Re: "a reference to"
Re: "a reference to"
- Subject: Re: "a reference to"
- From: Christopher Nebel <email@hidden>
- Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2008 09:55:38 -0800
On Jan 15, 2008, at 2:09 PM, Stan Cleveland wrote:
On 1/15/08 1:41 PM, Luther Fuller wrote:
I just went to my hardcopy AppleScript Language Guide [Addison-
Wesley, 1993], which I seldom look at these days. It defines 'get'
and indicates that it is optional, always. (At least, it was in
1993.)
I just checked the latest and last hardcopy ASLG printed [Apple
Developer
Connection, 1999, sold through fatbrain.com, covering AppleScipt
v1.3.7].
On page 143, it says "...the Get command is optional because
AppleScript
automatically gets the value of expressions and references when they
appear
in scripts."
So nine years ago, it was still not required.
No, nine years ago the documentation left out some details. This
business of implicit vs. explicit "get" commands has always been like
this; it's not a Mac OS X thing. Strictly speaking, the documentation
is correct -- AppleScript will evaluate object specifiers when they
appear in expressions. The problem is that the expression in this
case is bigger than you think it is:
tell app "Finder" to set scrWd to item 3 of (bounds of window of
desktop)
Parentheses in an object specifier affect grouping (this can be useful
when you've got more than one "whose" clause), but it's still
considered one specifier, and therefore one expression, so the
expression sent to Finder is "item 3 of bounds of window of desktop".
Unfortunately, Finder considers "bounds" to be a primitive value with
no elements, so it chokes on the "item 3 of" part. Adding an explicit
"get" (or an implicit one, by breaking the expression into two
distinct pieces) makes Finder evaluate just "bounds of window of
desktop"; the result is a list, which AppleScript can then get "item 3
of".
--Chris Nebel
AppleScript Engineering
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