Files¶

Overview¶

The PyRend files submodule allows the ability to run files of various types, manipulate open windows and take screenshots. Its main features lies in the window manipulation, with the ability to resize windows, restore windows, minimise, maximise, close and much more.

Managing files¶

You can run files using PyRend with:

pyrend.files.run(path)

path (str): The relative or absolute path to the file to be ran. The file will be instantly run in a subproccess, without stopping the main script. The file types you can run are: .exe, .bat, .py, .sh and .jar. Attempting to run any other unsupported file type will result in the error “PyRend error: Unsupported file type .{extension}”.

You can also download a file from the internet using:

pyrend.files.download(link)

The link can be anywhere on the internet, and be any file type. For example, you could download the PyRend favicon from 'https://pyrend.readthedocs.io/en/latest/_static/favicon.png'! It will download into the same folder as the script running.

Windows¶

Functions¶

There are a few useful functions for accessing windows in PyRend. The first few allow you to get the title or win32 window object from open windows.

pyrend.files.activeWindow(title=False) -> Win32Window or str

Will return the window that is currently on top/active. If title parameter is False like it is by default, it will return a Win32Window object, which is useful for creating window classes or managing in other ways. If True, will return the title of the window as a string, for example; 'Downloads - File Explorer', Command Prompt or 'Outer Wilds'.

You can get a list of all open windows titles using:

pyrend.files.getWindowTitles() -> list

This will give a list of all open windows. Note that the list will return some empty strings belonging to windows that are processes and not visible, so you will need to account for that. There also will be two non-visible windows most of the time: “Windows Input Experience” and “Program Manager” (Only tested on Windows 11, likely differs on windows 10).

You can also use the a similar function for getting a list of all windows in Win32Window format:

pyrend.files.getWindows() -> list

You can create a PyRend window class to allow manipulation over windows. You can make this using:

myWindow = pyrend.files.window(window)

For the window parameter, you can pass either a string with the full title of the window, or a Win32Window object (likely obtained from the previous functions)

Class¶

Creating a PyRend window class using the window() function above allows you to manipulate windows and get specific details from them.

Attributes¶

When a window object is created, it has a window and title attribute built in. The window is the Win32Window object and the title is a string with its title. As of PyRend 0.1.47, the title is a property, so will update if it changes (eg. You go to a different browser tab).

Example usage:

import pyrend

myWindow = pyrend.files.window(pyrend.files.activeWindow())
print(f"You are currently looking at: {myWindow.title}!")

Output:

You are currently looking at: main.py - Untitled (Workspace) - Visual Studio Code!

You can also use the property isMaximised to tell if the window is maximised. Yes, you are being forced to spell it the non-American way.

myWindow.isMaximised -> bool

Will return True or False whether the window is maximised or not. You can also use width and height attributes to check its size.

myWindow.width -> int
myWindow.height -> int

Will return its width or height in pixels.

Using these attributes, you can do things like this:

import pyrend

myWindow = pyrend.files.window(pyrend.files.activeWindow())
status = "maximised" if myWindow.isMaximised else "not maximised"
print(f"{myWindow.title} is {status} and is {myWindow.widtpixels wide}!")

Output:

Spotify Free is not maximised and is 845 pixels wide!

Management¶

You can close a window using:

myWindow.close()

You can minimise or maximise a window using:

myWindow.minimize()
myWindow.maximize()

And you can restore a window using:

myWindow.restore()

You can also resize windows:

myWindow.resize(x, y)

x and y are integers of how many pixels wide and tall to resize the window to. You can move a window to a certain position using:

myWindow.move(x, y)

This will move (teleport) a window to the x and y coordinates specified. This also uses pixels. For both moving and resizing, you can use pyrend.r2p(). To read about pixel vs relative coordinates, view here.

Moving a window will move it instantly with no animation.

Examples¶

Managing windows in PyRend has a lot of possibilities, especially in combination with the other submodules. Add keybinds to controlling windows with the input submodule, add sound effects with the sound submodule or manipulate windows in combination with the overlay submodule. Below are some examples of things you can do with mostly just the files submodule, with minimal other submodule usage.

This script allows you to use the arrow keys to resize the window active when the script is run:

import pyrend
pyrend.init()

window = pyrend.files.window(pyrend.files.activeWindow())
window.restore()  # Get the active window and set it up
window.move(0, 0)
window.resize(pyrend.overlay.screen_size()[0], pyrend.overlay.screen_size()[1])

def update():
    # Quit shortcut
    if pyrend.input.is_key_down('ALT') and pyrend.input.is_key_down('Q'):
        pyrend.close()

    if pyrend.input.is_key_down('LEFT'):   # If keys pressed, change window size
        window.resize(window.width - 10, window.height)
    if pyrend.input.is_key_down('RIGHT'):
        window.resize(window.width + 10, window.height)
    if pyrend.input.is_key_down('UP'):
        window.resize(window.width, window.height - 10)
    if pyrend.input.is_key_down('DOWN'):
        window.resize(window.width, window.height + 10)

pyrend.start(update)

Note that these are basic scripts for proof of concept and aren’t optimised or bug free.

This script adds a hovering effect to non-maximised windows:

import math
import time
import random
import pyrend
import win32gui

pyrend.init()

# Store base positions + random phase for each window
window_data = {}
start_time = time.time()

def update():
    global window_data, start_time

    # Quit shortcut
    if pyrend.input.is_key_down('ALT') and pyrend.input.is_key_down('Q'):
        pyrend.close()

    t = time.time() - start_time

    for w in pyrend.files.getWindows():
        window = pyrend.files.window(w)

        if window.isMaximised:
            continue  # skip maximized windows

        hwnd = window.window._hWnd

        if hwnd not in window_data:     # Calculate how to move the window
            rect = win32gui.GetWindowRect(hwnd)
            base_x, base_y = rect[0], rect[1]
            phase = random.uniform(0, math.pi * 2)
            speed = random.uniform(1.6, 2.1)
            window_data[hwnd] = (base_x, base_y, phase, speed)

        base_x, base_y, phase, speed = window_data[hwnd]

        # Gentle vertical oscillation with random phase + speed
        offset = int(5 * math.sin(t * speed + phase))
        window.move(base_x, base_y + offset)

pyrend.start(update)

Screenshots¶

You can take a screenshot using PyRend with:

myScreen = pyrend.files.grab_screen()

This creates a Screenshot() object under myScreen. The screenshot object has a few uses.

myScreen.write(path)

Writes the image file (png format) to the path specified. Can be relative or absoloute.

myScreen.retake()

Retakes the photo.

myScreen.get_bytes()

Returns the image as raw bytes

Warning

PyRend uses mss backend, but will it in an inifficient way if you plan on taking lots of photos at once or frequently, likely causing intense lag. To get around this, you will have to use mss yourself. Read the intensive use section of the mss documentation for further information.

You can use the image attribute in the screenshot object as a PIL image, for example:

myScreen.image.show()