Script Debugger 7 Scripts & Clippings Changes

alldritt · January 6, 2018, 5:18am

Script Debugger 7 (Build 7A20) introduces a change in how the Scripts menu, Clippings menu, and Clippings pane are populated. We’re looking for feedback.

In previous versions, when Script Debugger was launched it would look inside the user’s ~/Library/Application Support/Script Debugger N/ folder for Clippings and Scripts folders, and populate them with the set of factory scripts if they were not already present.

This posed problems if files had to be updated, because users may have customized the scripts or clippings.

Now, Script Debugger will no longer copy the clippings and scripts into the user’s Application Support folder, and the files will no longer be editable. Instead, the menus and clippings list will be divided into two sections: user scripts/clippings, which will be any the user has added to the relevant ~/Library/Application Support/Script Debugger 7 folder, and application scripts/clippings, which are the ones that ship with Script Debugger.

The two sections will be separated by a divider, and you can use the existing BBEdit-style naming conventions to order items within the user section. The user scripts/clippings will appear at the top, although this can be changed by setting the expert preference PrefUserItemsAboveAppItems to false. If there are no user scripts/clippings, there will be no divider.

Users who have a lot of their own scripts/clippings can also hide the application-provided ones using the expert preference PrefShowAppScriptsAndClippings.

A new script menu item, Import clippings, will allow you to transfer app-provided clippings into the user’s Clippings folder, should you wish to use a modified version.

Important: If you have already run a beta version of Script Debugger 7, the script/clippings will have already been copied to you library, so you will see them listed twice. You can fix this by deleting them from your ~/Library/Application Support/Script Debugger 7 folder (assuming you have not customised them).

JMichaelTX · January 15, 2018, 9:26pm

I just installed SD7 7A23 (my first install of SD7), and it is showing both a user and an application section in the menu, even though I don’t have any user scripts (yet).

So, shouldn’t there just be one block, the application block?
Where are the User Scripts to be stored?

Suggestion: Add a label for each block to clearly identify which is User Scripts and which is Application Scripts

JMichaelTX · January 15, 2018, 9:47pm

It does NOT seem to be working as descripted.
The App Scripts WERE copied and put into the Users Scripts folder:

Also, when I added my first script to the Users Scripts folder (by drag/drop), it did NOT show up in the SD7 Scripts menu.
It did not show up until I did the following:

Add another script
Delete the first script
Copy the first script again back into the folder

ShaneStanley · January 15, 2018, 10:33pm

Jim, is it possibly you installed an earlier version some time back, and just forgot about it? The reason I ask is that the code that copied the files across has been cut from SD7 completely.

The Open Scripts Folder script should take you there.

OK. The code for updating the menu is unchanged from SD6, except that it’s updating only a section of the menu. Is this folder under the control of DropBox, or aliased? Do you have Spotlight on?

JMichaelTX · January 15, 2018, 10:49pm

Shane, I’m pretty sure this is my first install of SD7. Here’s the Finder Info about it:

No to all of the above, except “Spotlight”. What do you mean by “Spotlight on”?
The only “Spotlight” I know about is the macOS Spotlight search, and yes, that is available.

I think it is confusing for the built-in scripts to have “Open … Folder” without saying they are user folders. Maybe these scripts should either be shown under the User section, OR, change the name to include “User”, as in “Open User Scripts Folder”.

ShaneStanley · January 15, 2018, 11:04pm

Unfortunately that would look the same either way. If you have something like Time Machine backup it would be interesting to know for sure, but honestly, I can’t see any other explanation. Maybe others will pipe in with their experiences.

(And yes, I meant the OS Spotlight indexing — sorry I wasn’t clearer.)

alldritt · January 15, 2018, 11:09pm

Another approach to testing this is to attempt a new Script Debugger 7 installation and see what results. Here are the steps:

quit all versions of Script Debugger
delete ~/Library/Preferences/com.latenightsw.ScriptDebugger7.plist
delete ~/Library/Application Support/Script Debugger 7
delete ~/Library/Caches/com.latenightsw.ScriptDebugger7
launch Script Debugger 7

estockly · January 24, 2018, 7:21pm

I know I’m a little late to the party, but I just did my first install of SD7, and I got exactly the same result as Jim, two identical versions of the provided scripts and clippings.

BillKopp · January 24, 2018, 9:21pm

I also have the same double set in the menu. I was fixed on testing I hadn’t actually noticed it was an exact double. I had just thought the SD 7 list was a lot longer then the SD6 one.

I’ll try uninstalling (using Mark list of steps) and closely watching the install process to see if I can figure out if there are certain conditions under which the double list occurs.

