I'm scripting iTunes with applescript using UI scripting. Depending on what I'm doing an iTunes notification will appear, at which point I need to handle it. The name of the window is AXWindow: "", and I can't seam to get applescript to handle it. I've tried using the literal "", I've tried defining a variable to "", I've tried both cases with escape characters, and I've tried getting the name of the frontmost process.
tell application "System Events"
set processName to name of front window
end tell
tell button "whatever" of window processName
click
end tell
But that comes up with "error "System Events got an error: Can't get window 1. Invalid Index."" Any help on this would be greatly appreciated.
You can do something like this:
tell application "iTunes" to activate
tell application "System Events"
tell process "iTunes"
set xxx to first UI element whose role description is "dialog"
end tell
end tell
Or to find them all:
tell application "iTunes" to activate
tell application "System Events"
tell process "iTunes"
set xxx to every UI element
end tell
end tell
Well, usually notifications or user dialogs will show up as the frontmost window and stay on top of the other windows of the same application until the user (or the script) clicks something.
Thus, the dialog window (if there is any) should be accessible via the specifier window 1. You can then further check if that really is the window you're interested in by reading its properties:
tell application "System Events" to tell application process "iTunes"
properties of window 1
end tell
Related
I have an AppleScript that sends focus to zoom.us:
tell application "System Events" to tell process "zoom.us"
set frontmost to true
end tell
Instead of hard-coding the process name (ie "zoom.us"), I would like to send focus to whatever process has been full-screened. How can AppleScript be used to find the title of a full-screened app assuming it can?
I want to get the foreground window title in macOS.
I have tried using AppleScript for this, it works but is very slow.
Here is the AppleScript code:
tell application "System Events"
set frontApp to name of first application process whose frontmost is true
end tell
tell application frontApp
if the (count of windows) is not 0 then
set window_name to name of front window
end if
end tell
It takes a lot of time when we run this using Java.
Is there any other efficient solution to this?
I haven't used Java in ages, so I don't remember how it accesses frameworks (assuming I ever knew), but the framework you want is Quartz Window Services. These methods give you access to the window server, which manages all of the onscreen windows.
This AppleScript code works for me using the latest version of macOS Mojave.
For me, this AppleScript code is lightning fast.
try
tell application "System Events" to tell (process 1 whose it is frontmost) ¬
to tell (window 1 whose value of attribute "AXMain" is true) ¬
to set windowTitle to value of attribute "AXTitle"
end try
I try to get the title of an app (and copy it as a var)
Here is my code so far but this is failing
tell application "app"
activate
end tell
tell application "System Events"
set frontApp to name of first application process whose frontmost is true
end tell
tell application frontApp
if the (count of windows) is not 0 then
set window_name to name of front window
end if
end tell
Result :
error "app got an error: every window doesn’t understand the “count” message." number -1708 from every window
The error message suggests that the frontmost application is not scriptable.
The only way to target a non-scriptable application's windows is via the properties of [application] process objects from the System Events context - not via its application object (only scriptable application objects have windows elements):
tell application "app"
activate
end tell
tell application "System Events"
# Get the frontmost app's *process* object.
set frontAppProcess to first application process whose frontmost is true
end tell
# Tell the *process* to count its windows and return its front window's name.
tell frontAppProcess
if count of windows > 0 then
set window_name to name of front window
end if
end tell
Why does the following Applescript hide Script Editor?
tell application "Last.fm" to launch
tell application "System Events" to tell process "Last.fm" to keystroke "h" using command down
This code I found will hide "Last.Fm", but also hides Script Editor. Ideally, I want to replace the keystroke "h" with a keystroke "w" but then I get an error:
The document can’t be closed while the script is running.
Why does the script I wrote effect Script Editor?
I don't have Last.fm, so I tried this:
tell application "TextEdit" to launch
delay 2
tell application "System Events" to tell process "TextEdit" to keystroke "h" using command down
And sure enough, it's true, TextEdit was hidden but so was Script Editor.
Then I tried this:
tell application "TextEdit" to launch
tell application "TextEdit" to activate
delay 2
tell application "System Events" to tell process "TextEdit" to keystroke "h" using command down
TextEdit was hidden, but Script Editor was not. So I would guess that this will help in your code too. Having the target app frontmost appears to be crucial (which makes a certain amount of sense, after all).
What is the functionality you're trying to achieve here? Is this the whole script? You want last.fm to launch, and then, ideally, to close the window?
tell application "System Events" to tell process
Doesn't work because it is highly misleading - it will not actually direct a keystroke to a particular application, the keystroke goes wherever it would go when it's hit regardless of the "tell process" statement, which is annoying.
I don't use last.fm, but either of these works for me:
tell application "TextEdit"
launch
activate
end tell
delay 0.1
tell application "System Events"
keystroke "w" using command down
end tell
or
tell application "TextEdit"
launch
activate
end tell
delay 0.1
tell application "System Events"
click menu item "Close" of menu 1 of menu bar item "File" of menu bar 1
end tell
Note that if you plan to run the script from a key command or the script menu, and don't want it to steal focus to last.fm, you can have it launch, close the window (or hide it), and then return you to the front app when the script was run:
set appPath to the path to the frontmost application
tell application "Finder"
set appName to the name of file appPath
set appName to text 1 thru ((offset of "." in appName) - 1) of appName
end tell
tell application "TextEdit"
launch
activate
end tell
delay 0.1
tell application "System Events"
keystroke "w" using command down
end tell
tell application appName to activate
So I have a very basic Applescript here that basically hides all my social networking related apps, and then a similar one that unhides them. Problem is that if one of these apps isn't running then the entire thing halts at that line and won't set the ones below that line to hidden either.
Here's the script:
tell application "System Events" to set visible of process "Twitter" to false
tell application "System Events" to set visible of process "Wedge" to false
tell application "System Events" to set visible of process "Facebook" to false
tell application "System Events" to set visible of process "Adium" to false
tell application "System Events" to set visible of process "Messages" to false
Am I doing this the wrong way? Do I have to check to see if each one of these is running first, or is there some way to get it to continue with the script either way?
EDIT: Experiencing the same thing with this script, which I use with an Alfred hotkey to quit specific apps and start the screensaver when I leave work:
tell application "Adium" to quit
tell application "Messages" to quit
tell application "1Password" to quit
tell application "iTunes" to quit
tell application "ScreenSaverEngine" to activate
So basically if iTunes - for instance - isn't running then the screensaver will not start, but the 3 apps before that line will all quit.
You can wrap each statement in a try block so it will fail silently:
set myApps to {"iTunes", "1Password"}
repeat with anApp in myApps
try
tell application anApp to quit
end try
end repeat
You Could use the try command as specified above and use on error do nothing to do it.
Hint: with the [Enhanced Application Object Model][1] you can also do things like this:
if application "iTunes" is running then
tell application "iTunes" to quit
end if
or
tell application "iTunes"
if it is running then
pause
end if
end tell
[ How to check in AppleScript if an app is running, without launching it - via osascript utility ]