MacOS: how to run AppleScript script from a Qt app?

goetz

At least you must call the AppleScript interpreter or create an executable of your script and call it with QProcess.

infoctopus

[quote author="Volker" date="1291395979"]At least you must call the AppleScript interpreter[/quote]

I clearly understand that :) The question is how exactly to do that? code samples would be great

[quote author="Volker" date="1291395979"]or create an executable of your script and call it with QProcess[/quote]

That's not desirable. Some API would be better.

goetz

There is no API in Qt to do that. You must include native API calls (Objective C, most probably) or call some command line tool (osascript) via QProcess.

infoctopus

Of course there's no API in Qt for that :)

goetz

Then I don't understand you problem. What are you trying to do?

infoctopus

I'm asking someone to point out to proper MacOS API or, ideally, some 3rd party Qt lib for that (which, most likely, doesn't exist, but nevertheless).

goetz

This may give you a start:

@
#include <QApplication>
#include <QProcess>

int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
QApplication a(argc, argv);

QString aScript =
        "tell application \"System Events\"\n"
        "    activate\n"
        "    display dialog \"Hello world\"\n"
        "end tell\n";

QString osascript = "/usr/bin/osascript";
QStringList processArguments;
processArguments << "-l" << "AppleScript";

QProcess p;
p.start(osascript, processArguments);
p.write(aScript.toUtf8());
p.closeWriteChannel();
p.waitForFinished();

}
@

goetz

I've added a wiki page (http://developer.qt.nokia.com/wiki/Call_an_AppleScript_from_Qt) in the how to section for this.

goetz

The wiki now contains a sample how to read the output of the script.

infoctopus

Volker, great! thank you

goetz

You're welcome. If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to ask.

infoctopus

Well, I'm thinking about binding Qt's JavaScript to AppleScript, mixing Qt objects and AppleScript-scriptable apps. About executing AppleScript line-by-line. About accessing AppleScript's scripting runtime environment.

goetz

I don't know if that's possible. I doubt one can "translate" JavaScript to AppleScript in that way.

infoctopus

[quote author="Volker" date="1291404790"]I don't know if that's possible. I doubt one can "translate" JavaScript to AppleScript in that way.[/quote]

It depends. For instance the following code

@tell application "System Events"
activate
display dialog "Hello world"
end tell;@

obviously can be expressed in Java/ECMAScript

infoctopus

I mean if we know the object model and grammar of a scripting language, we can tell if some script valid. And subset of features that is common for both scripting languages can be supported

goetz

[quote author="infoctopus" date="1291468109"]I mean if we know the object model and grammar of a scripting language, we can tell if some script valid. And subset of features that is common for both scripting languages can be supported[/quote]

From what I understood, you want to create a transformer app that kind of "translates" JavaScript to/from AppleScript. That seems to be a pretty huge task.

infoctopus

Well, I have own simplified scripting language (and simple IDE for it) that is mapped to JavaScript.
I'm thinking about switching to JavaScript completely, i.e. IDE has to be seriously upgraded.
And also to engane AppleScript as much as possible. For this, own scripting language can be left untouched, but mapping to AppleScript can be added. The problem is that I don't know how to control (exec line by line, debug, etc.) AppleScript execution, if it's possible at all. Most likely I have to dig apple docs

goetz

I don't know if thats possible with AppleScript at all. I wish you good luck for your research!

infoctopus

Volker, thank you :) I think that the task is solvable, but not sure about the amount of time/money needed for the solution, even roughly

tk.fs

Hi Volker, I've tried your solution on Mac OS X 10.9.1 using a simple AppleScript to retrieve a mail subject from Apple Mail. The script needs around 1 sec to execute with the AppleScript Editor application, but around 20-30 secs when using QProcess/osascript. Running osascript from a shell window also needs around 1 sec for the script.

Is this a known problem with QProcess or do you have any idea where this massive delay is coming from?

Thanks,

Thomas