AutoKey is a text replacement and hotkey utility. It allows you to manage collection of phrases or other text, and assign abbreviations and hotkeys to these phrases allowing you to insert them on demand into whatever program you are using. This is the most basic functionality, and is similar to a well-known Windows utility called AutoHotkey.
AutoKey works by sending and receiving keyboard events via the X server. As such it is compatible with any version of Linux running an X server that has the RECORD extension available/enabled. Full unicode support is provided and it should in theory work with any keyboard layout.
This new version has been totally rewritten, along with having many new features, including a full-featured GUI for managing the configuration.
In depth:
- Phrases can be collected into folders.
- Folders can also be assigned abbreviations and hotkeys, allowing you choose a phrase from the folder on entering the abbreviation/hotkey
- Regular expressions can be used to filter windows by their title, to excludes hotkeys/abbreviations from triggering in certain applications
- Phrases or folders can be attached to the tray icon menu, allowing you to select them without assigning a hotkey or abbreviation
- A predictive mode can be enabled on a phrase-by-phrase basis. AutoKey will then suggest matching phrase(s) as you type a configurable number of characters from the beginning of the phrase (see screenshot below)
- AutoKey can track your usage patterns and present the most frequently used items at the top of the phrase menu
- A plugin framework provides the ability to extend AutoKey
- An import facility allows users of AutoKey 0.40.x to import their existing abbreviations
This release is essentially a beta, but it is thoroughly unit-tested and should be trouble free. We are also looking for someone with experience in Debian packaging to package the application, which is released under GPL v3 (naturally).
Visit the SourceForge.net download page to download the source code, which is written entirely in Python and can be run as is (by running the autokey.sh shell script). Ensure that you have the required packages installed as listed on the release notes page.
Potential future features:
- Autocorrect and spell checking as-you-type (in ANY application)
- Automatic recognition and storage of frequently-typed sentences (using the Python Natural Language Toolkit)
Any comments/criticism/patches welcomed
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Originally Posted by marshag63
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