Show differences in two AppleScript files with TextWrangler

Hello.

The script displays differences of two AppleScript Files which is selected in Finder in TextWrangler (free), and gives you a nice display of the differences, though colorless.

I think the script only works in SL, or with Leopard if that was when osadecompile was introduced. I will come back and add support for Tiger, through Satimage.

So this is isn’t quite finished, but it is still in such a state that it should prove useful for many. You have to have TextWrangler (which is free) installed in order to use this. -And the command line tools! TextWrangler can be downloaded from here

Edit You don’t really need this if you have Smile in the first place since you can compare two windows in it.




-- The Idea and implementation and any faults is totally mine. © McUsr 2010 and put in the Public Domain.
-- The usually guarrantees about nothing what so ever applies, use it at your own risk.
-- Read the documentation.
-- You are not allowed to post this code elsewhere, but may of course refer to the post at macscripter.net.
-- macscripter.net/viewtopic.php?id=33758
(*
TERMS OF USE. 
This applies only to posting code, as long as you don't post it on other websites, or displays it (the code) on your own, you are welcome to do
whatever you want to do with it without any further permission. 
Except for the following: Selling the code as is, or removing copyright statmentents and the embedded link in the code (without the http:// part) from the code. 
I don't require you to keep this whole novel, but you must keep the link which refers to where it was originally posted. And my copyright.
You must also state what you eventually have done with the original source. This obviously doesn't matter if you distribute AppleScript as read only. I do not require you to embed any properties helding copyright notice for the code when you distribute as read only.

Credit for having contributed to your product would in all cases be nice!

If you use this code as part of script of yours you are of course welcome to post that code with my code in it here at macscripter.net. If you then wish to post your code elsewhere after having uploaded it to MacScripter.net please email me and ask for permission.

The ideal situation is however that you then refer to your code by a link to MacScripter.net
The sole reason for this, is that it is so much better for all of us to have a centralized codebase which are updated, than having to roam the net to find any usable snippets. Which some of us probabaly originated in the first hand.

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The above paragraphs are also valid if you violate any of my terms.

If you use this or have advantage of this code in a professional setting, where professional setting means that you use this code to earn money by keeping yourself more productive. Or if you as an employee share the resulting script with other coworkers, enhancing the productivity of your company, then a modest donation to MacScripter.net would be appreciated.

*)
-- © McUsr 2010 and put in Public Domain see: macscripter.net/viewtopic.php?id=33758 for reference and terms of use.

on run
	-- check if text wrangler of bbedit is installed.
	-- Dette er blokka for at finder er oppe.
	tell application "Finder"
		activate
		set theSel to (get selection)
		
		set selCount to count theSel
		
		--	if selCount is 0 then my errMsg() det er alltid et finder window og det er desktop
		
		if selCount is 2 then
			set {fileA, fileB} to {item 1 of theSel, item 2 of theSel}
		else
			if selCount is greater than 3 then my errMsg()
			
			if (count its windows) is 1 or selCount is 0 then my errMsg()
			-- only the desktop window or no items in the selection, -we don't handle folders - yet?
			set fileA to item 1 of theSel
			if class of fileA is not document file then my errMsg()
			set fw1 to id of its Finder window 1
			tell its Finder window 2 to activate
			
			set theSel to (get selection) -- of Finder window 1
			
			set selCount to count theSel
			if selCount ≠ 1 then my errMsg()
			set fileB to item 1 of theSel
			if class of fileB is not document file then my errMsg()
			tell Finder window id fw1 to activate
			if contents of fileB is equal to contents of fileA then my errMsg()
		end if
		
		
		set {mustDecompileFileA, mustDecompileFileB} to {my classifyASfile(fileA), my classifyASfile(fileB)}
		-- there were something applescript a like so we will commence
		set shortNm to name of fileA
		set {tids, AppleScript's text item delimiters} to {AppleScript's text item delimiters, "."}
		set shortNm to text item 1 of shortNm
		set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ""
		set shortNm to shortNm as text
		
