convert

[Ray_Barber]

hello. being new to applescript… i can only assume that this is an easy conversion…
if i have a file containing a variety of letters no specific order…
“a word”
and i want every instance of “a” to be “3” and every instance of “d” to become “5”…
“3 wor5”
i might want to convert every letter to a number or a word…
any help is helpful… thank you.
newbie

[Ray_Barber]

thank you for the help. this is perfect… i will look into the option of using a texteditor… thanks again.

The easiest way might be use the letter’s ASCII value as in:

ASCII number “a” – returns 97

You may then recalculate the number as necessary.

The reciprocal operation is

ASCII character 97 – returns "a’

then

set test_string to "this a word" 
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "a" 
set test_parts to every text item of test_string 
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "3" 
set new_test_string to test_parts as text 
new_test_string

but the best way might be to use a text editor. Most text editors are applescriptable and their search and replace is fast and can handle large files.

m_g

[Ray_Barber]

You probably already know this. Before m_g’s routine:

set oldDelim to AppleScript’s text item delimiters

and immediately after it:

set AppleScript’s text item delimiters to oldDelim

Otherwise you’ll get some very strange things ‘going wrong’.
Forgive me if that was already patently obvious.

[Ray_Barber]

The easiest way might be use the letter’s ASCII value as in:

ASCII number “a” – returns 97

You may then recalculate the number as necessary.

The reciprocal operation is

ASCII character 97 – returns "a’

then

set test_string to "this a word"
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "a"
set test_parts to every text item of test_string
set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "3"
set new_test_string to test_parts as text
new_test_string

but the best way might be to use a text editor. Most text editors are applescriptable and their search and replace is fast and can handle large files.

m_g