Re: Placing data on the clipbaord

[Scott Klement <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Thomas,

For a program to put data on the clipboard, it must be running on the 
same computer.  So you want to load data into the clipboard on Alice's 
PC, then you need a program that's running on Alice's PC that can do that.

A program running on Bob's PC can't put data onto Alice's clipboard, 
(though it could put data on Bob's.) Similarly, a program running on 
Carol's Linux box or David's IBM i box cannot put data on Alice's 
clipboard.  Hope I said that clearly... only a program running on the 
same computer can access the clipboard.

There are many ways to write programs and have them run on someone 
else's computer, of course.  For example, a browser session could load a 
signed Java applet into that browser. Code could therefore be fed from a 
web application sent from a server to the user's web browser where the 
applet could load the data into the clipboard.

Or, a program like IBM i Access (or another 5250 emulator) is running on 
the PC, so it is able to put stuff on the clipboard... but it is 
designed to do so only when the user manually uses the copy/paste 
options that the emulator provides.

You could, of course, write a PC program that sits and waits for data to 
be sent over the network from your IBM i program, and when it receives 
that data, it could put it on the clipboard.  (Though, make sure you 
consider security if you do something like that.)

But, I hope you can see the major logic flaw in your original 
question...  a program running on IBM i cannot insert data into a 
Windows clipboard simply because it's running on a different computer.




On 10/9/2014 9:41 AM, Thomas Garvey wrote:
> Hi, everyone,
>
> Is it possible to have a green screen IBM i program place data on a PC's
> clipboard?
>
> I have a client that uses a web-based order processing application that
> runs on an IBM i server.
> However, the web based application is unchangeable.  No code available.
>
> They do have green screen capability and knowledge of the application's
> infrastructure and database.
> So, they can have a PC user with a web browser into their order
> processing application AND a green screen client running simultaneously.
>
> Can a green screen program be written that does X and then automatically
> places it's results on the clipboard so the user can simply Alt-Tab to
> the browser
> and paste the results into the web application?  If the green screen
> program can place data on the clipboard, maybe it could perform the
> Alt-Tab and Ctrl-V (paste) as well?
>
> Yes, I know they could do it manually (select the data from the green
> screen using the mouse/keyboard and press Ctrl-C to place it on the
> clipboard in the first place).
> But they would like to skip the manual copy to clipboard step at least.
>
> Can it be done? How?
>
>
>
> Best Regards,
>
> Thomas Garvey