		
		set theDir to do shell script "/usr/bin/mktemp -d -t " & quoted form of shortNm
		
		set tempFn1 to quoted form of (theDir & "/" & my createPathDenotingFileNameWitoutExt((fileA as alias as text)))
		set tempFn2 to quoted form of (theDir & "/" & my createPathDenotingFileNameWitoutExt((fileB as alias as text)))
		
		if mustDecompileFileA then
			my decompileAppleScriptTextForDiff((fileA as alias), tempFn1)
		else
			try
				do shell script "cp " & quoted form of POSIX path of (fileA as alias) & " " & tempFn1
			end try
		end if
		if mustDecompileFileB then
			my decompileAppleScriptTextForDiff((fileB as alias), tempFn2)
		else
			try
				do shell script "cp " & quoted form of POSIX path of (fileB as alias) & " " & tempFn2
			end try
		end if
	end tell
	-- make the differences show up in text wrangler!
	try
		set myres to (do shell script "/usr/bin/twdiff --ignore-spaces " & tempFn1 & " " & tempFn2)
		tell me
			activate
			display alert "AppleScript Diff: The files are alike!"
		end tell
	on error e number n
		tell application "TextWrangler"
			activate
		end tell
	end try
end run

on classifyASfile(aFileRef)
	tell application "Finder"
		if file type of aFileRef is "osas" then return true
	end tell
	set aFileRef to aFileRef as alias
	tell application "System Events"
		set ftype to type identifier of (get properties of item (aFileRef as text))
		if ftype is not "com.apple.traditional-mac-plain-text" then
			my errMsg()
		else
			return false
		end if
	end tell
end classifyASfile

on errMsg()
	beep
	tell me
		activate
		display dialog "You need to select two and only two two different Apple Script files in the frontmost Finder Window or one file in each of the two frontmost Finder windows in order to run this script.
" with title "AppleScriptDiff" buttons {"Ok"} default button 1 with icon file ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:Unsupported.icns")
		
		error number -128
	end tell
end errMsg

on decompileAppleScriptTextForDiff(fileAlias, qpxTempFileName) -- Thanks to oldmanegan
	
	local theSourceText, qfPoxPath
	set qfPoxPath to quoted form of POSIX path of (fileAlias)
	try
		fileAlias as alias
	on error e number n
		set bad to true
	end try
	try
		do shell script "/usr/bin/osadecompile " & qfPoxPath & "| /usr/bin/tr -d '\\000' >" & qpxTempFileName
	on error e number n
		tell me
			activate
			display alert "AppleScriptDiff: decompileAppleScriptTextForDiff()" & e & " : " & n
		end tell
		error number -128
	end try
end decompileAppleScriptTextForDiff

on createPathDenotingFileNameWitoutExt(hfSfileNameAsText)
	set {tids, AppleScript's text item delimiters} to {AppleScript's text item delimiters, ":"}
	-- set hfsFilenameAsText to {""} & text items 2 thru -1 of hfsFilenameAsText
	-- Uses the line above instead of line under if  you want to convert to unix alike filename.
	set hfSfileNameAsText to text items of hfSfileNameAsText
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "_"
	set hfSfileNameAsText to hfSfileNameAsText as text
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to "."
	set hfSfileNameAsText to text item 1 of hfSfileNameAsText as text
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to tids
	return hfSfileNameAsText
end createPathDenotingFileNameWitoutExt


Would be fine if it was able to compare two scripts even if one or two of them are text ones (wxyz.appleScript).

These ones may be identified by the pair
file type : TEXT
creator type : ToyS

or by the type identifier : com.apple.traditional-mac-plain-text"

compiled script’s type identifier is : “com.apple.applescript.script”

Yvan KOENIG (VALLAURIS, France) mardi 3 août 2010 15:21:05

Hello Yvan.

That was a good idea, which I implemented, I was going to, but since there was a request… :slight_smile:

I will use this together with some scripts for using the RCS (included) version control system with AppleScript a tad later.

