TypePaste

Pastes clipboard data into the current active window by emulating actual keypresses (using PyAutoGUI).

Assumes US Keyboard layout.

Requirements

• Python 3 (for typepaste.py, base32e.py)
• Python 2 (for base32lcd.py -- target environment assumed to have older Python)
• pip
• virtualenv

Installation

0. Clone the repository.

1. Create a virutalenv named venv in the folder:

   virtualenv venv
   

2. Activate virtualenv and install dependencies:

   . venv/bin/activate
   pip install -r requirements.txt
   

3. Edit typepaste.applescript and set LOCATION to where the TypePaste repo was checked out:

   do shell script "/bin/bash -s <<'EOF'
       LOCATION=~/Projects/typepaste/
       . ${LOCATION}/venv/bin/activate && ${LOCATION}/typepaste.py --batch-size 10
   EOF"
   

   Repeat for *.applescript. You can also increase the number of characters printed at once via adjusting --batch-size 10.

4. Open typepaste.applescript in Mac OS Script Editor and in Preferences tick Show script menu in menu bar.

5. In Menu bar click Open Scripts Folder -> Open User Scripts Folder and copy *.applescript there.

You can run TypePaste from the menu bar.

FAILSAFE

Move mouse cursor to top left corner of the screen to abort typepasting.

Methods for transferring files

A.) Use typepaste-file-base32.applescript

For larger files you might want to split the file into smaller chunks (see B. and C.).

1. Open a text editor with a new empty file.
2. Start the script. It opens a file selector window to pick a file. Pick a file.
3. Next it displays a dialog that after clicking continue it will wait for 3 seconds, so you have time to make the window active you want to paste. Click continue.
4. Make the window active you want to paste to.
5. FAILSAFE: Remember, moving the mouse pointer to the upper left corner of the screen will terminate pasting.
6. Save the file and quit the editor.
7. Use base32lcd.py (or its content, main part is 2 lines, plus 2 lines of imports) to decode the file.

B.) Copy file contents

1. Copy file contents to clipboard.
2. Use the typepaste-base32.applescript or if you are a bit more paranoid the typepaste-base32-lowercase.applescript script to paste the data as base32 encoded string.
3. Use the provided base32lcd.py or any other base32 decoder to decode the contents. For other decoders make sure all characters are uppercase and remove white space.

C.) Copy multiple files

1. Create an archive (e.g., tar.gz).
2. Base32 encode the archive, e.g., by using the provided base32e.py.
3. Use split to split the files, e.g., split -b 2000 files.tar.gz.b32.
4. Copy contents to clipboard, e.g., cat xaa | pbcopy.
5. Use typepaste.applescript to copy to the end of an open file at the destination.
6. Repeat for all parts (e.g., xaa, xab, xac,...).
7. Base32 decode the resulting file (e.g., with the provided base32lcd.py).
8. Extract the archive.

Troubleshooting

1. Check target content for invalid characters:

   cat files.tar.gz.b32 | sed 's/[0-9A-Z=]//g'
   

   or if the file was created with lowercased data:

   cat files.tar.gz.b32 | sed 's/[0-9a-z=]//g'