Does AutoIt Support Wildcards?

[4b0082]

$oIE = _IECreate("http://google.com")
Local $pTitle = WinGetTitle("[ACTIVE]")

If $pTitle = ("* - Internet Explorer") Then
 Sleep(3000)
EndIf

Basically I need to know how to get the asterisk to function as a wildcard; is this possible?

[MyEarth]

Window Titles and Text (Advanced)

[4b0082]

Window Titles and Text (Advanced)

That's not what I'm looking for. I need to know if it's possible to use a character as a wildcard for substituting information.

I need to be able to do this (just an example):

"This is a sentence about a fish toy."

"This is a sentence about a dog toy."

"This is a sentence about a cat toy."

Find: "This is a sentence about a * toy."

 

[BrewManNH]

That link is exactly what you're looking for, unless you want someone to tell you how to do it rather than reading that page and learning from it.

Use a REGEXPTITLE for the title, or CLASS or a partial title match using the WinTitleMatchMode option.

[czardas]

In some AutoIt functions, asterisk represents any acceptable sequence of characters, but this is certainly not universal. If you want to use asterisk in other circumstances, then you have to create the code to interpret the characters as you prefer. Here's an example, but it's slightly complicated because of the regular expressions:

;

Local $sString = "whatever - Internet Explorer"
Local $sQuery = "* - Internet Explorer"

Local $sPattern = StringRegExpReplace($sQuery,  "[\W]", "\\$0") ; Ignore special character meanings
$sPattern = "(" & StringReplace($sPattern, "\*", ".*") & ")" ; Dot in the pattern signifies any characters may appear.

If StringRegExp($sString, $sPattern) Then
    MsgBox(0, "", "Match Found")
EndIf

Edited October 5, 2014 by czardas

[4b0082]

That link is exactly what you're looking for, unless you want someone to tell you how to do it rather than reading that page and learning from it.

 

Actually that link is exactly not what I'm looking for, and I don't appreciate you passive-aggressively implying I'm too lazy to read the page. What I'm looking for isn't exclusive to window titles. In fact, in the case I'm looking for it's not even related to titles at all - I just used that snippet of script as an example for what I meant by a wildcard character.

Here's some situations where I'd like to be able to use the wildcard:

https://www.google.com/search?q=boston+art+museums
https://www.google.com/search?q=broadway+musicals
https://www.google.com/search?q=new+cinematography
https://www.google.com/search?q=ice+hockey+canada

I need to use a wildcard so I can execute something like finding "https://www.google.com/search?q=b*" and outputting it into a .txt file.

Text file 1 says "Hello, my name is John and this is my thesis paper. I once . . ."
Text file 2 says "Hello, my name is Mark and this isn't my thesis paper. I once . . ."

I need to use a wildcard so I can execute something like finding "* this is my thesis paper *" to find only files that include those words.

I know there are alternative methods to doing this, but that's not what I want. I want to know if using a wildcard is possible, and how to do it.

[jdelaney]

Regular expressions:

$string = "blahblahhttps://www.google.com/search?q=boston+art+museums more stuff"
$a = StringRegExp($string,"(https[^\s]+)",3)
ConsoleWrite($a[0] & @CRLF)
$a = StringRegExp($string,"(?U)(https.*)\s",3)
ConsoleWrite($a[0] & @CRLF)

Your second example needs no wild card...use:

StringInStr

[MyEarth]

Incredible you attitute. The link is correct...for title is REGEXP, for "string" is StringRegExp, for search file with wildcard use_RecFileListToArray / _FileListToArray

Don't change the OP during the thread:

"In fact, in the case I'm looking for it's not even related to titles at all"

So why do you post THAT example...? And don't post directly what you want to do? Many, many way to skin a cat.

[4b0082]

 

In some AutoIt functions, asterix represents any acceptable sequence of characters, but this is certainly not universal. If you want to use asterix in other circumstances, then you have to create the code to interpret the characters as you prefer. Here's an example, but it's slightly complicated because of the regular expressions:

;

Local $sString = "whatever - Internet Explorer"
Local $sQuery = "* - Internet Explorer"

Local $sPattern = StringRegExpReplace($sQuery,  "[\W]", "\\$0") ; Ignore special character meanings
$sPattern = "(" & StringReplace($sPattern, "\*", ".*") & ")" ; Dot in the pattern signifies any characters may appear.

If StringRegExp($sString, $sPattern) Then
    MsgBox(0, "", "Match Found")
EndIf

 

 

Regular expressions:

$string = "blahblahhttps://www.google.com/search?q=boston+art+museums more stuff"
$a = StringRegExp($string,"(https[^\s]+)",3)
ConsoleWrite($a[0] & @CRLF)
$a = StringRegExp($string,"(?U)(https.*)\s",3)
ConsoleWrite($a[0] & @CRLF)

Your second example needs no wild card...use:

StringInStr

Thanks guys, I'll give these a try!

 

Incredible you attitute. The link is correct...for title is REGEXP, for "string" is StringRegExp, for search file with wildcard use_RecFileListToArray / _FileListToArray
Don't change the OP during the thread:
"In fact, in the case I'm looking for it's not even related to titles at all"

So why do you post THAT example...? And don't post directly what you want to do? Many, many way to skin a cat.

 

I appreciate you linking to a page that you thought would help, but it wasn't the thing I was looking for, which is why I stated it wasn't what I was looking for and gave another example.
I posted that example because any example is just as good, I wasn't asking how to find the title another way, I was asking specifically how to use an asterisk as a wildcard.

I'm sorry if you feel like I had an attitude with you; I don't.

Edited October 5, 2014 by 4b0082

[czardas]

In SRE, asterisk has a different meaning, so you can see there are various interpretations - not only used for wildcards. I often forget someone might want case insensitive matches, so here's another version.

;

Local $sString = "tHIs IS A senTEnce aBOut A CAt TOy."
Local $sQuery = "This is a sentence about a * toy."

Local $sPattern = StringRegExpReplace($sQuery,  "[\W]", "\\$0") ; Ignore special character meanings
$sPattern = "(?i)(" & StringReplace($sPattern, "\*", ".*") & ")" ; Dot in the pattern signifies any characters may appear.

If StringRegExp($sString, $sPattern) Then
    MsgBox(0, "", "Match Found")
EndIf

;

It's not much different from my previous example.

Edited October 5, 2014 by czardas

[4b0082]

In SRE, asterisk has a different meaning, so you can see there are various interpretations - not only used for wildcards. I often forget someone might want case insensitive matches, so here's another version.

;

Local $sString = "tHIs IS A senTEnce aBOut A CAt TOy."
Local $sQuery = "This is a sentence about a * toy."

Local $sPattern = StringRegExpReplace($sQuery,  "[\W]", "\\$0") ; Ignore special character meanings
$sPattern = "(?i)(" & StringReplace($sPattern, "\*", ".*") & ")" ; Dot in the pattern signifies any characters may appear.

If StringRegExp($sString, $sPattern) Then
    MsgBox(0, "", "Match Found")
EndIf

;

It's not much different from my previous example.

Awesome, I was able to use this for exactly what I needed. Thanks a million, czardas!