Apple

There is one more API called API AXUIElementCreateSystemWide() could also be helpful in finding the focused accessibility element regardless of which application is currently active.

Here is the documentation

http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Accessibility/Reference/AccessibilityLowlevel/AXUIElement_h/CompositePage.html#//apple_ref/c/func/AXUIElementCreateSystemWide

and more ADC discussions:

http://lists.apple.com/archives/carbon-dev/2005/Aug/msg00428.html

http://lists.apple.com/archives/accessibility-dev/2006/Jun/msg00012.html

http://lists.apple.com/archives/carbon-dev/2006/Sep/msg00626.html

Chen

From: accessibility-dev-bounces+chen.wang=email@hidden [mailto:accessibility-dev-bounces+chen.wang=email@hidden] On Behalf Of Patti Hoa
Sent: Wednesday, February 11, 2009 2:35 PM
To: Chris Idou
Cc: email@hidden
Subject: Re: Accessibility - currently selected text

Hi Chris,

Accessibility Inspector obtains the element under the mouse via AXUIElementCopyElementAtPosition. Then it asks the element for all of its available attributes, via AXUIElementCopyAttributeNames. For each of the attribute, it then displays the returned value for that attribute.

In your case, it sounds like you are not fetching the UIElement via mouse position. So let's say you have the application UIElement already. Here's what you do:

1. Get the keyboard focused UIElement of the application.

The way to get the keyboard focused UIElement of that application is to ask the application UIElement for its AXFocusedUIElement attribute. If a text field currently has the keyboard focus, then that UIElement would be returned as the value of AXFocusedUIElement.

2. Determine if the AXFocusedUIElement is a text.

See if the AXFocusedUIElement has one of the text AXRole, like AXTextField/AXTextArea. Use AXUIElementCopyAttributeValue to get back the AXRole given an UIElement.

3. Determine if the text is editable, if that's your criteria

Use AXUIElementIsAttributeSettable with AXValue as the parameter to see if this attribute is settable.

4. Ask for the selection via parameterized attribute

Use AXUIElementCopyAttributeValue to get the AXSelectedTextRange. For example, let's say you are looking at a Cocoa text field that contains the words "hello world" and the word "hello" is selected. AXSelectedTextRange should return a range of 0 to 5. Then call AXUIElementCopyParameterizedAttributeNames with that CFRange as a parameter to AXAttributedStringForRange to get back an attribute string containing the word "hello". Alternatively, you can ask for AXStringForRange if you don't care about the attributes of the text.

5. Alternative way to ask for selected text.

Use AXUIElementCopyAttributeValue to get the AXSelectedText. This should also give you back the selected string.

hopefully that helps,

Patti

On Feb 10, 2009, at 7:58 PM, Chris Idou wrote:

I've read the doco and looked at the Accessibility Inspector code, but I'm still struggling with this.

How do I obtain the currently selected text from the currently focused component of the currently active application?

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	>Re: Accessibility - currently selected text (From: Patti Hoa <email@hidden>)