| Carl,
On Jan 31, 2008, at 3:19 PM, Carl Springer wrote: I want to be able to create a new, blank Word document in whatever
folder I am pointing to in a Finder Window. A friend of mine wants to
create this feature on a Mac, that apparently is a standard feature in
Windows.
For example: Say, I am in Finder, navigate to the folder I want, then
I want to right-click, select a script from the pop-up window to
create a Word document in that folder and stop. I guess you could also
activate a script to open a Finder window, then scroll around to the
right folder, and then make the Word file.
I have reviewed the list of actions in Automator, and have downloaded
a set of Microsoft Office applications. It is not clear to me which of
these would help. I found one to create a new Word document. This
trick is getting it to be stored in the current folder showing in the
Finder window.
I thought it would be useful to have a variable for the current
folder, but it seems like all the variables have to be defined as a
specific folder.
Any suggestions?
I'm not sure about the Office actions you've downloaded, but Office 2008 comes with over 90 Automator actions. If you've got Office 2008, you can build a workflow like this by utilizing the "New Path" variable to store the incoming folder path, and then referencing it in the path popup when saving the file. See the example image I've posted at...
Once you build the workflow, you can then save it as a Finder plug-in, and trigger it from the Finder's contextual menu. The folder you have selected when triggering the workflow should get passed as input to the first action in the workflow. With custom variable-based workflows like this, I would recommend testing in Automator first. Then, once you're sure it's working, save it as a Finder plug-in.
You could also create a similar workflow that builds a simple text file, rather than a Word document. Here's an example of this...
Hope this helps.
-Ben
Ben Waldie President Automated Workflows, LLC 610.935.0652 ============================================= AppleScript * Automator * Workflow Automation Products, Training, Custom Development Services ============================================= |