[Pythonmac-SIG] rewritten documentation for OSA

[Michael J. Barber]

On Friday, January 18, 2002, at 02:27  PM, Steven Majewski wrote:

>
> Nice work, Michael!  (and nice timing, since I was about to delve into
> trying to do some of that stuff.) I'll send you more detailed
> comments after I've worked thru the examples.
>
Thanks. I'm looking forward to the comments. I've made a few changes 
based on what you've already said. Still at: 
<http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~mjbarber/applescript.html>.

> The main point to make for OSX is that (as I was telling Dan) 
> AppleEvents
> do actually work to and from the unix command line mach-o python.
> I wasn't even sure whether it was supposed to work when I tried it --
> I asked on one of the osx lists if this ( AEs from non GUI apps ) was
> likely to disappear or would be supported in the future and someone
> reminded me (Duh!) about Apple's osascript/osacompile command line
> tools.
>
Duh for me, too! I had been aware of those tools, but hadn't made the 
connection to using them with python for some reason. Probably because I 
was already using gensuitemodule. At any rate, I think I'll have to 
rewrite a couple of scripts and play a bit.

I've added a brief section on OS X. Right now, it mainly mentions 
osascript and osacompile with a RTFM-like comment. Possibly, I can 
expand that after some experimentation.

> One termonological point: I thought an 'Open Scripting Extension'
> meant something more specifically like what bill fancher 
> <bfancher@mac.com>
> is doing -- actually writing an extension for OSA rather than a
> program that uses OSA and AppleEvents.
>
That is my understanding as well. I had just kept the title of the 
original version, but I see that "Open Scripting Architecture" is used 
at another point in the MacPython docs. I've changed the title.

Since I'm now expanding the scope of the document a bit, it seems like 
Bill Fancher's OSA Python should be mentioned as well. Unfortunately, 
the link I had to his web page seems to be invalid now. If there is a 
new page for it, I'll gladly add a brief description and relevant links. 
I'll email him and ask.

Anyone know of other related tools that should be mentioned?