OpenCV SikuliX robot

Use the OpenCV to recognize a portion of your screen and have Selenuium Python click on a portion of it

Overview

This is a deep dive from the innnards up:

OpenCV (Open Computer Vision) is a utility used by many Artificial Intelligence packages such as self-driving cars to understand images. It is used to take pictures, recognize objects in the pictures, and the coordinates of objects it recognizes in pictures.

SikuliX uses OpenCV to find the location of a picture provided to OpenCV. SikuliX uses the location returned from OpenCV to mouse click on the screen, or type as if a user is using a physical keyboard.

SikuliX does that and other methods based on a script in its own IDE or in response to an API called by a JavaScript scripting engine managed by Java, as organized by Selenium. Alternately, calls from Python code organized within the Robot Framework.

Optionally, Tesseract provides OCR (Optical Character Recognition) to extract text from pictures.

All this to make you more “productive” at playing games. ;)

Why?

The benefit of repeating some action repeatedly (and not get bored or distracted) extends to:

Videographers making screencast videos in multiple takes
Salespeople use it to power their live demos.
Developers and testers going through a sequence of actions to reach a particular point in the UI needing debugging.

Here’s how it works:

A picture is taken of your screen(s).
The text and location of objects recognized in the picture is fed to your program to click or type.
Your program then takes another round of picture taking
visual object recognition to ensure the results are what are intended.

This uses a different, more generalized, approach than packages such as HP UFT which depended on finding identifiers in the DOM (Document Object Model) behind each internet browser web page.

Versions

Sikuli was started somewhen in 2009 as an open-source research project at the User Interface Design Group at MIT by Tsung-Hsiang Chang and Tom Yeh.

RaiMan created an IDE (using Java) and got APIs for Java, Python, and Ruby. His SikuliX2 (version 2.0.1 as of ) at
https://github.com/RaiMan/SikuliX2

https://github.com/RaiMan/Sikulix2opencv

https://github.com/RaiMan/SikuliX1/releases
https://github.com/RaiMan/SikuliX1/wiki/ZZZ-Bug-Fixes
https://github.com/RaiMan/SikuliX1/wiki/macOS-Linux:-Support-Libraries-for-OpenCV-4

Others have created installers:

A) https://github.com/wernight/docker-sikulix

B) https://github.com/dhoer/chef-sikulix

C) Download and compile it locally*

exec java -Xmx512M -Dfile.encoding=UTF-8 -Dsikuli.FromCommandLine -jar /usr/share/sikulix/sikulix.jar “$@”

Instructions below are based on Mac 10.14 (Sierra) referencing http://sikulix.com/quickstart.

All in a Terminal:

### Pre-requisites

Install JRE 8.
Install the Java language IDE you want to use (Eclipse or IntelliJ).
Install Eclipse or Robot Framework (which uses Python).
Install Python 3.7.

OpenCV install

Get the latest version of OpenCV:

brew install opencv

==> Pouring opencv-4.1.2.mojave.bottle.1.tar.gz
Warning: opencv dependency gcc was built with a different C++ standard
library (libstdc++ from clang). This may cause problems at runtime.
🍺  /usr/local/Cellar/opencv/4.1.2: 753 files, 228MB

Tesseract install

Sikuli IDE from Raiman

To avert Issues in GitHub, disable ClearType in Windows Settings.
Navigate to a folder:

Download the ready-to-use jar (Java Archive):

curl -O https://launchpad.net/sikuli/sikulix/2.0.1/+download/sikulix-2.0.1.jar

Invoke the Sikuli IDE:
java -jar sikulix-2.0.1.jar</pre> The IDE should appear: Alternate command line parameters. -v or -d 3 sets the debug level. -c redirects output from IDE message area to the command line. The IDE running redirect all debug output to a file named SikulixDebug.txt in your home folder. ### Take a picture Create a small picture where you want Sikuli to click or type:
In the IDE, Click “Take a picture” or press a hot-key (Command + Shift + 2).
Drag the upper-left to the lower-right, then release the mouse.

QUESTION: If a dialog disappears with mouse motions, press the keystroke to take a picture of the screen, then use a photo editing program to cut out an area, and paste the little picture into the IDE.

Script

Type the debug level inline:

Debug.on(3) # switch debugging on with level 3
...
Debug.off() # switch debugging off

# inserts a comment.

Press Ctrl+S to save the file as a “.sikuli” file.

PROTIP: A keyboard press is quicker than moving the mouse.

