pywin_contextmenu

A simple and intuitive way to add your custom scripts to your windows right click contextmenu.

Installation

You can download the pywin_contextmenu.py file from this repository (https://raw.githubusercontent.com/naveennamani/pywin_contextmenu/master/pywin_contextmenu.py) and place the file in your scripts folder.

Or you can install this package from pypi using

pip install pywin-contextmenu

and simply import in your scripts.

import pywin_contextmenu as pycm

Detailed Usage

import pywin_contextmenu as pycm

# create a group
group1 = pycm.ContextMenuGroup("My python scripts")

# convert your script into executable command
script_cmd = pycm.python_script_cmd("scripts/clean_empty_folders.py", rel_path = True, hide_terminal = True)

# create the item
item1 = pycm.ContextMenuItem("Clean empty folders", script_cmd)

# add item to the group
group1.add_item(item1)
# or
group1.add_items([item1])

# get root_key
rk = pycm.get_root(pycm.UserType.CURR_USER, pycm.RootType.DIR_BG)

# Create the group and test
group1.create(rk)

########################
# In a more pythonic way
########################
pycm.ContextMenuGroup("Group 1", items = [
    pycm.ContextMenuItem("Open CMD", "cmd.exe"),
    pycm.ContextMenuItem("Open CMD 2", "cmd.exe")
]).create(
    pycm.get_root(pycm.UserType.CURR_USER, pycm.RootTYpe.DIR_BG)
)

Simple and easy usage

import pywin_contextmenu as pycm

def test_function(file_or_dir_name):
    print(file_or_dir_name)
    input("Press ENTER to continue")


# create the nested groups to execute direct commands, python functions
# and python scripts
cmgroup = pycm.ContextMenuGroup("Group 1", items = [
    pycm.ContextMenuItem("Open cmd", "cmd.exe"),
    pycm.PythonContextMenuItem("Test py", test_function),
    pycm.ContextMenuGroup("Group 2", items = [
        pycm.PythonContextMenuItem("Python script test", pycm.python_script_cmd(
            "example.py", rel_path = True, hide_terminal = True
        ))
    ])
])

# create the group for the current user to be shown on right click of
# directory, directory background and for python files
cmgroup.create_for(pycm.UserType.CURR_USER, [
    pycm.RootType.DIR,
    pycm.RootType.DIR_BG,
    pycm.RootType.FILE.format(FILE_TYPE = ".py")
])

API

The script depends on two main classes ContextMenuItem and ContextMenuGroup.

ContextMenuItem

This is the menu item which triggers and launches the command when clicked in the contextmenu. The signature of this class is

ContextMenuItem(
    item_name, # name of the item to be shown 
    command, # command to be executed when selected
    item_reg_key = "", # registry key associated with the item
                       # (if not given will be treated as item_name)
    icon = "", # path to an icon to be shown with the item
    extended = False # set to True if the item is to be shown when right clicked with shift button
)

Methods

.create(root_key: HKEYType) - Adds the item to the registry at the given registry root_key. Obtain the root_key using get_root utility method.

.create_for(user_type: UserType, root_type: List[RootType]) - Adds the items for given user and given root locations.

.delete(root_key: HKEYType) - Delete the item at the given root_key.

.delete_for(user_type: UserType, root_type: List[RootType]) - Delete the items for the given user and the root locations.

Note: The .delete is not preferred as any root_key can be passed. Instead please use .delete_for method as the registry keys to be deleted will be automatically and safely deleted.

PythonContextMenuItem

This class inherits ContextMenuItem and converts a python function to an executable command. Simply pass the python function as python_function argument.

PythonContextMenuItem(
    item_name,
    python_function: Callable[[str], Any], # callable python function which should take file/folder name as the single argument
    item_reg_key = "",
    icon = "",
    extended = False
)

ContextMenuGroup

This class groups multiple items and subgroups.

ContextMenuGroup(
    group_name, # name of the group to be shown
    group_reg_key = "", # registry key associated with the group
    icon = "", # path to an icon to be shown with the group
    extended = False, # set to True if the group is to be shown when right clicked with shift button
    items = [] # items to be displayed on this group
)

Methods

For adding items or groups to a group instance call add_item/add_items method of the class.

ContextMenuGroup.add_item(item)
# or
ContextMenuGroup.add_item(subgroup)
# for multiple items
ContextMenuGroup.add_items([item1, item2, subgroup1, subgroup2])

Note: The same functionality will be achieved if the items are passed during the creation of ContextMenuGroup object by passing the items using items keyword.

Then to create the group and add to the contextmenu simply call .create with the key obtained from get_root function as argument.

ContextMenuGroup.create(root_key) # Create the group and add to contextmenu

The class also has method .create, .create_for, .delete and .delete_for methods which are same as that of the methods of ContextMenuItem.

Note: All methods of ContextMenuItem and ContextMenuGroup returns self, so they can be chained. Adding items to ContextMenuGroup will not add them to the contextmenu/registry unless .create method is called.

Utility methods available

• RootType - an Enum for choosing where the context menu item/group will be displayed
• UserType - an Enum for choosing whether to add the context menu for current user or for all users
• get_root(user_type: UserType, root_type: RootType, file_type: str) - creates/opens the registry key for the selected user_type and root_type. If the root_type is RootType.FILE then file_type argument is required and indicates the file extention.
• python_script_cmd(script_path, rel_path = False, hide_terminal = False) - a utility function to convert a given script_path to an executable command.
• delete_item(root_key, item_reg_key) - deletes the item_reg_key at the given root_key registry. Warning: Please ensure you're not deleting the keys at the top level registry keys (e.g. HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT, HKEY_CURRENT_USER etc.)

TODO

• Add a way to handle passing of multiple files/folders to the selected script without launching multiple instances of the script.

---

© Naveen Namani