Bill

BillKopp · January 24, 2018, 9:56pm

I did the five steps Mark laid out and launched SD7. A lot of stuff showed up in the console and and the ScriptDebugger 7 Crash reporter can up. The odd thing is the crash report saying it is for a crash form 2018-01-18 22:28:42.093 -0800, 6 days ago. I’m not sure why a 6 day old crash report came up.

I saved both the “crash report” and “console output” into text files and zipped the file into a archive called “Archive.zip”. I sent the crash report incase there was some information that isn’t captured by copying the contents of the SD crash reporter. I referenced this topic in the crash report.

Bill

alldritt · January 24, 2018, 10:02pm

'm able to reproduce this as well. I created a new user account, installed and run Script Debugger 7. Like you all, I got duplicate menus:

43%20PM

and

We’ll get this sorted out in a future build.

BillKopp · January 24, 2018, 11:07pm

Mark and Shane,

I went into the system folder and removed everything that had anything to do with script debugger. The exact files I removed are listed in the file “Files removed.txt”. Then I logged out of my account and back in again to make sure all the user processes had been shut down and brought back up again. Then I launched SD7 thinking it would do a clean install of SD 7. But SD7 got an Internal Error

Internal%20error%20dialog

I clicked the “Show Details” button and the contents of what was displayed are contained in the “Show details text.txt” text file. Then I clicked the crash button. Apple Crash reporter showed up and the contents of that crash report are in the file “Apple crash report.txt”. When I launched SD7 the SD7 crash report came up and the contents of the crash report are in the file “Script Debugger crash report.txt”

I was able to create a new window, go to clippings menu and and insert a clipping with any problems or errors. But the items in the Clipping menu were still duplicated like they were before. This seems to suggest that when no files or folders are already loaded into the user library for SD7 it get an internal error and the items in the clipping menu are are duplicated. When there are clippings in the library folder the menu items are just duplicated. Of course someone buying SD7 without ever using ScriptDebugger before that would get the internal error.

I was not expecting an internal error. I thought removing all the ScriptDebugger stuff from the folders “Application Support” “Caches” and “Preferences” in the user Library folder would do a new clean install.

I used a program called “Find Any File” to search the entire user library folder for anything named
“latenightsw,” “ScriptDebugger” or “Script Debugger.” No files were found.

All the files that go with this report are stored in a zip archive called “The files.zip” which has been included in this post. The files included are:

Files removed.txt
Script Debugger crash report.txt
Apple crash report.txt
Show details text.txt
Internal error dialog.png

I’m not sure what to make of this result, nor am I sure what to try next. It seems like there are more issues then I first expected.

Bill

The files.zip (170.4 KB)

Nr.5-need_input · October 6, 2024, 12:54pm

Hey Mark

I’m sorry for bumping this old thread.

Speaking of the expert Preference you mentioned I wasn’t able to find it documented anywhere.

I’m remembering the use of it do to my own Clippings Structure a long time ago and I thought I had documented it for myself - but I was wrong.

I have a huge structure where I integrated the default ones into and also have them changed to my liking.

It would be very kind of you if you could provide me the information on how to use it outside Script Debugger with the Terminal and from within Script Debugger via ASObjC

Getting the current used value if it’s used
Setting it to hide the Clippings / Clippings and Scripts

Many thanks in advance

Greetings from Germany

Tobias

ShaneStanley · October 6, 2024, 10:37pm

From Terminal:

defaults write com.latenightsw.ScriptDebugger7 PrefShowAppScriptsAndClippings -bool YES

From a script window:

use AppleScript version "2.4" -- Yosemite (10.10) or later
use framework "Foundation"

current application's NSUserDefaults's standardUserDefaults()'s setObject:true forKey:"PrefShowAppScriptsAndClippings"

Nr.5-need_input · October 7, 2024, 1:05pm

Many thanks Shane, appreciate this …

I know how to get a Plist Key‘s value using the defaults read command …

Is there any equivalent to do it in ASObjC (not speaking of shell commands used with NSTask…) ?

Greetings from Germany

Tobias

ShaneStanley · October 7, 2024, 10:18pm

That’s what the second example does.

Nr.5-need_input · October 8, 2024, 6:25am

Sorry to say that - but that’s not true …

setObject:forKey: is writing the Value - not reading it …

You’ve only provided the equivalent to defaults write …

Greetings from Germany

Tobias

ShaneStanley · October 8, 2024, 6:37am

I misunderstood your question.

use AppleScript version "2.4" -- Yosemite (10.10) or later
use framework "Foundation"

current application's NSUserDefaults's standardUserDefaults()'s boolForKey:"PrefShowAppScriptsAndClippings"

Nr.5-need_input · October 9, 2024, 8:34am

Thanks again, Shane

Appreciate your help …

Greetings from Germany

Tobias