Re: scripting Photoshop
Re: scripting Photoshop
- Subject: Re: scripting Photoshop
- From: JollyRoger <email@hidden>
- Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2000 11:59:46 -0600
on 12/12/00 7:42 AM, Leonard Rosenthol at email@hidden wrote:
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Let's stop making stuff off because it sounds good. If you don't
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know the REAL truth - don't start spouting off with crap...If you
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want to do that, find another list to vent on!
Three words: another dissatisfied user.
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At 4:31 PM -0800 12/11/00, email@hidden wrote:
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>> Once a command or function is created to operate by menu
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>> or button within a program, why isn't the Apple Script access to
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> that command
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>> or function simply made available by the developers?
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>
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> Because Adobe apparently (a) didn't think of Applescript during development
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> of Photoshop,
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>
Bzzt - sorry, thanks for playing!
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>
Not only did Adobe think about AppleScript during the
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development of the Photoshop Actions architecture, but if you
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actually LOOKED inside of a PS Action, you'd find that it uses the
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EXACTLY SAME technology as AppleScript (event classes, ID's, lists,
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etc.)
Oh, I see, they decided not to provide that support outside of Photoshop
for the benefit of their users.
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> (b) implemented their own internal-only and therefore very
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> limited scripting system instead, and
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>
Again, WRONG!
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>
You will find that the Photoshop Actions architecture is
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actually MORE powerful than AppleScript, because they looked at AS's
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limitations and flaws (like a single flat namespace) and addressed
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them in it's implementation.
And they decided not to provide access to this "more powerful" support in an
external Applescript implementation. I guess this was for the benefit of
users too.
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> (c) would rather be lazy and let third
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> parties do all the Applescript work.
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>
This is actually Cal's fault more than Adobe's.
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>
Originally (PS4) there WERE plans for REAL AppleScript
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support (since hooking up the two architectures is pretty trivial
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given their similarity) - BUT Cal came to Adobe (and has many times
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since) to convince them NOT to do their own scripting support because
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that would take away his livelihood (aka Photoscripter).
So Cal thwarted built-in Applescript support in one of the most popular
graphics applications for Mac so that he would be able to continue charging
$300+ for his third-party app. The end result?
a) Users that do not know about Photoscripter are miffed when they learn
that this wonderful graphics app flat-out sucks in the Applescript
department.
b) Users that do know of Photoscripter (and have the money to pay for it
after unloading their wallet on Photoshop) pay out the wazoo for it.
Thanks, Cal. This is definitely better for users.
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Since users were happy, and Adobe could put engineers on other features that
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more people could use, that was fine with them - common business sense.
Seems to me the reason this thread started was that users aren't happy about
the situation. But who am I to say - I'm just a user. ;D
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> What you end up with is scripting
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> support that costs dearly, and isn't as good as it could be if it were built
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> into the app.
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>
Actually, I would argue that Cal & Eric did a BETTER job than
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Adobe's engineers would have done at the time since they had MUCH
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more experience with AS/scripting than almost anyone working on
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Photoshop or related technologies did.
How would you know? Adobe never implemented built-in support, so you have
nothing to compare it to. That's purely speculation.
Meanwhile, people are forced to fork over big money for support that
arguably could be included with the product.
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Today, of course, Adobe has some GREAT engineers (Sue and
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Andy) to address the scripting aspects of Adobe products - the
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functionality in Illustrator 9 being the result!
That's great to hear. Now they should get started working on Photoshop...
JR