How to launch application and bring it to front using Cocoa api?

Question

I'm very new to a cocoa programming and I can't find the way to do the following:

Start a particular application by name
Do some work
Later bring that application I've started to be the front process

From what I've found in Carbon API it looks like the calls i should use are launchApplication() and setFrontProcess().

But how to do this in Cocoa? I.e. launch it, get PID, set that PID to be a front process. I tried to google for examples and find nothing...

If any of you can provide a minimalistic sample that would be awesome :)

Thanks in advance.

score 35 · Accepted Answer · edited Nov 06 '16 at 23:16

35

To launch an application :

[[NSWorkspace sharedWorkspace] launchApplication:@"/Applications/Safari.app"];

To activate an app :

NSRunningApplication* app = [NSRunningApplication
                             runningApplicationWithProcessIdentifier: PID];
[app activateWithOptions: NSApplicationActivateAllWindows];
// or
NSArray* apps = [NSRunningApplication
                 runningApplicationsWithBundleIdentifier:@"com.bla.blah"];
[(NSRunningApplication*)[apps objectAtIndex:0]
 activateWithOptions: NSApplicationActivateAllWindows];

edited Nov 06 '16 at 23:16

M Katz

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answered Feb 25 '10 at 13:49

Nyx0uf

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I tried to launch an app this way from a background process, but it seems that this method of launching doesn't work in Lion or later if the process doing it is not a GUI application. – Bob Murphy Mar 08 '13 at 23:29
2

The `NSApplicationActivateAllWindows` option will cause all of the Application window to come forward, which is almost always not what you want. Instead you can pass in `NSApplicationActivateIgnoringOtherApps` to just activate the window that was most recently active in the app. – thomasfuchs May 10 '14 at 18:03

score 4 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 25 '10 at 10:10

4

To start an application, use the NSWorkspace class: NSWorkspace Reference

Specifically, the launchApplication: function.

I don't know the answer of the activation part off my head. You can activate your own application with -[NSApplication activateIgnoringOtherApps:], but I don't know how to do it for other apps.

answered Feb 25 '10 at 10:10

ashcatch

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Thanks. That's the right function, yes, I saw it, but i can't find a way to find pid and reuse it later. Let's wait maybe someone knows the answer :) – dimsuz Feb 25 '10 at 10:21

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Jun 24 '12 at 22:00

1

NSRunningApplication is available on Mac OS X 10.6 or later.

If you have to support earlier systems, this can be done with APIs such as GetCurrentProcess() and SetFrontProcess() and the old ProcessSerialNumber structure.

answered Jun 24 '12 at 22:00

Kevin Grant

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score 1 · Answer 4 · edited Jul 12 '11 at 10:13

1

Did you look into NSRunningApplication?

edited Jul 12 '11 at 10:13

Rui Andrada

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answered Feb 25 '10 at 13:34

catlan

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score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Dec 02 '15 at 06:33

For Swift2 version

Launch App:

let task = NSTask()
task.launchPath = "/usr/bin/env"
task.arguments = ["/Applications/TextEdit.app/Contents/MacOS/TextEdit"]
task.launch()

To get the app using bundle Identifier:

    var apps: [AnyObject] = NSRunningApplication.runningApplicationsWithBundleIdentifier("com.apple.TextEdit")
    var MyApp: [NSRunningApplication] = apps as! [NSRunningApplication]        
            for app in MyApp        
            {
            }

I am still trying to find the way to know "active", "hide" etc state of app, But not succeed till now.

score 0 · Answer 6 · answered Feb 09 '18 at 01:59

In swift 4, you can use NSWorkspace.shared.launchApplication(appName:) to open an app. It also makes the launched app at front in my case.

You also can try:

do {
    try NSWorkspace.shared.launchApplication(at: yourAppURL,
                                             options: .andHideOthers,
                                             configuration: [:])
} catch {
    printError("Failed to launch the app.")
}

Option andHideOthers: Hide all apps except the newly launched one.

score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Feb 13 '20 at 10:29

Open App in Mac in Objective C

#import <Cocoa/Cocoa.h>

int main(int argc, const char * argv[]) {

    @autoreleasepool {
        // insert code here...
        [[NSWorkspace sharedWorkspace] launchApplication:@"/Applications/Books.app"];
    }
    return 0;
}

How to launch application and bring it to front using Cocoa api?

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