SikuliX Actions and Methods
Open an app:
```
PathFirefox = r"C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe"
App.open(PathFirefox)
```
PROTIP: Instead of the hassle of using double slashes to specify special characters, put a 4 in front of calls to take the backslash and quotes as part of the word/sentence.
Define variables:
```
imageExpected1=3;
```

Define action:

click(SearchImageButton)
wait(imageExpected1)
type("hello")

Type the verification actions.
Save a sample script with comments after # character:

On a Mac:

http://doc.sikuli.org/tutorials/helloworld/helloworld-mac.html

On Windows:

http://doc.sikuli.org/tutorials/helloworld/helloworld-win.html
Run the file.

More actions

http://doc.sikuli.org/genindex.html is an alphabetical index of all methods and command options.

JavaDocs of classes are at
http://nightly.sikuli.de/docs/index.html

https://github.com/RaiMan/SikuliX-2014/tree/master/StuffContainer/testScripts
has several sikulix scripts.

Type S and double-click the SikuliX IDE app to open it.

The IDE should appear:

(Click to open image in full new screen)

The installer installs its own version of Python.

On a Mac, create a version-specific installer folder on your $HOME folder:
```
cd ~
mkdir sikulix-1.1.2-install
cd    sikulix-1.1.2-install
```
Download from http://nightly.sikuli.de right-click and select Save link As … the link that says:

sikulixsetup….jar

At the time of writing, the URL is:

https://oss.sonatype.org/content/groups/public/com/sikulix/sikulixsetup/1.1.2-SNAPSHOT/sikulixsetup-1.1.2-20170316.001623-90-forsetup.jar

By the time you read this, the date in the link will change because the code is actively worked on.
Click the “md5” for the MD5 hash (a33616bac6d4f44785b89a02b110a0f8) to verify download integrity using whatever tool you use.
Expand the installer (in Downloads):
java -jar sikulixsetup-1.1.2.jar</pre> This creates file:
SikuliX-1.1.2-SetupLog. (which reflects what goes to the Terminal) and an empty SetupStuff folder.
Open the txt file and refresh it to see progress.
Click checkboxes for Jython and for Tesseract in the UI pop-up, then Setup Now.

(Click to open in full new screen)
Click Setup Now for:

(Click to open in full new screen)
Click Yes for:

(Click to open in full new screen)
Click No to pop-ups about Mac native libs (jar’s) previously installed into /Users/___/Library/Application Support/Sikulix/SikulixDownload_201610061722/…
Click Yes to download a stand-alone version of Python (No to get Jython 2.5 due to 2.7 UTF-8 warning):

(Click to open in full new screen)

Success!
Click 3 the boxs OK to the pop-up:
Click “OK” to the “Hallo” pop-up.

Clean up installers
In Finder, Move to Trash the installer file sikulixsetup-1.1.0.jar

After Install

QUESTION: How to verify a good install and use the program?
In Finder, move sikulix.app to your user’s Applications folder.
In case you’re curious, view the folders (not necessary unless you run into problems)
- Extensions folder
- Lib folder contains the supporting stuff for Jython and JRuby
- SikulixDownloads
- SikulixDownloads_versionstamp contains
- SikulixLibs_versionstamp contains native libraries
- SikulixStore
- SikulixTesseract
Note different files are downloaded for Windows vs. Mac:
- sikulixjython.jar
- sikulixlibsmac.jar
- sikulix.jar
- sikulixapi.jar

Sample scripts

PROTIP: Search for Sikulix scripts within GitHub:

Here’s one:

https://github.com/lowkorn/SikuliX
Click the Example folder, JavaCompile.sikuli, then JavaCompile.py.
If you intend on updating this repository and contributing changes back to the author, sign-in to your own account and fork the repository under your own account.
PROTIP: Use Git to store Sikuli scripts. Install a Git client.
PROTIP: Create a Git folder to hold files associated with GitHub.

On a Mac:
```
cd ~
mkdir gits
cd gits
```
Create a folder to hold sikuli repositories created when cloning from others:
```
cd ~/gits
mkdir sikulix
cd sikulix
```
You are now in the folder where you clone scripts from other repositories on GitHub.
Create a folder to hold repositories from lowkorn:
```
mkdir lowkorn
cd lowkorn
```

Clone one I’ve found:

git clone https://github.com/lowkorn/SikuliX

Response:

Cloning into 'SikuliX'...
remote: Counting objects: 34, done.
remote: Total 34 (delta 0), reused 0 (delta 0), pack-reused 34
Unpacking objects: 100% (34/34), done.

