AppleScript for scanning folders and adding cues

[Patrick Holladay]

I’m an audio guy for corporate events that require a lot of stingers. My question is: is there a way that I could make a cue list mirror a folder on my mac? I have a “Stingers” folder which is subdivided by genre of music; what I would like to do is have a cue list that mirrors each genre folder so that songs that are added to the folder are automatically added to the corresponding cue list. This way I can create carts from cues in the lists which already have in/out points and fades and stuff that I would commonly use, but have the ability to quickly change them on the fly. Plus it saves the headache of opening the finder every time I want to add an audio file. 

I emailed support about this and they suggested writing an AppleScript that could scan your folders and add cues to the lists automatically. You could then put this AppleScript into a Script cue and have that cue run automatically when your workspace opens. This sounds like exactly what I'm looking for, but I have no idea whatsoever how to write an AppleScript that would do such a thing, or any AppleScript at all for that matter. 

Could anyone possibly help me with this, or point me in the right direction of where to start?

Thanks!

[Rich Walsh]

See how you get on with the attached workspace. I think it works, but I haven’t tested it very thoroughly.

The folder “watched” will be recreated in the cuelist “Watched” when you run the script. More or less.

Rich

(* Scan for files *)

--

(* This script will attempt to recreate the folder structure of a user-specified folder as Group Cues in a user-specified cuelist, adding any audio files as Audio Cues

– unless they already exist. It will fail if the names of subfolders are not unique, or if cues with those names already exist in the wrong place. *)

--

(* This script is designed to be run as a Script Cue

v0.9: 20/07/17 Rich Walsh

-- ###FIXME### Not thoroughly tested

<<< Last tested with QLab 4.1.1 & Mac OS X 10.11.6 >>> *)

-- User-specified variables

set userWatchedFolderIsNextToWorkspace to true -- Change this to false if your watched folder isn't next to the workspace

set userWatchedFolder to "watched" -- Set the name of the watched folder (or change this to a full POSIX path if you change the above to false)

set userWatchedCuelist to "Watched" -- Set the name of the cuelist for automatically-generated cues

set userFlagNewCues to true -- Flag any automatically-generated cues?

-- Declarations

global dialogTitle

set dialogTitle to "Scan for files"

set audioFileTypes to {"com.apple.coreaudio-format", "com.apple.m4a-audio", "com.microsoft.waveform-audio", "public.aifc-audio", "public.aiff-audio", ¬

"public.audio", "public.mp3", "public.mpeg-4-audio"}

(* This list deliberately excludes "com.apple.protected-mpeg-4-audio" to protect against old DRM-restricted iTunes files *)

set cuesAdded to 0

-- Main routine

tell application id "com.figure53.qlab.4" to tell front workspace

-- Locate the watched folder

if userWatchedFolderIsNextToWorkspace then

-- Establish the path to the current workspace

set workspacePath to path

if workspacePath is missing value then

display dialog "The current workspace has not yet been saved anywhere." with title dialogTitle with icon 0 ¬

buttons {"OK"} default button "OK" giving up after 5

return

end if

-- Get the path to the watched folder

tell application "System Events"

set watchedFolder to path of container of file workspacePath & userWatchedFolder

end tell

else

set watchedFolder to userWatchedFolder

end if

-- Check watched folder exists

tell application "System Events" to set folderExists to exists folder watchedFolder

if not folderExists then

display dialog "The watched folder \"" & POSIX path of watchedFolder & "\" does not exist." with title dialogTitle with icon 0 ¬

buttons {"OK"} default button "OK"

return

end if

-- Check watched cuelist exists

try

set watchedCuelist to first cue list whose q name is userWatchedCuelist

on error

display dialog "The destination cuelist \"" & userWatchedCuelist & "\" does not exist." with title dialogTitle with icon 0 ¬

buttons {"OK"} default button "OK"

return

end try

-- Replicate file structure

set theFolders to {POSIX path of watchedFolder}

set countFolders to count theFolders

set parentFolders to {}

set i to 0

set currentTIDs to AppleScript's text item delimiters

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "/"

repeat until i = countFolders

set eachFolder to item (i + 1) of theFolders

-- Record the parent of each folder processed

if i = 0 then

set end of parentFolders to last text item of eachFolder

else

set end of parentFolders to text item -2 of eachFolder

end if

-- Make a list of all Group Cues in the watched cuelist

set existingGroups to cues of watchedCuelist whose q type is "Group"

set countExistingGroups to count existingGroups

set j to 0

repeat until j = countExistingGroups

try

set existingGroups to existingGroups & (cues of item (j + 1) of existingGroups whose q type is "Group")

end try

set j to j + 1

set countExistingGroups to count existingGroups

end repeat

-- Find first Group Cue whose name matches

set makeNextCueIn to current cue list -- If there is no match, new cues will be added directly to the cue list

