Communicate with the Clipboard? And Keystrokes?

[Andy L]

[Sorry, I've submitted my previous message too early by accident.]

Can I use JSTalk to send and get text to the clipboard?

Also, is it possible to simulate key presses?

How would I go about doing these?

Thanks in advance. Looking forward to knowing this... It'd be great if
I could migrate my clipboard-enhancing scripts to JavaScript.

-Andy

[Gus Mueller]

On Sep 5, 2009, at 12:00 PM, Andy L wrote:

>
> [Sorry, I've submitted my previous message too early by accident.]
>
> Can I use JSTalk to send and get text to the clipboard?
>
> Also, is it possible to simulate key presses?
>
> How would I go about doing these?

Key presses have always been a bit odd on Mac OS X. I've been wanting
to build a plugin to help with this actually, but haven't gotten
around to it yet.

Here's a sample script which grabs the clipboard, adds some text to
it, puts it back on the clipboard, and then simulates a cmd-v key press.

var pasteBoard = [NSPasteboard generalPasteboard];

// grab a string on the paste board.
var pbString = [pasteBoard stringForType:NSStringPboardType];

// make a new string based on it:
var newString = pbString + "!!!";

// tell it we're going to be putting a single string type on the
pasteboard
[pasteBoard declareTypes:[NSStringPboardType] owner:null];

// and then put it on
[pasteBoard setString:newString forType:NSStringPboardType]

// simulate a cmd-v
// 55, and 9 are virtual key codes. There's probably a reference
somewhere for this.
CGInhibitLocalEvents(true);
CGEnableEventStateCombining(false);

var keyDown = true;
var keyUp = false;

// command down:
CGPostKeyboardEvent(0, 55, keyDown);

// v down, then up
CGPostKeyboardEvent(0, 9, keyDown);
CGPostKeyboardEvent(0, 9, keyUp);

// command up
CGPostKeyboardEvent(0, 55, keyUp);

CGEnableEventStateCombining(true);
CGInhibitLocalEvents(false);

Hope that helps,

-gus

--

August 'Gus' Mueller
Flying Meat Inc.
http://flyingmeat.com/

[Andy L]

Hi Gus,

Thank you for your very complete example. I've just set up JSTalk and
ran successfully the default script in the Editor. I'll try your
example now...

But, I was wondering, should the "jstalk" file (from the binary Zip
you provided) be copied to any particular folder (besides being one
that's in the PATH)?

On Sep 5, 9:23 pm, Gus Mueller <g...@flyingmeat.com> wrote:
> Here's a sample script which grabs the clipboard, adds some text to  
> it, puts it back on the clipboard, and then simulates a cmd-v key press.
>

>...

[Gus Mueller]

On Sep 5, 2009, at 4:44 PM, Andy L wrote:

> Thank you for your very complete example. I've just set up JSTalk and
> ran successfully the default script in the Editor. I'll try your
> example now...
>
> But, I was wondering, should the "jstalk" file (from the binary Zip
> you provided) be copied to any particular folder (besides being one
> that's in the PATH)?

You've lost me here, sorry :)

How are you wanting to run the script? From a hotkey, out of the
JSTalk editor, from the command line? Something else?

thanks,

[Andy]

Sorry, Gus. I was referring to the files in the installation .zip. I
assume "JSTalk Editor.app" can go into the "Applications" folder. But
where does the "jstalk" file go into?

- Andy

[Gus Mueller]

On Sep 6, 2009, at 8:22 PM, Andy wrote:

> Sorry, Gus. I was referring to the files in the installation .zip. I
> assume "JSTalk Editor.app" can go into the "Applications" folder. But
> where does the "jstalk" file go into?

Oh- that's a command line tool for JSTalk.

Good question. So, I'm not sure where the "recommended" place to put
unix executable places is these days. In my home dir, I've got ~/unix/
bin , which I add to my $PATH, and that's where I put odd scripts and
such that I don't want clobbered by the system.

You might try that if sounds reasonable. Or if anyone else has any
other suggestions...?

[Andy]

Ah, ok. I've been putting stuff like that in "/usr/local/bin" -- I
think that's the correct place (that directory was recommended in some
other program's installation instructions), but I'm not really really
sure. ;)

Thanks.

-Andy