How to start a search automatically

PeterJones

@Alan-Kilborn said in How to start a search automatically:

Not sure the OP ever said anything about a replacement.

You’re right, in OP posts, I only see “search”, not “replace”. That was my addition.

With that clarification, I will sum up my position:

Notepad++ doesn’t natively allow for automation of the search action from startup
PythonScript is the simplest solution to implement, but you seem to reject that extra step
- if you are willing to use this solution, @Alan-Kilborn appears willing to give you a starting script; but he doesn’t look like he’ll put in the effort if it’s not likely you’ll use it
it might be possible with SendMessages
- I’ve pointed you to the Notepad+±specific messages, especially the one for launching the Search dialog via a menu command
- for manipulating the contents of the search dialog window, there are Windows messages which can handle that, assuming you can figure out the control IDs and craft the appropriate instructions to those dialog elements
- this is a complicated solution, and I don’t have the time to do more research to hand it to you. If you can’t “do it successfully by [yourself]”, this may not be the best solution for you
if the search term is fixed, then you can record a macro, and even distribute the XML for that macro, and explain the steps to your users on how to edit their shortcuts.xml and run the macro themselves – not quite as automatic, but it’s the easiest to implement, overall, IMO.

kaifuzi

@Alan-Kilborn @PeterJones Now I can use FindWindow to get Notepad++ window handle, and I can send message by SendMessage, but I checked the manual, there is only message NPPM_LAUNCHFINDINFILESDLG which I can find, I can’t use it to find all in current document. Do you have any idea? Thanks!

Alan Kilborn

@kaifuzi said in How to start a search automatically:

Using ShellExecute to start Notepad++ and open a certain file.
Using SendMessage to start Search
Using SendMessage to send search string to the Search text box
Find all in current document.

I may be more optimistic about this sequencing description. :-)
It seems doable, but of course I am thinking about it from a Pythonscript perspective, not a purely “SendMessage” approach…
If you have questions about specific portions as you do it, just fire away and we’ll try to answer.

PeterJones

@kaifuzi said in How to start a search automatically:

NPPM_LAUNCHFINDINFILESDLG

Notepad++ was not written with scripted control of the search dialog in mind.

As I’ve said, you can use NPPM_MENUCOMMAND to launch any menu entry; the menuCmdID.h file in sourcecode shows all the menu command IDs that you would pass to the message. However, that just opens the dialog, it won’t let you populate it.

There are other Windows API commands you could use to explore that dialog and fill it out, but it’s more complicated than we can help you through – those steps would be the same no matter what application the dialog is in, so it’s a general programming question, rather than Notepad++ specific. That’s where a GuiTest-style library would come in handy. We cannot write that for you.

Again, if you are just using a fixed search string – always the same for every user – then recording and sharing the macro would seem the easiest solution.

Alan Kilborn

@PeterJones said in How to start a search automatically:

However, that just opens the dialog, it won’t let you populate it.

You can populate it after you get a handle to it, using the dialog control IDs in FindReplaceDlg_rc.h.
Set up your search text (still not 100% how you obtain that, in the final solution…) and then use code to “press” the Find All in Current Document button.
It doesn’t sound “horrible”, but a bit of a devil in the details.

if you are just using a fixed search string – always the same for every user – then recording and sharing the macro would seem the easiest solution.

I continue to get the feeling that this is NOT the case.

PeterJones

@Alan-Kilborn said in How to start a search automatically:

You can populate it after you get a handle to it, using the dialog control IDs in FindReplaceDlg_rc.h.

I had never noticed that before. And now I know where the 1700 and similar IDs come from, as referenced in the search-and-replace macros docs. Thanks!

I continue to get the feeling that this is NOT the case.

And the OP continues to be mum on the subject, neither confirming nor denying, no matter how many times it is brought up. It is an answer that would definitely help craft any future discussion.

However, at this point, I probably won’t weigh in much more, because you seem to understand the OP’s desires better than I do, and I don’t want to get in the way or muddle things any more.

kaifuzi

@PeterJones @Alan-Kilborn I did it, thanks a lot for your help!!!
I use FindWindow and FindWindowEx to get window handles which I need, then I use SendMessage to control them, with NPPM_MENUCOMMAND I can open Find dialog.

kaifuzi

@Alan-Kilborn @PeterJones In fact, I sitll have a small issue. When I use ShellExexute to open a file by Notepad++, I don’t know when it’s ready, I mean I can get the handle of Notepad++. So I use a loop to wait, once the handle value of Notepad++ is greater than 0, then I think Notepad++ it’s ready, then I can start search. I’m not sure is there any other best way.

Alan Kilborn

@kaifuzi said in How to start a search automatically:

I did it, thanks a lot for your help!!!