I also removed some errors due to the fact that i did forget to remove the references to my script object when I “flattened” it.

Edit:
I’ll make another version for plain text files of any kind a little bit later, as this is as useful as this, and easier than putting the files into FileMerges trays.

Edit+I will come back soon and turn it into a general script, where a file is converted into text by its Uti, so that you can see differences in an rtf file and a word file for instance.

Hello.

I have updated the Script to take files from the two frontmost finder windows. -A bit more practical.
I have also added an icon to the dialog which displays error messages. Please ensure that the hard drive name corresponds with yours. (“Macintosh Hd”)

The ‘path to’ command can save users having to do that:

display dialog "You need to select two and only two two different Apple Script files in the frontmost Finder Window or one file in each of the two frontmost Finder windows in order to run this script.
" with title "AppleScriptDiff" buttons {"Ok"} default button 1 with icon file ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:Unsupported.icns")

Or, unofficially:

display dialog "You need to select two and only two two different Apple Script files in the frontmost Finder Window or one file in each of the two frontmost Finder windows in order to run this script.
" with title "AppleScriptDiff" buttons {"Ok"} default button 1 with icon file ((path to "csrv" as text) & "CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:Unsupported.icns")

Hello Nigel! :slight_smile:

Thank you very much for pointing that out! I have fixed, I probably have some others here, but I’ll take them when they show up, at least for now.

I tend to do it your way nowadays, it is so much more practical!

About the codes
Is there a place you can find all those “unofficial codes” I believe I have seen people calling application “syscve” for instance. and it would be good to have that knowledge, that is, if there is a compilation somewhere, or if they are all from a system doc.

/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/
Frameworks/CarbonCore.framework/Versions/A/Headers/Folders.r

. but don’t get carried away.

Edit: Path split into two lines to make it all visible in the forum window.

Thanks a whole lot! :slight_smile:

I am not intending to use it, but it is good to be able to understand what is going on at times, when people has resorted to this practice.

My personal views on this is that the codes should be avoided, if there exist other alternatives.

But there is sure many codes in there, that there aren’t many alternatives too. :smiley: Interesting!!!

Having said that; those codes, that is one thing, raw events in code, a totally different one, but I guess it is sometimes necessary.

Or even:

display dialog "You need to select two and only two two different Apple Script files in the frontmost Finder Window or one file in each of the two frontmost Finder windows in order to run this script.
" with title "AppleScriptDiff" buttons {"OK"} default button 1 with icon (path to resource "Unsupported.icns" in bundle ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle") as alias)

Hello! :slight_smile:

There is something odd right there icon or icon file, sometimes one works but not the other, I guess that is when I have made a file reference to the icon image up front, I’ll make a mental note about that!

Yes. The relevant labelled parameter of ‘display dialog’ is ‘with icon’. The value of this parameter has to be an ‘alias’ or ‘file’ reference. In your original code (and my variant), the ‘file’ is in front of some code which produces an HFS text path, so the overall effect is a file specifier.

Shane coerces his path to alias instead, which I think is slighty more efficient “on the fly”. This alias then becomes the ‘in bundle’ parameter of a ‘path to resource’ command, which in turn returns another alias. Putting ‘file’ in front of the result would cause an error.

Hello. :slight_smile:

display dialog "You need to select two and only two two different Apple Script files in the frontmost Finder Window or one file in each of the two frontmost Finder windows in order to run this script.
" with title "AppleScriptDiff" buttons {"OK"} default button 1 with icon (path to resource "Unsupported.icns" in bundle ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle") as alias)

It is interesting to know that Shane’s coercing is faster, and to be reminded of the in bundle paramter of the path to command.

And yes, the file keyword, is a qualifier for what comes after icon in the display dialog command. (That the file keyword doesn’t work with a file reference is something to understand, that it doesn’t work with the alias is not so intiuitive, but maybe it is only Finder that takes easy on such matters.)

