Max External for Virtual Keyboard?

andrewj's icon

I'm looking for a Max external that can type keystrokes. Does anyone know of any? I've struggled to find any so far. I'm running Windows XP. Thanks!

MIB's icon

I am sure I misunderstand...

Max Patch
Copy patch and select New From Clipboard in Max.

andrewj's icon

Sorry, that's not it. I'm not looking for keyboard /input/, I'm looking for keyboard /output/. When I send MIDI in, I want Max to type on the keyboard.

Stephen Lee's icon

So you want Max to write letters/words on the screen, like a word processor? The LCD object would probably be the easiest way.

andrewj's icon

No. I want the ability to use a Virtual Keyboard. Think Bome's MIDI translator. But better.

seejayjames's icon

notein --> map note # to ascii values wanted (can go directly if you want to do a,b,c... or a special mapping for "qwerty" or dvorak layouts.

then use the ascii and sprintf %c to get your letters. In the example I've limited the values allowed since MIDI notein is 0-127, and within that are pretty much every character you'd need, but also a bunch that aren't printable (and some pesky "gremlins" too)... so I used a split to get a more useful subset.

p.s. check out dvorak if you don't know of it, it was hell to learn but is really worth it once you do, since it's so much more efficient. just don't have tons of work to do in a hurry while you're learning! :)

Max Patch
Copy patch and select New From Clipboard in Max.

andrewj's icon

Thanks, but I'm looking for an external that can TYPE KEYS. That can TYPE INTO BOXES ON OTHER WINDOWS. I want Max to be able to type just like I would type on a keyboard. That's the kind of control I need.

I don't want to print Ascii values. I don't even want to read keyboard input.

I want to send keyboard output that windows can comprehend.

Thanks for the replies, though.

seejayjames's icon

ah, gotcha. My feeling is that Max can't send keys to other apps, nor read keys when it's not the app in focus. Not without additional externals, or with Java. I was able to get some key magic via Processing for a past project, but not sure if that's quite what you're looking for. I'd look into java perhaps, since I think it can send keystrokes to any app in focus...? butiamnoexpert... obviously!

Sebastian Lexer's icon

look at aka.keyboard

I guess that's what you're looking for.

andrewj's icon

I checked out aka.keyboard. If only I was on a mac...

I'll try to see if I can't write some Java for sending virtual keystrokes. Thanks for the help.

Sebastian Lexer's icon

Apologies, I started to read this thread half way down, I wasn't aware that you are looking for a solution for Windows.

ciperlone's icon

Check out this...

it's not an external object, but an external program. Wish there was an external for Windows, but it's better than nothing. And it's free.

tell me what you think ;)