repeat with eachGroup in existingGroups

if q name of eachGroup is item (i + 1) of parentFolders then

set makeNextCueIn to eachGroup

exit repeat

end if

end repeat

-- Move the selection to set where the next cue will be made

try

set selected to last item of (cues of makeNextCueIn)

on error

set current cue list to watchedCuelist

end try

-- Make Group Cues if needed

if i = 0 then

set currentGroup to watchedCuelist

else

set groupName to last text item of eachFolder

set currentGroup to false

repeat with eachGroup in existingGroups

if q name of eachGroup is groupName then

set currentGroup to eachGroup

exit repeat

end if

end repeat

if currentGroup is false then

make type "Group"

set cuesAdded to cuesAdded + 1

set newCue to last item of (selected as list)

if userFlagNewCues then set flagged of newCue to true

set q name of newCue to groupName

set currentGroup to newCue

end if

end if

-- Make a list of files already used in the current Group Cue

set existingTargets to file target of cues of currentGroup whose broken is false and q type is "Audio"

set usedFiles to {}

repeat with eachTarget in existingTargets

set end of usedFiles to POSIX path of eachTarget

end repeat

-- Get files of folder to be processed

tell application "System Events" to set theFiles to POSIX path of disk items of folder eachFolder whose visible is true

-- Process them: if folder, add to list for processing; if file, make a cue if needed

repeat with eachFile in theFiles

try -- This detects folders

tell application "System Events"

set eachType to type identifier of file eachFile

end tell

if eachType is in audioFileTypes and eachFile is not in usedFiles then

make type "Audio"

set cuesAdded to cuesAdded + 1

set newCue to last item of (selected as list)

if userFlagNewCues then set flagged of newCue to true

set file target of newCue to eachFile

if parent of newCue is not currentGroup then -- Will need to move first cue made if Group Cue was empty

set newCueID to uniqueID of newCue

move cue id newCueID of parent of newCue to end of currentGroup

set selected to newCue

end if

end if

on error

set theFolders to theFolders & eachFile

end try

end repeat

set i to i + 1

set countFolders to count theFolders

end repeat

set AppleScript's text item delimiters to currentTIDs

-- Report how many cues added

if cuesAdded = 0 then

set theMessage to "No cues were added."

else if cuesAdded = 1 then

set theMessage to "1 cue was added."

else

set theMessage to (cuesAdded & " cues were added.") as text

end if

display dialog theMessage with title dialogTitle with icon 1 ¬

buttons {"OK"} default button "OK" giving up after 5

end tell

(* END: Scan for files *)

[nelson d'aires]

Hi,

I've tried this script and it works as it is. But now i would like to make a modification to images (not audio files), i've made this, but it doesn't add the video cues with image... some help please? 

(* Scan for files *)

--

(* This script will attempt to recreate the folder structure of a user-specified folder as Group Cues in a user-specified cuelist, adding any audio files as Audio Cues
– unless they already exist. It will fail if the names of subfolders are not unique, or if cues with those names already exist in the wrong place. *)

--

(* This script is designed to be run as a Script Cue

v0.9: 20/07/17 Rich Walsh

-- ###FIXME### Not thoroughly tested

<<< Last tested with QLab 4.1.1 & Mac OS X 10.11.6 >>> *)

-- User-specified variables

set userWatchedFolderIsNextToWorkspace to true -- Change this to false if your watched folder isn't next to the workspace
set userWatchedFolder to "watched" -- Set the name of the watched folder (or change this to a full POSIX path if you change the above to false)
set userWatchedCuelist to "Watched" -- Set the name of the cuelist for automatically-generated cues
set userFlagNewCues to true -- Flag any automatically-generated cues?

-- Declarations

global dialogTitle
set dialogTitle to "Scan for files"

set imageFileTypes to {"public.image"}

set existingTargets to file target of cues of currentGroup whose broken is false and q type is "Video"

set usedFiles to {}
repeat with eachTarget in existingTargets
set end of usedFiles to POSIX path of eachTarget
end repeat

-- Get files of folder to be processed

tell application "System Events" to set theFiles to POSIX path of disk items of folder eachFolder whose visible is true

-- Process them: if folder, add to list for processing; if file, make a cue if needed

repeat with eachFile in theFiles

try -- This detects folders
tell application "System Events"
set eachType to type identifier of file eachFile
end tell

if eachType is in imageFileTypes and eachFile is not in usedFiles then
make type "Video"

[Rich Walsh]

Maybe take my name out of it if you’re rewriting the code, so it doesn’t look like I wrote it?

I did update that a couple of years later to also handle Video Cues: https://wiki.allthatyouhear.com/doku.php#scan_for_new_files.

Not tested it recently though.

Rich

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[nelson d'aires]

You are right Rich, i should have had take your name of after the modification. Thank you so much for the link with the update, it works!

Best,