Repositories cloned locally you can later update with changes made, using commands such as:

git remote add upstream https://github.com/lowkorn/SikuliX
git remote -v
git pull upstream master

Response:

remote: Counting objects: 34, done.
remote: Total 34 (delta 0), reused 0 (delta 0), pack-reused 34
Unpacking objects: 100% (34/34), done.
From https://github.com/lowkorn/SikuliX
        * branch            master     -> FETCH_HEAD
        * [new branch]      master     -> upstream/master

Alternately, to do a two-stage sync per https://help.github.com/articles/syncing-a-fork/

git fetch upstream
git checkout master
git merge upstream/master

On GitHub.com, sign-in to your own account and create a repository (named sikulix-scripts in this example) with a READM.md file.
Clone your own sikulix-scripts repo to your laptop (in this example, substitute “wilsonmar” with your own account name):

On a Mac:
```
cd ~/gits/sikulix
mkdir wilsonmar
cd wilsonmar
git clone https://github.com/wilsonmar/sikulix-scripts
cd ~/sikulix-scripts
```
Into this folder the SikuliX IDE should read and save scripts.

SikuliX Commands

SikuliX can be called by batch scripts from a Terminal/Run command line.

SikuliX recognize both one-character flags and longer options:

sikulix –args -i

-t or –test sikuli-file

-r or –run sikuli-file

-s or –stderr

Videos

jobiaj

Intro and setup 13 Nov 2015

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LRm3fJQ6AU

The Basics shows how to (in Windows) open the Calculator and click a calculation.
Conditional Automation
Conditional Looping
Game Example

Others:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y41vKeGM9U 5 Apr 2016

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-UYoezac4Q

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LRm3fJQ6AU 24 Jul 2016

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2cK85z_8bs Keywords and Misc Stuff</a> 17 Nov 2016

Playlist of Sikuli scripting (no sound)

Sample scripts

Navigate to where you can open a .sikulix file
Switch to an internet browser:
- bpteam’s Firefox browser opens https://sinoptik.ua and search on Windows within a try-except block.
- vincent-tygron/SikuliX contains a full suite of scripts for an app
  https://github.com/vincent-tygron/sikulix-160429 using defined functions
- Excedrin provides several variables to play Windows game Clicker Heroes at
  https://github.com/windows-2048/The-Windows-Intel-Fastest-Mouse-Clicker also at
  https://sourceforge.net/projects/fast-mouse-clicker-pro/ at
  git clone git://git.code.sf.net/p/fast-mouse-clicker-pro/code fast-mouse-clicker-pro-code
- randhier packages maven to install java-language scripts calling sikuli to exercise Spotify
- ntchris provides Windows command line scripts to invoke the script at a specified time to visit Baidu.com
woodplastic has a Windows cmd file to invoke a jar file
```
wait(Pattern("1437608642600.png").similar(0.90),15)
click(Pattern("1437608666644.png").similar(0.90).targetOffset(82,125))
```
- rstormsf’s experiments for captcha
Let me know if you find others.
PROTIP: Additional Sikuli scripts from the internet:
- compile Java
Let me know if you find others.

Alternatives

Java

boter50 clicks http://www.pianotiles.org/ which provides audio feedback The script has a java unit test with eclipse perfs settings

https://github.com/lowrin/sikulix-test/blob/master/src/main/java/Main.java

How to use Sikuli Java API - Part 2

Jython

https://github.com/saint1729/SikuliX-Jython

Robot framework

https://github.com/jaredfin/SikuliXRobotLibrary

Scala

https://github.com/haradakazuy02/SikulixScript

Cucumber: https://github.com/dilcom/sikulix_formatter

Fitnesse: https://github.com/sergebug/SikuliX-fixture

Ruby

https://github.com/rssdev10/sikulix-ide-templates

Resources

http://www.praqma.com/stories/automating-gui-tasks-with-sikuli-and-jenkins/

Gitter channel at
https://gitter.im/RaiMan/SikuliX-2014

https://answers.launchpad.net/sikuli

Websites

http://sikulix.com is the new web page.

Detailed docs are at
http://sikulix-2014.readthedocs.io/en/latest/basicinfo.html#sikulix-system-specifics</a (with source at https://github.com/RaiMan/SikuliX-2014-Docs)

(Ignore abandoned sites:
http://sikulix.weebly.com/quickstart.html and
https://sikulix.wordpress.com)

http://sikulix-2014.readthedocs.io/en/latest/
has the most detail, which are repeated several places:

Installer bits are obtained from Ubuntu
https://launchpad.net/sikuli

https://github.com/wilsonmar/sikuli-scripts

In your Mac’s Finder, get to Applications folder by pressing shift+command+A.

More on IoT

This is one of a series on IoT:

NOTE: Pages about GE’s Predix have been removed.

Wilson Mar

OpenCV SikuliX robot

Why?

Versions

OpenCV install

Tesseract install

Sikuli IDE from Raiman

Script

SikuliX Actions and Methods

More actions

Success!

Clean up installers

After Install

Sample scripts

SikuliX Commands

Videos

Sample scripts

Alternatives

Java

Jython

Robot framework

Scala

Ruby

Resources

Social

Websites

More on IoT

You might also enjoy (View all posts)