First encounters with AS (was: Re: AS adoption barriers [Starter Kit])
First encounters with AS (was: Re: AS adoption barriers [Starter Kit])
- Subject: First encounters with AS (was: Re: AS adoption barriers [Starter Kit])
- From: Charles Arthur <email@hidden>
- Date: Tue, 25 Sep 2001 15:27:11 +0100
On Tue, 25 Sep 2001 10:57:04 +0100, Mr Tea <email@hidden> wrote:
>
It's a problem of definition. For many people, help is something you ask for
>
when something's gone wrong and you don't know how to fix it, otherwise you
>
ask for information, directions, advice, intstruction, guidance - not help.
Very good point. Though I can see Apple's logic - as in journalism and
especially headlines, "Help" fits in smaller spaces than any of those other
more meaningful words.
>
I didn't discover AppleScript because it was mentioned in the help system. I
>
found it because the Script Editor was right there in the Launcher when I
>
got my first Mac (Performa 5200/System 7.5) out of the box, so I figured it
>
had to be something important, and it was clearly connected to those
>
mysterious 'Automated Tasks' in the Apple Menu...
My first time was on getting OS 8.5 - I think that's it - which included
iDo Script Scheduler Lite. I wondered what a script could be that you would
want to schedule it, and why Apple had thought that so important as to
include a third-party piece of software to do it.
I had done Pascal at university (tr: college) and Cobol and assembler after
that but had really missed the object-oriented boat. It was quite a nice
surprise, some months into AS, to find that I was doing OOP without really
meaning to.
(And doing it badly, of course, but Cobol has this effect. It
lingers like cigarette smoke on clothes.)
The first script I tried to write was to find the space remaining on my
six-partition HD. It seemed like the sort of thing worth doing regularly,
but too boring to do by hand. (In fact the key part of the code, the repeat
loop - repeat with i in the disks - was done by someone on
comp.lang.applescript.)
>
Visibility is the key, and although there is excellent info in the help
>
centre, it just isn't visible enough. Making the script editor and some
>
useful scripts conspicuous on newly installed systems is a start, but
>
having a script menu and scheduler built in to the Mac OS would boost
>
AppleScript's profile far more effectively.
I'll second that, being living proof of how effective that can be.
Charles
----------------------------
http://www.ukclimbing.com : 1000+ British crags, 350+ British climbing
walls - searchable by distance and anything else you care to think of -
with weather forecasts for every one, plus maps, articles, news and
features. Plus Britain's busiest climbing discussion boards. And there's
even a cool shop attached.