When I call uigetdir, how can I enter a directory path using Java Robot?

I'm trying to use Java Robot to enter a directory path into the "Select Directory" pop-up that appears when uigetdir is called.

I've tried the following code but the robot "types" the letter h before the pop-up appears and the letter i appears after the pop-up is manually closed.

import java.awt.AWTException; 
import java.awt.Robot;
import java.awt.event.KeyEvent;

robot = Robot();
robot.keyPress(KeyEvent.VK_H);
robot.keyRelease(KeyEvent.VK_H);

uigetdir;

robot.keyPress(KeyEvent.VK_I);
robot.keyRelease(KeyEvent.VK_I);

What I would want is the robot to type in hi in the "Select Directory" pop-up in the "File Name" field.

I really appreciate any help you can provide.

[Cinimod]

Has anyone stumbled upon a solution for the above question?

Thanks

Answer 1

[Jan]

It is a strange and indriect approach to let the robot remote-control the file selection dialog. If you use a TIMER to let the robot click during the UIGETDIR dialog is open, further timing problems may occur. Therefore I strongly recommend to use another approach. What do you actually want to achieve?

[Cinimod]

I am trying to automate testing a GUI and for this one test case, one of the first steps involves clicking on a "Load File" button. The button uses a callback that eventually opens the dialog box for selecting a directory (via the uigetdir function).

In order to select the file I can either browse to the file via this dialog box or I can type in the full file path in the dialog box's "File Name" space.

For the automated test run, I can imitate clicking on the "Load File" button by using a callback function in my test script. When I do this, the dialog box opens up, but at this point, I am unsure how to select a file via automation.