OS Input Capture (oic)

This module adds operating system level keyboard, mouse, and window logging capabilities to your project. Unlike the other loggers available for node, this logger does not require you to be typing in a specific window, it will snag all input keystrokes and mouse button events no matter what application the user currently has active. Additionally this module allows you to take screen shots of any available window on both keyboard and mouse events.

Note

Please make sure to use version 2.0.1 or greater of this package as it fixes a major import error.

Dependencies

Currently this module only works on linux hosts and must be launched with the ability to access /dev/input/, which is generally restricted to root or sudo accounts. Additionally if you would like to be able to capture images of a specific window, you must have the imagemagick command line tool installed on the host machine.

Node

"devDependencies": {
    "babel-cli": "^6.11.4",
    "babel-preset-es2015": "^6.9.0",
    "del": "^2.2.1",
    "gulp": "^3.9.1",
    "gulp-babel": "^6.1.2",
    "jasmine-es6": "^0.2.1"
},
"dependencies": {
    "execa": "^0.4.0",
    "fs-extra": "^0.30.0",
    "inquirer": "^1.1.2",
    "robotjs": "^0.4.4",
    "winston": "^2.2.0"
}

Installation

Install the package through npm

npm -i os-input-capture

Disclaimer

I wrote this module to allow me to start crafting some input data sets for a learning machine project I am tinkering with. That being said, I know this module could be used for some pretty nefarious stuff. All that I ask is that you, as the user of this package, please keep in mind other peoples privacy when writing anything that uses os-input-capture, and most importantly

DO NOT USE THIS MODULE TO BE A JERK

thanks.

Example Usage

Top level convenience class

import oic from 'os-input-capture';
/*
    configuring the options for our desired loggers
    ---
    NOTE: Each logger will use its respective
    configuration values (shown below) if you do not
    explicitly provide you own during instantiation.
*/
let options = {
    keyboardOptions: {
        inputPath: '/dev/input/by-path/platform-i8042-serio-0-event-kbd',
        outputDir: path.resolve(__dirname, 'keyboard')
    },
    mouseOptions: {
        inputPath: '/dev/input/mice',
        outputDir: path.resolve(__dirname, 'mouse')
    },
    windowOptions: {
        outputDir: path.resolve(__dirname, 'window'),
        windowTitle: 'such a title'
    }
}

// picking which loggers to use
let desiredLoggers = ['keyboard', 'mouse', 'window'];

// creating our actual os logger!
let logger = oic.OsInputCapture(desiredLoggers, options);

Creating standalone loggers

All loggers are available for use without the top level OsInputCapture class

// configuration
let keyboardOptions = {
    inputPath: '/dev/input/by-path/platform-i8042-serio-0-event-kbd',
    outputDir: path.resolve(__dirname, 'keyboard')
}

// instantiation
let kbdLogger = oic.KeyboardLogger(keyboardOptions);

How to start logging keys

By default logging is started when the L button is pressed on the keyboard, and stopped (or killed) when the K button is pressed. Currently the mouse logger has to be manually activated as shown below

// creating mouse logger class with default options
let mousey = oic.MouseLogger();
mousey.active = true;

Getting screen shots

If you want to be able to get screen shots of windows, you currently have to use the top level oic.OsInputCapture class, as the MouseLogger and KeyboardLogger classes chain the call to WindowLogger.get() through oic.OsInputCapture.

// main.js
let options = {
    keyboardOptions: {
        inputPath: '/dev/input/by-path/platform-i8042-serio-0-event-kbd',
        outputDir: path.resolve(__dirname, 'keyboard')
    },
    windowOptions: {
        outputDir: path.resolve(__dirname, 'window'),
        windowTitle: 'such a title'
    }
}

let desiredLoggers = ['keyboard', 'window'];

let logger = oic.OsInputCapture(desiredLoggers, options);

Then when L is pressed on the keyboard the following is executed within keyboardLogger.handleKeyboardEvent()

// os-input-capture/keyboard-logger.js
if (!_.isUndefined(this.parent.getWindow)) {
    this.parent.getWindow();
}

which chains back to the following in the parent instance of OsInputCapture

// os-input-capture/os-input-capture.js
getWindow() {
    if (!_.isUndefined(this.windowLogger)) {
        this.windowLogger.get();
    }
}

Testing

Unit testing via jasmine is available via npm test.

License

os-input-capture is Copyright (c) 2016 Brandon DeMello @bdell and licenced under the MIT license. All rights not explicitly granted in the MIT license are reserved. See the included LICENSE file for more details.

github-bdem/os-input-capture