AppleScript: what do you want to see in the Scrivener Suite?

[KB]

I'm sure you'll tell me that has been in Scrivener (gold) since V0.0005

Well, I didn't want to mention it, but...

Glad that's what you were after!

[gr]

Mischief managed.

[Juddbert]

Mischief managed.

There's a script for that? Wow!

[JAWSh]

It's not being actively developed yet... I'm hoping to get to work on it finally in the new year.

Any update on this? I just bought Scrivener and my life is changed. I'm excited about the ability to augment the app and add it into heavily scripted workflows like those found here.

• One feature I'd like to script would be the ability for Scrivener external links to link directly to the actual page of a .pdf that I am referencing - I would think that .pdf page number would be a dead-simple hook?. Scrivener is basically taking the place of DevonThink for a lot of my workflow...

• I am also using scrivener to import large amounts of different types of notes from Skim. So hooks for creating text pages would be great (I think importing notes as text pages is better than as notes/comments, since they need metadata, links, etc.).

• On that note, I would LOVE hooks to create metadata (of all types), and links. I want to be able to add semantic data to my imported notes - such as links to the pdf they are on, custom metadata for author of the article referenced, page number, etc. Since I have a script to export notes from Skim based on colour, type, and page, it would be amazing to then write a script to import those notes into Scrivener based on the same data - (ie a blue highlight means "author to follow up on", and I have a folder in my Scrivener workflow for "Key Researchers", so it would be great to be able to automate the connection between the two)

• Hooks for splitting documents based on expressions. Presently you can only do this on import, meaning you can't add metadata to a document before splitting it, resulting in a lot of repetition.

• Also on that same idea, hooks to create notes/comments with a way of locating them in the text or over a .pdf would be great. Skim has all sorts of hooks and it looks like I could potentially write a script to export notes with their locations and sync them into Scrivener

• Not directly Applescript-specific, but I would like the ability to create "types" of text files - types in this case relating to the custom metadata fields that appear. An "advanced custom metadata" option would be great too, to allow dropdowns, radio buttons, etc in custom metadata.

• While I'm requesting features, I find it really annoying that I can't edit most metadata with multiple documents selected. It would be really helpful if I could add a tag to 100 pages at the same time instead of adding a tag 100 times...

• Is there any possibility of text anchors for internal links, like you can do with HTML and in Adobe .pdf software? Would be great if my internal links could point to a specific position in a document

• While you're contemplating scripting hooks, another great feature along the same lines would be to also connect those hooks into the internal linking system - so that without writing an Applescript I can hyperlink to a specific action in Scrivener from another app/document or HTML page using the x-scriv... hyperlink prefix. My understanding is that DevonThink offers this kind of thing and it would be really great. (example use-case: add a link in my notes to specific page of .pdf they relate to, or if internal link anchors are implemented, to a specific location in a long Scrivener document/specific view of binder and other documents in Scrivener... etc.)



I absolutely LOVE Scrivener and the design philosophy behind it... I never usually get involved in software forums, or even use paid software (I heart Opensource), but I knew as soon as I got into the Scrivener tutorial that I was going to buy it. There are so many awesome features I don't even know where to start... internal linking... the ability to import research files as aliases... custom metadata... So apologies for the long post of ideas, but I'm stoked.

[gr]

• While I'm requesting features, I find it really annoying that I can't edit most metadata with multiple documents selected. It would be really helpful if I could add a tag to 100 pages at the same time instead of adding a tag 100 times..

.

On your Point #7:

If by 'tag' you mean label, status or keyword, you can already do what you are asking for, but you need to take the action directly on the selected group of items in the Binder, not in the Inspector.

You can control-click any of the selected docs to add label or status to the whole selected group of docs. You can also drag and drop a keyword (from the Project Keywords floater window) onto one of a group of selected docs to apply the keyword to them all.

--Greg

[JAWSh]

On your Point #7:

If by 'tag' you mean label, status or keyword, you can already do what you are asking for, but you need to take the action directly on the selected group of items in the Binder, not in the Inspector.

You can control-click any of the selected docs to add label or status to the whole selected group of docs. You can also drag and drop a keyword (from the Project Keywords floater window) onto one of a group of selected docs to apply the keyword to them all.

--Greg

Thanks Greg! This has been pointed it to me elsewhere as well

[ChrisRosser]

I'd prefer python support with Cocoa bindings so we can make our own GUI plugins easily. AppleScript is simply awful!

[philippecmartin]

Hello,

My 2 cents.

background: I am new to scrivener and I have not used AppletScript. I am a software/firmware engineer by trade.

I have been thinking of asking for a plugin for a while then I saw this post.

I want to stress that after having refused to use Mac OS since I gave up my Mac SE, I just purchased a Mac because I wanted some features of Scrivener Mac I could not find in the Windows version.

While I would love to see AppletScript support with read/write access to internal objects + calls to published methods; I would love, even more, these features to be platform/programming-language-agnostic.

Plugins are good for that: Scrivener would publish some install/init protocol and then some "hook" methods, which could then be used by any language that can access shared libraries / dll. This would also allow the feature to be accessible under Windows, even if phased; while sticking to AppleScript would most likely rule Windows out (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2631 ... on-windows).

That's my take / would love to help test a Python plugin

Regards,

Philippe

[ChrisRosser]

+1 for Phillipe's ideas

I'd love to see python scripting support. I don't use AppleScript, though I understand it's necessary for Automator support, which would also be a nice to have.

[derick]

Would it make sense to move this out of the Mac forum to a more cross-platform discussion of automation?

I started one here:

https://www.literatureandlatte.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=34852

but mostly just stopping back in to see if anything is in the works to accompany the iOS version.

[derick]

I realize that this topic is dead in the water, but I'm constantly finding use scenarios....it would be great to be able to script adding keywords to documents. I'd write a Service that would allow me to right-click text in any MacOS app and add it as a keyword to the active document in Scrivener. That would be so useful for note-taking and coding.