Re: The future for AppleScript [was Re: where are the shell scripts ?]
Re: The future for AppleScript [was Re: where are the shell scripts ?]
- Subject: Re: The future for AppleScript [was Re: where are the shell scripts ?]
- From: Paul Berkowitz <email@hidden>
- Date: Thu, 10 Feb 2005 12:01:29 -0800
On 2/10/05 11:04 AM, "Roger Howard" <email@hidden> wrote:
> I'm not going to respond to the personal aspects of this thread,
> however...
>
> I think Martin's point is fairly clear. If a non-scriptable app is to
> support Automater, then which would be easier:
>
> 1) Build out proper AppleScript support, and then build Automator
> support on that...
> or
> 2) Build Automator support directly, bypassing AppleScript.
>
> The second scenario is what has me somewhat concerned, and I think is
> what Martin is getting at. Why would number 1 be easier than number 2,
> especially for developers who've resisted adding AppleScript support
> already?
>
> I'm not concerned about the difficultly of adding Automator support to
> already-scriptable apps, such as the PowerPoint example.
My understanding is that to "build Automator support directly", the app
would a) have to be Cocoa and b) make its APIs public, as , say Apple's
Address Book and iChat are, but not much else. Perhaps I've misunderstood
this part? If not, then I predict this is what will happen:
1) Small new apps will only get "Automator support" in the form of actual
Automator actions that the developer himself provides. No one else will be
able to write Cocoa actions. (Please correct me if I'm wrong here.)
2) Large apps that want to enable the possibility for 3rd-party Automator
actions (other people writing actions for their apps) will make their apps
scriptable so that this can be done, as with applescripts at present. Most
current big Carbon apps are well-placed already.
The interesting thing will be to see if Cocoa developers understand that if
they take advantage of the fact that it should be quite easy to make their
apps scriptable they will be encouraging the development of a "community" of
AppleScript Automator Action writers for their app, making it more useful
and popular (as AppleScript does in any case), or whether they will restrict
themselves to writing a few actions of their own. I don't envisage them
making their Cocoa APIs open source - why should they, if they're selling
their apps? - to allow 3rd parties to write Cocoa Automator actions?
So the question is whether Cocoa Automator actions can actually be written
for an app that does not expose its APIs. I don't understand how they could
be. Even AppleScript Actions will be able to access system-level features
via Cocoa commands, and enhance their capabilities that way as needed. But
we're all talking here about application control.
--
Paul Berkowitz
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