Well, that’s good.
It is sort of tradition to provide more details in the form of code about your working solution, for those that read this later wanting to do the same or a similar thing.
Not mandatory, though.

kaifuzi

@Alan-Kilborn Yes, that’s good, I will post my code in there. I did it in VB.net, same for C#.

kaifuzi

Public Sub NppFindAllInCurDoc(ByVal fileFullPath As String, ByVal searchString As String)
    Dim i As Integer = 0
    Dim hNppWnd As IntPtr = IntPtr.Zero
    While CInt(hNppWnd) = 0
        hNppWnd = FindWindow("Notepad++", fileFullPath & " - Notepad++")  'Notepad++ handle
        i += 1
        If i > 10 ^ 5 Then
            MsgBox("Timeout!" & Environment.NewLine & "Please run this command again.", MsgBoxStyle.Exclamation, "Warning")
            Exit While
        End If
    End While

    If CInt(hNppWnd) > 0 Then
        'Open find dialog
        SendMessage(hNppWnd, NppMessage.NPPM_MENUCOMMAND, 0, New IntPtr(NppCmdID.IDM_SEARCH_FIND))
        'Get find dialog
        Dim hFindWnd As IntPtr = IntPtr.Zero
        Dim hChildWnd As IntPtr = IntPtr.Zero
        hFindWnd = FindWindow("#32770", "Find")  'Find dialog handle
        hChildWnd = FindWindowEx(hFindWnd, IntPtr.Zero, "ComboBox", vbNullString)
        hChildWnd = FindWindowEx(hChildWnd, IntPtr.Zero, "Edit", vbNullString)
        SendMessage(hChildWnd, WindowMessage.WM_SETTEXT, 0, searchString)
        'Start search
        hChildWnd = FindWindowEx(hFindWnd, IntPtr.Zero, "Button", "Find All in Current &Document")
        SendMessage(hChildWnd, WindowMessage.BM_CLICK, 0, IntPtr.Zero)
    End If
End Sub

Alan Kilborn

@kaifuzi said in How to start a search automatically:

When I use ShellExexute to open a file by Notepad++, I don’t know when it’s ready, I mean I can get the handle of Notepad++. So I use a loop to wait, once the handle value of Notepad++ is greater than 0, then I think Notepad++ it’s ready, then I can start search.

It appears from your code that you found a solution to this?

kaifuzi

@Alan-Kilborn Yes, in my code, I use a loop to wait the Notepad++ handle. But I don’t think this is a good solution:

Dim hNppWnd As IntPtr = IntPtr.Zero
While CInt(hNppWnd) = 0
    hNppWnd = FindWindow("Notepad++", fileFullPath & " - Notepad++")  'Notepad++ handle
    i += 1
    If i > 10 ^ 5 Then
        MsgBox("Timeout!" & Environment.NewLine & "Please run this command again.", MsgBoxStyle.Exclamation, "Warning")
        Exit While
    End If
End While

PeterJones

@kaifuzi ,

I use a loop to wait the Notepad++ handle. But I don’t think this is a good solution

Waiting for a handle is not bad practice. In the Perl Win32::GuiTest library previously mentioned, two of the commonly-used wrapper functions are WaitWindow and WaitWindowLike, which wrap around the FindWindow interface, like you’ve done. That’s really the best way to make sure the Window exists after you’ve created it.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a similar “it exists, but is it ready for me?” call. Sometimes, I’ve found that trying to edit the text or launch menus immediately after the window exists will intermittently fail; in those cases, I add a 100ms or 1s delay (normally, what I’m automating in Notepad++ isn’t time critical; one second difference doesn’t matter).

So I think wait-for-hwnd is a good first step; if that’s not sufficient, wait a bit after you have the handle before trying to do something with it.

kaifuzi

@PeterJones Thanks for your suggestion! Yes, for now, waiting the handle it’s enought for me. But I will try WaitWindow funciton.

PeterJones

@kaifuzi said in How to start a search automatically:

I will try WaitWindow funciton.

I don’t think they exist in the raw win32 api. I think they are just wrappers in that specific Perl library. But if you can find them for your library, great.

kaifuzi

@PeterJones Yes, you are right, there is no function WaitWindow and WaitWindowLike in raw win32 api. Then before I have better solution, I will use loop to wait handle.

dinkumoil

@kaifuzi

The whole approach to remotely control Notepad++ via a VB or C# program seems to take too much effort and is not very reliable. Thus, I would like to recommend using the tool grepWin for searching (download it from >> here <<). It provides subfolder recursion, regular expression search (and replace), folder exclusion by pattern and filtering by file type, size and time stamp.

This tool integrates itself into the Windows Explorer files and folders context menu, can also be started via command line/batch script (providing a lot of command line options) and can be configured to start Notepad++ or any other text editor by double-clicking its search results. It is even possible to place the cursor in Notepad++ at a certain search result using the appropriate Npp command line options.

Alan Kilborn

@kaifuzi

One more note about your code.
I notice that you do not set up ALL of the controls on the Find window before running your search.
It could be dangerous (i.e. wrong results) in certain circumstances, e.g. Match case checkbox is set one way but logically the user of your code thinks it is set the other way.
So you may want to add more code to specify the settings on other parameters that may affect your search.
Just an FYI.

Alan Kilborn

@dinkumoil said in How to start a search automatically:

I would like to recommend using the tool grepWin for searching

A nice thing about this is that grepWin uses the Boost regex engine, just like Notepad++, so if you are very familiar with doing “advanced” searching with regular expressions in Notepad++, you’d feel very familiar with doing it in grepWin.