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Basic AppleScript Dialog:

display dialog "Your text here" with icon stop buttons {"OK"} default button {"OK"} giving up after 5

'giving up after 5' will automatically close the script after the indicated interval of time has elapsed.

HTML Anchor Code

Here is a sample of how to write code to link one part of your blog page to another:

<a name = "By Email">[optional text]</a> --place this where you want the link to go <a href = "#By Email">By Email</a> --this is the actual link

more HTML

HTML Code to Link to Other Web Pages

Here is a sample of code to link to another page. this is similar to the anchor code, except that the destination code is the url of the destination site:

<a href= "www.webSite.
com"> Website Name</a>

--just replace "www.webSite.
com"
with the actual url destination site and replace 'Website Name' with the prompt that the user will see.
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AppleScript Note:

It might be interesting to those of you who are AppleScript enthusiasts that the HyperCard (HyperTalk) project was the prototype back in the '80's of what became the system-wide Applescript language (akin to JavaScript) that is in use today.
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Trapping for List Dialog Errors

With 'List Dialog' type dialogs, since errors cannot be intercepted in an 'on error' handler, there is no 'normal' way to trap for 'Cancel' which, of course, would result in some sort of undesirable error dialog such as 'User cancelled. Error number -128'. Here is an example of one simple way I have found to trap for this type of error: set x to (choose from list {"Joe","Amy",
"Bill"} with prompt "Choose a record:")
if x is false then
else
set targetItem to (x as text)
show every record whose cell "Name" contains x
end if
When the user clicks on 'Cancel', the variable x is assigned the boolean value false. So all you have to do is set up a conditional to deal with that and to perform the usual statements otherwise.

Learning AppleScript

Create Multiple Folders with Terminal

If you are more of a techy kind of person and are comfortable with using Terminal, here is a script you can use to easily create multiple folders:

First, for a single folder, type in: mkdir "Folder 1" --or whatever you want to name your folder, this creates a new directory, which, in effect is a new folder. To place multiple items in the 'Documents' folder: cd/Users/ Administrator/ Documents mkdir "Folder 1" "Folder 2" "Folder 3" To quickly create multiple folders, create a text file with the desired folder names (as many as you want) and name it something like 'folderList .txt'. Next type this in Terminal: cat folderList.txt |xargs mkdir Or you could create folders with the same prefix by entering: mkdir "Invoices " {"Corporate", "Individual", "Pro-Bono"}

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Mac LC III (1994), the first Mac that I ever owned, the CD-Rom and Zip drive were added much later.

Mac LC III (1994), the first Mac that I ever owned, the CD-Rom and Zip drive were added much later.

Basic HTML

Here is an example of a very simple HTML document:

<html>
<head>
<title>Basic HTML Document</title>
</head>
<body>
Your text goes here
</body>
</html>

more HTML

Dialogs for Lists

Apple Modern iMac Flat ScreenIn this post, we will deal with situations when you want to choose from multiple options within a list. You can have lists that are preset, such as choosing from a list of months of the year, for instance, or perhaps a list such as that which might be generated from a database program when certain criteria are specified (ie names beginning with the surname Bill).

Take a look at this example:

set theName to (choose from list {"John", "Joe", "Bill"})
if theName is false then
display dialog "You clicked cancel to exit." with icon stop buttons {"Exit"} default button {"Exit"}
else
set theName to (item 1 of theName)
display dialog theName with icon note buttons {"Info"} default button {"Info"}
end if

–first note in the first line that ‘choose from list’ prompts you to choose from the three names given {“John”, “Joe”, “Bill”}. the name chosen is assigned to the variable ‘theName’.

–if the user clicks cancel from a ‘choose from list’ dialog such as this, then the variable ‘theName’ takes on the value false indicating that the user decided not to make a choice of the items listed in the dialog.

–if the user makes a choice, say for instance “Bill”, then ‘theName’ takes on that value and can be used for further script execution.

Adapting the previous dialog, assuming you had a list of items (whatever criteria relevant to what you want) compiled from a database of your own design, in this case we will call the list ‘recentOrders’, a list of customer names who have ordered products or services from you in recent months. Another version of the list dialog that could be used based on these premises:

set recentOrders to recentOrdersArray as list
try
set recentCustomer to (choose from list recentOrders)
if recentCustomer ≠ false then
set recentCustomer to (item 1 of recentCustomer)
set scriptAction to button returned of (display dialog "Get information for last order from '" & recentCustomer & "' ?" with icon note buttons {"Cancel","Info"} default button {"Info"})
display dialog "Info for last order from: " & recentCustomer
--here you would return to the user the info from your database on 'recentCustomer'
end if
on error
end try

–here, we choose a particular item (customer) from ‘recentOrders’. next, if we do not cancel execution, the variable ‘recentCustomer’ is assigned. if we do not cancel the next request dialog, the data on the requested customer can be displayed (based upon info stored in whatever the referenced database).

As list type dialogs deviate from the standard dialogs dealt with up until now, it is important to note that, although computers are supposed to follow some sort of logic, you sometimes have to ‘go with the flow’ on things that don’t seem to follow that logic.

I have tried to emphasize from the beginning, that the whole process of learning how to AppleScript builds upon itself. In my coming posts, I will continue to try to make things easier to grasp by using a step-by-step approach, as I have found it effective in building my AppleScript repertoire.

I hope everyone has found this post useful in furthering their knowledge of scripting with AppleScript. If you do not understand the basics of this post, please see my recent posts at the bottom of the page, as they are the basis of understanding the more complex ones.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6006084025483872237

video.google.com/

As always, if you have any questions or comments, contact me at: hyperscripter@gmail.com or http://twitter.com/hyperscripter or to subscribe, click the By Email link at the top of the page

If you find this post useful, check out this one: More on List Dialogs

254 comments to Dialogs for Lists

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Create Multiple Folders with Terminal

If you are more of a techy kind of person and are comfortable with using Terminal, here is a script you can use to easily create multiple folders:

First, for a single folder, type in: mkdir "Folder 1" --or whatever you want to name your folder, this creates a new directory, which, in effect is a new folder. To place multiple items in the 'Documents' folder: cd/Users/ Administrator/ Documents mkdir "Folder 1" "Folder 2" "Folder 3" To quickly create multiple folders, create a text file with the desired folder names (as many as you want) and name it something like 'folderList.txt'. Next type this in Terminal: cat folderList.txt |xargs mkdir Or you could create folders with the same prefix by entering: mkdir "Invoices " {"Corporate", "Individual", "Pro-Bono"}

AppleScript 1-2-3

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An AppleScript to Verify a Date

Run this in the Script Editor:

set dateRecord to (current date)
set defaultDate to (date string of dateRecord)
try
set apptDate to text returned of (display dialog "Enter appointment date:" default answer defaultDate buttons {"Set"} default button {"Set"})
set datetext to apptDate as text
date apptDate --if an invalid date is entered, the next dialog is aborted and it triggers the error alert below.
display dialog datetext & " is a valid date." with icon note buttons {"OK"} default button {"OK"}
on error
set alertText to "An error has occurred!"
set messageText to quote & datetext & quote & " is an invalid date."
display alert alertText message messageText as warning buttons {"OK"} default button "OK" giving up after 15
return
end try