How do I copy a string to the clipboard on Windows using Python?

Question

I\'m trying to make a basic Windows application that builds a string out of user input and then adds it to the clipboard. How do I copy a string to the clipboard using Pytho

Answer 1

In addition to Mark Ransom's answer using ctypes: This does not work for (all?) x64 systems since the handles seem to be truncated to int-size. Explicitly defining args and return values helps to overcomes this problem.

import ctypes
import ctypes.wintypes as w

CF_UNICODETEXT = 13

u32 = ctypes.WinDLL('user32')
k32 = ctypes.WinDLL('kernel32')

OpenClipboard = u32.OpenClipboard
OpenClipboard.argtypes = w.HWND,
OpenClipboard.restype = w.BOOL

GetClipboardData = u32.GetClipboardData
GetClipboardData.argtypes = w.UINT,
GetClipboardData.restype = w.HANDLE

EmptyClipboard = u32.EmptyClipboard
EmptyClipboard.restype = w.BOOL

SetClipboardData = u32.SetClipboardData
SetClipboardData.argtypes = w.UINT, w.HANDLE,
SetClipboardData.restype = w.HANDLE

CloseClipboard = u32.CloseClipboard
CloseClipboard.argtypes = None
CloseClipboard.restype = w.BOOL

GHND = 0x0042

GlobalAlloc = k32.GlobalAlloc
GlobalAlloc.argtypes = w.UINT, w.ctypes.c_size_t,
GlobalAlloc.restype = w.HGLOBAL

GlobalLock = k32.GlobalLock
GlobalLock.argtypes = w.HGLOBAL,
GlobalLock.restype = w.LPVOID

GlobalUnlock = k32.GlobalUnlock
GlobalUnlock.argtypes = w.HGLOBAL,
GlobalUnlock.restype = w.BOOL

GlobalSize = k32.GlobalSize
GlobalSize.argtypes = w.HGLOBAL,
GlobalSize.restype = w.ctypes.c_size_t

unicode_type = type(u'')

def get():
    text = None
    OpenClipboard(None)
    handle = GetClipboardData(CF_UNICODETEXT)
    pcontents = GlobalLock(handle)
    size = GlobalSize(handle)
    if pcontents and size:
        raw_data = ctypes.create_string_buffer(size)
        ctypes.memmove(raw_data, pcontents, size)
        text = raw_data.raw.decode('utf-16le').rstrip(u'\0')
    GlobalUnlock(handle)
    CloseClipboard()
    return text

def put(s):
    if not isinstance(s, unicode_type):
        s = s.decode('mbcs')
    data = s.encode('utf-16le')
    OpenClipboard(None)
    EmptyClipboard()
    handle = GlobalAlloc(GHND, len(data) + 2)
    pcontents = GlobalLock(handle)
    ctypes.memmove(pcontents, data, len(data))
    GlobalUnlock(handle)
    SetClipboardData(CF_UNICODETEXT, handle)
    CloseClipboard()

#Test run
paste = get
copy = put
copy("Hello World!")
print(paste())