AppleScript: Change Font of Every Selected Character Randomly - macos

Question

For a project for children I would need a script, which allows me to select a text (let's say in word) of which every character is changed to a random font out of a pool of fonts.
Would appreciated help very much - to be honest I do not have a clue where to start.
Thank you!

Answer 1

Here's where to start. Apple includes on everyone's computer a bunch of pre-made applescripts. One of them is called "Crazy Message Text" and when run it asks you to type in a short message. When complete it opens a new email and types that message into the email in a variety of fonts/colors/sizes. So that would be a good place to start because it shows how to do much of what you need. Here's the script but you can find in on your computer in the /Library/Scripts/ folder. You should look through those scripts. There's a lot that can be learned in that folder.
property font_list : {"American Typewriter", "American Typewriter Light", "American Typewriter Bold", "American Typewriter Condensed", "American Typewriter Condensed Light", "American Typewriter Condensed Bold", "Arial", "Arial Italic", "Arial Bold", "Arial Bold Italic", "Arial Black", "Baskerville", "Baskerville Italic", "Baskerville SemiBold", "Baskerville Bold", "Baskerville SemiBold Italic", "Baskerville Bold Italic", "Big Caslon Medium", "Comic Sans MS", "Comic Sans MS Bold", "Copperplate", "Copperplate Light", "Copperplate Bold", "Didot", "Didot Italic", "Didot Bold", "Futura Medium", "Futura Medium Italic", "Futura Condensed Medium", "Futura Condensed ExtraBold", "Geneva", "Gill Sans", "Gill Sans Italic", "Gill Sans Light", "Gill Sans Light Italic", "Gill Sans Bold", "Gill Sans Bold Italic", "Herculanum", "Lucida Grande", "Lucida Grande Bold", "Marker Felt Thin", "Marker Felt Wide", "Optima Regular", "Optima Italic", "Optima Bold", "Optima Bold Italic", "Optima ExtraBlack", "Papyrus", "Verdana", "Verdana Italic", "Verdana Bold", "Verdana Bold Italic", "Zapfino"}
property low_color : 0
property high_color : 65535
property low_fontsize : 36
property minimum_size : 9
property high_fontsize : 72
property this_text : "Happy Birthday!"
activate
repeat
display dialog "Enter the text:" & return & return & ¬
"Minimum Character Size: " & (low_fontsize as Unicode text) & return & ¬
"Maximum Character Size: " & (high_fontsize as Unicode text) default answer this_text buttons {"Cancel", "Set Prefs", "Continue"} default button 3
copy the result as list to {user_text, button_pressed}
if the button_pressed is "Set Prefs" then
repeat
try
display dialog "Enter the minimum character size to use:" & return & return & ¬
"(Must be at least " & (minimum_size as Unicode text) & ")" default answer low_fontsize
set the user_size to text returned of the result as integer
if the user_size is greater than or equal to the minimum_size then
set low_fontsize to the user_size
exit repeat
end if
on error
beep
end try
end repeat
repeat
try
display dialog "Enter the maximum character size to use:" & return & return & ¬
"(Must be greater than " & (low_fontsize as Unicode text) & ")" default answer high_fontsize
set the user_size to text returned of the result as integer
if the user_size is greater than the low_fontsize then
set high_fontsize to the user_size
exit repeat
end if
on error
beep
end try
end repeat
else
if user_text is not "" then
set this_text to the user_text
exit repeat
end if
end if
end repeat
tell application "Mail"
activate
set this_message to make new outgoing message at end of outgoing messages with properties {content:this_text, visible:true}
tell content of this_message
repeat with i from 1 to the length of this_text
repeat
try
set this_font to some item of the font_list
set font_size to random number from low_fontsize to high_fontsize
set red_value to random number from low_color to the high_color
set green_value to random number from low_color to the high_color
set blue_value to random number from low_color to the high_color
tell character i
set font to this_font
set size to font_size
end tell
set the RGB_value to {red_value, green_value, blue_value}
set the color of character i to the RGB_value
exit repeat
end try
end repeat
end repeat
end tell
end tell

Answer 2

If you want to use "Microsoft Word", try this script
tell application "Microsoft Word"
set tc to count characters of selection
set fontNames to font names
set cF to count fontNames
repeat with i from 1 to tc
set thisName to item (random number from 1 to cF) of fontNames
try
tell font object of character i of selection to set name to thisName
end try
end repeat
end tell