the matching criteria, especially for compiled scripts
WinActivate ahk_class ahk_x11
return

Appearance

(*) The MsgBox picture at the top was taken on a XFCE system with Chicago95 installed, a theme that resembles Win95 look&feel. On your system, it will look like whatever GTK popups always look like.

Incompatibilities with Windows versions

Like covered above, AHK_X11 is vastly different to modern Windows-AutoHotkey because 1. its spec is missing its more recent features and 2. there are still several features missing. Apart from that, there are a few minor incompatibilities between AHK_X11 and the then-Windows-AutoHotkey 1.0.24:

  • #NoEnv is the default, this means, to access environment variables, you'll have to use EnvGet.
  • All arguments are always evaluated only at runtime, even if they are static. This can lead to slightly different behavior or error messages at runtime vs. build time.
  • Several more small subtle differences highlighted in green throughout the docs page
  • There are a few commands present which are missing from Windows AHK, i.e. prominently #DefineCommand, Echo and Eval.

Besides, it should be noted that undocumented == undefined.

Migrating a modern Windows AHK v1.1 script

Besides the Legacy Syntax used in AHK_X11, more modern Windows AHK v1.1+ also supports (and favors) expression syntax. So chances are you might have to adjust a few things. Here's a general guideline on how to convert modern to legacy code. If you're annoyed by this, feel free to contribute a more capable parser so we can also parse expressions. Please also let us know if you know of an automated conversion tool. Note that in AHK v2.x, legacy was entirely dropped.

MODERN -> LEGACY (AHK_X11)

  • x := 1 -> x = 1

  • x := y -> x = %y%

  • b := a + 3 ->

    Simple math instructions with := like this one are actually wonkily supported, so chances are you can leave it as is. In this case, you'd omit the percent signs % unless you want to double-deref, just like on Windows. But for more complicated stuff such as string concatenation, you'll have to resort back to classic syntax:

    b = %a%
b += 3

  • MsgBox, % "c plus 3 is " . c + 3 . "." ->

    new_c = %c%
new_c += 3
MsgBox, c plus 3 is %new_c%.

  • If(my_var = "my string") -> If my_var = my string

  • If(d == e && f == "x") { ->

    If d = %e%
{
    If f = x
    {

  • IfWinExist("Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia") -> IfWinExist, Wikipedia`, the free encyclopedia

  • ; Functions
Send, % Add(7,8)

Add(x, y) {
    return x + y
}

    ->

    add_first = 7
add_second = 8
GoSub, Add
Send, %result%
Return

Add:
result = %add_first%
result += %add_second%
Return

    or you can use the special built-in command (AHK_X11-only) #DefineCommand to reduce code repetition:

    #DefineCommand Add, LblAdd

Add, result, 7, 8
Send, %result%
Return

LblAdd:
%A_Param1% = %A_Param2%
%A_Param1% += %A_Param3%
Return

  • my_array := ["one", "two", "three"] ->

  • my_array := ["one", "two", "three"]
index = 1
MsgBox, % my_array[index]

    ->

    my_array1 = one
my_array2 = two
my_array3 = three
index = 1
; Use any command that has an "InputVar" argument. StringTrimLeft is a nice choice because it doesn't do anything to the received value if the "Count" argument is 0 as below. Yes, it's weird, AHK_X11 has no actual arrays. In fact, in AHK v1.0, it used to be the same and the official docs also used StringTrimLeft a lot
StringTrimLeft, my_value, my_array%index%, 0
MsgBox, %my_value%
  • colors := "red,green,blue"
for index, color in StrSplit(colors, ",")
    MsgBox % "Color number " index " is " color

    ->

    colors = red,green,blue
StringSplit, color_array, colors, `,
Loop, %color_array0%
{
    StringTrimLeft, this_color, color_array%A_Index%, 0
    MsgBox, Color number %A_Index% is %this_color%
}

  • my_obj := { key_a: 1, key_b: "value b" }` -> Doesn't exist. You'll have to use normal variables instead.

  • class MyClass {} -> Doesn't exist. You'll have to use normal variables instead.

  • x := y%z% (double de-ref) -> StringTrimLeft, x, y%z%, 0. You can also use Eval, x = `%y%z%`% but that's ten times slower as Eval is generally very slow.

Performance

AHK_X11 is an interpreted language, not a compiled one. This means that no compile time optimizations take place on your script code, apart from some validation and reference placements. Also, all variables are of type String. So you probably wouldn't want to use it for performance-critical applications. However, the tool itself is written in Crystal and thus compiled and optimized for speed, so everything should still be reasonably fast. The speed of some of the slower commands depends on either libxdo or X11 and it's not yet clear whether there is much room for improvement. Some tests run on a 3.5 GHz machine:

Parsing a single line takes about 30 µs (this happens once at startup), and execution time depends on what a command does:

  • x = 1: 70 ns (0.00000007 s)
  • FileRead, x, y.txt: 10 µs (0.00001 s)
  • WinGetTitle, A: 87 µs (0.000087 s)
  • Send, a: 530 µs (0.00053 s)
  • Clipboard = a: 6 ms (0.006 s)
  • SendRaw, a: 9 ms (0.009 s) (??)
  • WinActivate, title: 60 ms (0.06 s)
  • WinGetText: 0-3 s (!)

You can run fine-grained benchmarks with the following special hidden instruction:

AHK_X11_track_performance_start
Loop, 1000
    Send, a
AHK_X11_track_performance_stop

prints something like:

[{"send", count: 1000, total: 00:00:00.530032328>},
 {"loop", count: 1001, total: 00:00:00.000206347>}]

Note that the internal code around executing commands takes about 10 µs between two every commands and you can't do anything about it and this not measured / included in the benchmark command's output. This can actually be the bottleneck in some scripts and should probably be improved

More tips:

  • Some values are cached internally while the thread is running, so repeated commands may run faster
  • The first time an AtSpi-related command (Control-*, WinGetText, ... see "Accessibility" section above) runs, the interface needs to be initialized which can take some time (0-5s)
  • Searching for windows is slow. Querying the active window is not. Also, windows are internally cached by their ID during the lifetime of the thread, so e.g. WinActivate, ahk_id %win_id% will be much much faster than WinActivate, window name. So for many window operations you might want to do a single WinGet, win_id, ID beforehand and then reuse that %win_id.

Build from source / Contribute

If you want to help with AHK_X11 development or prefer to build from source instead of using the prebuilt binaries, detailed build instructions are to be found in ./build/README.md. Most users will not want to do that, please go to Installation if you're not sure.

Issues

For bugs and feature requests, please open up an issue, or check the Discord or Forum.

Notable dependencies

License

GPL-2.0

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AutoHotkey for Linux (X11-based systems)

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Aug 3, 2024
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