Is there a way to Open an App just by its Name in Python

Question

I'm making an "Advanced Virtual Assistant" by using Python and I want to be able to run any app on the PC with just entering its name. Something likes:

i = input("What App Do You Want To Open?:  ")
d = getDirectory(i)
os.startfile(d)

Now I can set this up manually for some apps by getting their directory but it won't be for every app so its not what I need. Is there any easy way to do this?

Answer 1

There is no easy way, but you could use something like winapps which will get you the install directory of the program if it exists. However, the hard part is knowing which file will execute the program.

You could use wmi to fetch the location by passing in the info from winapps; similar to this this answer but that may be out of date so have a look through the /docs/.

Answer 2

From Lucan's answer, I got this code:

import wmi
w = wmi.WMI()
for p in w.Win32_Product():
    if 'Box, Inc.' == p.Vendor and p.Caption and 'Box Sync' in p.Caption:
        print 'Installed {}'.format(p.Version)

Sorry but I couldn't figure it out, Where exactly does the app name go in this?

Answer 3

There are many good tools to do this already.

Here is an common solution you may try implement it:

• Scan or record apps on your PC and store records in database or formated file. (e.g. registry / program files / other folders )
• Map app name, description, caption or etc to the app executable path.(read executable information with wmi or other way as the other answers described.)
• Try find the entered text in the fields.
• (if you want nature language matching, that's another story.)
• Use Python subprocess or other function/lib to run the executable of the record you just found.

Answer 4

I've written the below which uses winapps as suggested in my previous answer. This implementation has many limitations, such as it only works for programs installed for all users. However, you could alter this code to use another way of getting the install location and use getPossibleExePaths to get the executables. This answer gives some alternative ways which may be better than winapps.

import os
import winapps
import subprocess

def getPossibleExePaths(appPath):
    if not appPath:
        raise Exception("App Path cannot be None")
    pattern = appPath + ":*exe"
    try:
        returned = subprocess.check_output(['where', pattern]).decode('utf-8')
        listOfPaths = filter(None, returned.split(os.linesep))
        return [i.strip() for i in list(listOfPaths)]
    except subprocess.CalledProcessError as e:
        raise Exception(f"Error getting path for '{appPath}'")

def getAppPath(appName):
    for app in winapps.search_installed(appName):
        installPath = str(app.install_location)
        if installPath and installPath != "None":
            return installPath
    return None

if __name__ == '__main__':
    print(getPossibleExePaths(getAppPath('Chrome')))

This code utilises Window's where command so this will not work cross-platform.

However, please note that getPossibleExePaths will return a list of executable paths and not necessarily the executable that will launch the process. You'll need to figure out how your program will deal with that, there's no easy way to separate out an uninstaller.exe from launchApp.exe. You could, of course, match up the uninstall location that winapps provides and exclude it from the returned list but that doesn't solve the issue that it might not be the launch executable.

I hope that helps you