CODEWITHSUNDEEP
textapplescriptselectiondetect
Conor James Thomas Warford Hen
Conor James Thomas Warford Hen

Reputation: 325

How can I detect whether something is selected with AppleScript?

I'm using some software called controllermate with allows you to customize the behavior of buttons on a keyboard or mouse. One of the 'building blocks' you can use in a particular function in an apple script. I would like to create a custom behavior for my mouse such that a certain button will execute CMD+C if something that can be copied is currently selected, but otherwise execute a different keyboard shortcut. It seems I will have to use an appleScript in order to determine whether text is selected, but after reading other some other people's solutions online I was unable to figure out how to implement it myself. Thanks for any help.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 731

Answers (1)

jackjr300
jackjr300

Reputation: 7191

Here's a solution:

Put an empty string to the clipboard, do CMD+C, check the clipboard.

set the clipboard to ""
tell application "System Events" to keystroke "c" using command down
delay 0.2

set b to false
try
    set b to (the clipboard as string) is not ""
on error -- error when the clipboard contains a custom type (like a copy in the Photos Application)
    set b to true
end try
if b then -- the clipboard does not contains an empty string
    -- *** script to execute a different keyboard shortcut ***
    --tell application "System Events" to keystroke someChar using someModifier
end if

Upvotes: 1

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