QuickTime Player 7 export fails with the error ...

Scripting Forums AppleScript | Mac OS X
#1

… «The specified object is a property, not an element»

Hello,

I tried to export a movie in QuickTime Player 7 and got this error message. There’s only the class “document” as a top-level document element, not “movie”, so object model reference concerns don’t apply. I’m puzzled. My script is very simple.

property MovieTitle : ""
property Ext : {".mov", ".mp4", ".aif", ".aiff", ".mp3", ".m4a", ".avi", ".wav", ".wave", ".wv"}
property ExportPath : POSIX path of (path to movies folder)


tell application "QuickTime Player 7"
tell document 1
	set MovieTitle to name
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to Ext
	set MovieBaseName to text item 1 of MovieTitle
	
	set DocumentPath to (POSIX file (ExportPath & MovieBaseName & ".mp4")) of me
	
	export to DocumentPath as MPEG4 using settings preset "Movie to MPEG-4" with replacing
	
end tell

end tell

Every time I add the optional parameter [format]using settings preset[/format] it chokes with this error (it doesn’t when it’s absent but then I don’t get to use a preset I want to). I tried to direct this command to the top-level app object, to the video-track to no avail. Googling found me experimenting with references: I used file path:to:file instead of POSIX file path:to:file and still had that error returning only that was a coercion error -1700 [format]can’t make document "hotbabe.p4" of application "QuickTIme Player 7" into the specified type"[/format] . I don’t understand what “specified object” is the offender?

Model: MacBook Pro 9,1 (mid-2012 15") Core i7 2.3 GHz, 16 GB RAM, 500 GB SSD
AppleScript: 2.7
Browser: Safari 605.1.15
Operating System: macOS 10.14

#2

Any ideas of what could go wrong?

Model: MacBook Pro 9,1 (mid-2012 15") Core i7 2.3 GHz, 16 GB RAM, 1TB SSD
AppleScript: 2.7
Browser: Safari 605.1.15
Operating System: macOS 10.14

#3
  1. Exporting documents and using presets is job of application and not of document. Put it inside the correct tell block and use correct syntax

export document 1 to …

  1. file coercion should make the app itself and not you. You should only provide it with HFS path and in the export command put

file HFSpath

#4

scrutinizer82’s syntax is nominally correct, AppleScript-wise. The target of the ‘tell’ statement is the default target of the export command. I get the same error using either syntax, but don’t have QuickTime Player 7 Pro, so I can’t investigate further. The expression using settings preset “Movie to MPEG-4” looks like a specification for a particular settings preset, which would make it an ‘element’. Something seems to think it should be a ‘property’. :confused:

#5

Problem solved.

Solution:

  1. Use POSIX path, not file reference as a path string after the POSIX file specifier

  2. [format]using settings preset[/format] doesn’t work and is a misleading entry in the QTP 7 dictionary. Use [format]use settings[/format] instead.