Making Cocoa Application Scriptable Swift

Question

Goal

I am trying to make my Cocoa Application that has been written in Swift scriptable from Applescript.

What I've Done

I have created a SDEF file, configured my info.plist and created a class which I think is appropriate.

definition.sdef

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE dictionary SYSTEM "file://localhost/System/Library/DTDs/sdef.dtd">


<dictionary title="SamX">

    <!-- specific suite(s) for the application follow... -->
    <suite name="SamX Scripting Suite" code="Samx" description="Suite for communication with the application">

        <command name="savedoc" code="corecnte" description="description">
            <cocoa class="ProjectName.ScriptingSaveNotification" id="BLah"/>

            <parameter name="with dname" code="WTdc" type="text" optional="no" description="description">
                <cocoa key="DocumentName"/>
            </parameter>

            <result type="boolean" description="The result of the invocation. True if it succeeds, False if it does not"/>
        </command>
    </suite>
</dictionary>

info.plist

ScriptingSaveNotification.swift

import Foundation
import Cocoa

class ScriptingSaveNotification: NSScriptCommand, NSUserNotificationCenterDelegate {

    override func performDefaultImplementation() -> AnyObject? {
        let parms = self.evaluatedArguments
        var name = ""
        if let args = parms {
            if let DocumentName = args["DocumentName"] as? String {
                name = DocumentName
            }
        }


        debugPrint("We were prompted to save");
        return "hello world"
    }

    func userNotificationCenter(center: NSUserNotificationCenter, shouldPresentNotification notification: NSUserNotification) -> Bool {
        debugPrint("We were prompted to save");

        return true
    }
}

Where I Am

I have an application that launches. The application's SDEF file appears to be reflecting in the Applescript Editor. The Applescript editors also returns a dictionary definition. However when I run the command, I always get an output of 5 (int), and none of my debug lines appears to be outputting in Xcode.

It appears to me that maybe I'm referencing my class in the SDEF improperly. But I'm not 100% sure. I've tried renaming it several times. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Applescript Dictionary

Test Script

tell application "MyApplication"
    set testString to "Hello"
    set returnValue to savedoc testString
    display alert returnValue
end tell

Answer 1

Edit:

The main issue is that you don't actually use the with dname parameter in your script. It should be:

set returnValue to savedoc with dname testString

That said, the info below is still valid for creating a proper sdef and the other suggestions/examples may be helpful.

---

This is a basic example of passing a string in the evaluatedArguments of the NSScriptCommand and then returning that string as the result of the script command in Swift (you could return a boolean on success/failure of the command or any other type of result; and, actually, in your sdef you say you're going to return a boolean but your command is returning a string (text in sdef definitions)). Creating your sdef can be tricky. Your command's code should start with the suite's code and you can remove the id and optional parameter (if you omit the optional parameter, the default is that the parameter is required). If you do just need a single parameter you could also just use the direct-parameter instead.

You can download a demo project:

ScriptableSwift.zip

Here are the relevant bits (aside from the plist entries that you have correct in your tests).

ScriptableSwift.sdef

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE dictionary SYSTEM "file://localhost/System/Library/DTDs/sdef.dtd">
<dictionary title="ScriptableSwift Terminology">
    <suite name="ScriptableSwift Scripting Suite" code="SSss" description="Standard suite for application communication.">
        <command name="save" code="SSssSave" description="Save something.">
            <cocoa class="ScriptableSwift.SaveScriptCommand"/>
            <parameter name="in" code="Fpat" type="text" description="The file path in which to save the document.">
                <cocoa key="FilePath"/>
            </parameter>
            <result type="text" description="Echoes back the filepath supplied."/>
        </command>
    </suite>
</dictionary>

SaveScriptCommand.swift

import Foundation
import Cocoa

class SaveScriptCommand: NSScriptCommand {
    override func performDefaultImplementation() -> AnyObject? {
        let filePath = self.evaluatedArguments!["FilePath"] as! String
        debugPrint("We were prompted to save something at: \(filePath)");
        return filePath
    }
}

Test AppleScript

tell application "ScriptableSwift" to save in "path/to/file"

Result:

"path/to/file"