It’s actually the path to resource command. There’s no in bundle parameter with path to.

Hello.

I wonder, why is there an own path to resource command, other than the obvious, to state in your code that you are getting a resource?

Is there any differences from this to the normal path to command that I should be aware of, than merely the in bundle parameter?

Edit:

I see it is handy for getting into bundles, and that the directory parameter is taking a parameter relative to the resources folder of a bundle of an app.

Um, looking at the dictionary entries I see that ‘path to’ either takes an application name, or some variant of that (like ‘me’ or ‘it’), or a folder designation (not same as its name) from a predefined (and fixed!) list.

So you can use ‘path to’ on applications and (specific) folders, but not on other bundle types.
That’s where ‘path to resource’ comes in, with ‘in bundle’ to plunder any bundle whatsoever, privileges permitting.

Anyway, that’s my €0,02.

Hello!

This horse is beaten to death, I know! :smiley:

My final words is, that when it comes to at least icon resources then I prefer the a reference to file to an alias because then there isn’t any alias to resolve during the awakening of the dialog. I don’t know if this can be felt, or timed, as our cpu’s performs several billions instructions per second, nowadays, and SSD disks are also around…

But at least, it feels faster, when you know that the icon file doesn’t have to be resolved during the display of a dialog.

So my favorite for displaying icons in dialog boxes are:

set my infoIcon to a reference to file ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns")

Yuk! I wish I hadn’t looked at this this morning! :expressionless:

As expected:

alias ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns")
--> alias "MacBook Pro HD:System:Library:CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns"

((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns") as alias
--> alias "MacBook Pro HD:System:Library:CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns"

a reference to file ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns")
--> file "MacBook Pro HD:System:Library:CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns" of «script»

But (in Leopard and Snow Leopard):

file ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns")
--> error "Can't get file \"MacBook Pro HD:System:Library:CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns\"."

But again:

read file ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns") as data
--> «data rdat69636E73000063A249434E230000010800000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000FF800007FFF000. etc.

The above phenomena are true with any kind of file, not just system icons.

With regard to setting up and using file references, I haven’t been able to find any reliable difference in speed between using ‘file blah’ and ‘a reference to file blah’. But they’re both definitely faster than ‘blah as alias’, which in turn is faster than ‘alias blah’. My earlier assertion that a coercion to alias is more efficient than a run-time file specifier must have been confusion with the fact that it’s faster than a run-time alias specifier. File specifiers are fastest, although they no longer appear to exist. :confused:

I don’t doubt you, but these days I think it’s worth adding a rider about the OS used for testing – as you’re seeing, there have been changes under the hood on what constitutes a file.

I’m not sure if it’s just a transition gone wrong or not. If you call, say, choose file name, the result appears as ‘file “Blah:blah”’, but its class is «class furl». It looks to me like «class furl» has been given the term file, but that the older «class file» still has it too.

OYOH, “as «class furl»” seems to work nicely…

I just want to add that I was writing about feelings but it was in a script consisting of a little less than 2000 lines at the time being, from within Script Debugger in Debug mode.

I don’t think I can’t notice any difference anyway, when the script is running, though the file refrence, drags a little less resources. and furls are ok, as long as file references stay!

But then again, I like the screen updates to be as crisp as possible, so I will use the filereferences for icons anyway.

But you have to have rather quick reactions, to spot any difference, in this snippet! :slight_smile:


set infoIcon to a reference to file ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle:Contents:Resources:AlertNoteIcon.icns")

set unsuppicon to (path to resource "Unsupported.icns" in bundle ((path to library folder from system domain as text) & "CoreServices:CoreTypes.bundle") as alias)


tell application "SystemUIServer"
	activate
	
	display dialog "Hit Enter" with icon 1
	
	display dialog "You hit Enter" with icon infoIcon
	
	display dialog "Hit Enter" with icon 1
	
	display dialog "You hit Enter" with icon unsuppicon
end tell

Interesting. Thanks for the insight.