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I'm basically trying to send a keypress to a Flash Object. Essentially I have a Win32Com instance of Internet Explorer and I have a Flash Object taken from the Internet Explorer document that I have loaded.

Is there any way to send keystrokes to this Flash Object without actually pressing the keys?

Please allow me to clarify: This is not my Flash application, it is a Flash application published onto the web in .swf form.

Ryan
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  • You're trying to send the key event from within flash or from outside of flash? –  Mar 23 '11 at 05:17

3 Answers3

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You can simulate keypresses by just dispatching a KeyboardEvent within your app:

public function Main() 
{
    // add a listener to our stage
    this.stage.addEventListener( KeyboardEvent.KEY_DOWN, this._onKeyDown );

    // mimics an event for an 'a' key press
    var e:KeyboardEvent = new KeyboardEvent( KeyboardEvent.KEY_DOWN, true, false, 97, 65 );
    this.dispatchEvent( e );
}

// called when a key is pressed
private function _onKeyDown( e:KeyboardEvent ):void
{
    trace( "Key pressed! " + e.keyCode );
    trace( e.keyCode + " = keycode" );
    trace( e.keyLocation + " = key location" );
    trace( e.charCode + " = char code" );
}

Check out the KeyboardEvent class for more info: http://help.adobe.com/en_US/FlashPlatform/reference/actionscript/3/flash/events/KeyboardEvent.html

If you want to fire this from your browser, then you can set up an ExternalInterface call to call your flash function that will fire off the event. http://help.adobe.com/en_US/FlashPlatform/reference/actionscript/3/flash/external/ExternalInterface.html

divillysausages
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    Allow me to clarify: this is not my Flash application. I do not have access to the actual action script of Flash file. Although this solution may be correct if I was the author of the Flash file, this is not exactly what I'm looking for. – Ryan Mar 23 '11 at 14:02
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On Windows, you can generate input and send it to OS with SendInput function. Input is generated on system level as if user is pressing keys or using mouse, so browser must be in focus to get input.

alxx
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0

***UPDATE... AGAIN*** Okay so I think I have the real answer to your question here. Check out this documentation:

http://livedocs.adobe.com/flex/3/html/help.html?content=19_External_Interface_10.html

You'll want to use the axShockwaveFlash.FlashCall interface.

***UPDATE*** Found this link:

Get instance of Excel application with C# by Handle

Explains how to fetch a reference to an active application instance.

***ORIGINAL POST*** I agree with alxx this is something you'll have to do natively and I don't know that it will be all that easy to do. You'll have to grab the flash instance somehow, and I'm not sure how difficult that is going to be there are a lot of variables at play to account for. However, I can say it is possible to do and here is some documentation on how to do this with various languages (C#, VC++ etc):

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms171548.aspx

And here is a blog post of mine on how to interface with the flash control in C# (at least to give you an idea):

http://blog.ascensionsystems.ca/?p=153

There is a link to the source code as well available on SVN. This isn't the greatest answer in that I'm not offering any exact method but I hope this is a good start for you.

Community
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  • lol what a dumbass I am I skimmed over your question too fast, didn't realize you already have a reference to the flash instance. Anyway I'll leave my answer as is just for other people's NFO. –  Mar 23 '11 at 16:46
  • Any of this nfo helpful? Pretty sure the last update regarding the FlashCall is the right answer. –  Mar 24 '11 at 03:20