AppleScript: Select a specific drop down menu item

applescriptfont

folks.

I'm incredibly new to AppleScript…just starting to open up my world to coding, and thought I'd start here. (I did BASIC back in high school. haha)

All I'm trying to do is set a font type and size for Avid Media Composer. As of now, I have it written to just change the font to a predetermined size of 14, but I can't figure out how to se3lect the specific font from the drop-down menu. All the help I've found on here tends to be about Javascript and stuff…I found one that selected menu items in the Dictation sys pref… But I couldn't figure out how to apply it to my script.

Here what I have for setting the font size to 14:

on run
    tell application "AvidMediaComposer"

        activate

    end tell


    tell application "System Events"

        tell process "Avid Media Composer"

            click menu item "Set Font..." of menu "Edit" of menu bar 1

        end tell

    end tell

    tell application "System Events"
        keystroke "14"
    end tell

    tell application "System Events"
        keystroke return
    end tell
end run

I need to be able to select what you see here:
enter image description here

Thanks in advance! (I'm sure my script is garbage too, but it works…happy to take any/all criticism. Just beginning to get into this.)

Best Answer

As far as I can guess at your "structures", code to select a specific font might look like this:

-- insert after: click menu item "Set Font..." of menu "Edit" of menu bar 1

click pop up button of group of window "Set Font"
click menu item "[someFontName]" of menu of pop up button of group of ¬
   window "Set Font"

Depending on dialog window's "surroundings" s.th. like "group 1 of..." may be necessary.

Related Solutions

MacOS – Applescript to automate drop-down selection in Mozilla Firefox

Try this

tell application "Firefox"
    activate
    tell application "System Events"
        keystroke tab
        keystroke (key code 125)
        keystroke (key code 125)
        keystroke (key code 125)        
    end tell
end tell

You might not need to activate Firefox if it's the current active app. Them you just need :

tell application "System Events"
    keystroke tab
    keystroke (key code 125)
    keystroke (key code 125)
    keystroke (key code 125)        
end tell

AppleScript Setting Select Drop Down

Using the shell Defaults command in an Applescript Do shell script seems to work ok for me. This will save on GUI scripting problems.

The script first reads the preference file. Then sets it to the opposite of its Bool.

set dictionToggle to (do shell script " defaults read ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.assistant.support \"Dictation Enabled\" ") as integer

do shell script "defaults write  ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.assistant.support \"Dictation Enabled\" -bool " & (not (dictionToggle as boolean)) as Unicode text

I always backup any preference files using the contextual menu compress "…." to make a zipped copy of it.

enter image description here

The file com.apple.assistant.support.plist that is changed is found in your preferences folder

/Users/UserName/Library/Preferences/com.apple.assistant.support.plist

If you have to use GUI scripting especially if you want to change the short cut keys. ( and since I cannot be Ars… to figure out which one of the symbolic hotkey settings in the com.apple.symbolichotkeys.plist is the right one)

Then this should work. (as it does on my Mac at least :-) )

  set off to 1
set fnTwice to 3
set rightCommandTwice to 4
set leftCommandTwice to 5
set eitherCommandTwice to 6


tell application "System Preferences"
    activate
    set current pane to pane "com.apple.preference.speech"
    reveal (first anchor of current pane whose name is "Dictation") 
end tell
tell application "System Events"

    tell application process "System Preferences"
        set theGroup to tab group 1 of window "Dictation & Speech"
        click radio button "On" of radio group 1 of theGroup

        try
            click button "Enable Dictation" of sheet 1 of window "Dictation & Speech"
        end try
        set thePopUp to pop up button 2 of theGroup
        click thePopUp
        click menu item fnTwice of menu 1 of thePopUp
    end tell
end tell
tell application "System Preferences"
    --quit
end tell

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