Re: debugging folder action scripts
Re: debugging folder action scripts
- Subject: Re: debugging folder action scripts
- From: Sander Tekelenburg <email@hidden>
- Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 05:06:32 +0200
At 20:20 -0500 UTC, on 2004/04/27, Adam K. Wuellner wrote:
[...]
>
I am a little dismayed to see very little in the way of debugging
>
features in Script Editor.
Take a look at some of the third-party editors, like "Smile" or "Script
Debugger".
Also, you can encapsulate your code in a try block, have that catch errors
and write them to a log. You'd have to write all that code yourself though
(but it's a good exercise ;) and you'll end up with a handler that you'll use
more often) and you'd only catch errors, not all events. Something along
these lines:
try
-- do stuff
on error m number n
my errHandler(1, n, m)
end try
try
-- do more stuff
on error m number n
my errHandler(2, n, m)
end try
try
-- do more stuff
on error m number n
my errHandler(3, n, m)
end try
on errHandler(errNum, n, m)
set the_log to open for access [path to file] with write permission
try
write errNum & tab & n & tab & m & return to the_log starting at eof
close access the_log
end try
close access the_log
end errHandler
How effective this is will mostly depend on the amount of code of your
script. If you need to encapsulate 20 statements in try blocks, it sucks... ;)
Note that I use this approach mostly for idle handlers; scripts that run
continusouly, under changing circumstances. (I have it also insert the
date&time of the error in that case.) I haven't used it for FolderActions,
but it seems to me it would be useful there too. Same with droplets.
You'd have to remember to look in the log now and then of course. If you tend
to forget, you could have the script open it automatically, or beep at you or
something like that.
>
I, unluckily, picked a folder action as my
>
first AppleScript project, for which the code sits in an 'on adding
>
folder items' block. When I ran the code, it was very difficult to
>
tell where it was failing. No errors, despite not getting the desired
>
results. I wrapped most of it in an 'on run' block in a new script,
Can be useful if you know what you're doing. With this approach, I'd advice
to only grab portions of your script though. Make sure each little part is
correct. If after that you're still getting errors, you know that the problem
is likely to be specifically related to the special circumstances of the
script (in this case its FolderAction-ness). By then you _know_ you need
better debugging tools.
>
and was treated to a bunch of informative error messages when I ran it
>
from Script Editor (instead of having the folder action trigger the
>
'real' script).
The problem with that approach is, or at least can be if you're not fully
aware of it, that you then run the script under different circumstances, so
the part of your code where that matters will generate different
errors/successes.
--
Sander Tekelenburg, <
http://www.euronet.nl/~tekelenb/>
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