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User profile for user: kmccracken1951
kmccracken1951 Author
User level: Level 1
16 points

Applescripts not working in Scripts menu in Catalina

I have application-specific scripts in the ~/Library/Scripts/Applications/Mail folder, so they appear in the System Scripts menu when I am in Mail. They run correctly if I run them within Script Editor, but not if I select them in the Scripts menu; the script is apparently triggered because the "gear" turns briefly in the menu bar, but nothing happens. These are scripts installed by the DEVONthink 3 application, which worked in El Capitan. Since I have updated to a new machine running Catalina, they no longer work. Has something changed in the way AppleScript interfaces with Mail?

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Aug 2, 2020 2:19 PM

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User profile for user: kmccracken1951
kmccracken1951 Author
User level: Level 1
16 points

Posted on Aug 2, 2020 5:53 PM

I found the solution! It was in fact a problem in Privacy Settings, but not Full Disk Access as I first suspected: I started looking at the other settings and discovered the settings for Automation. You have to allow “apps … to control other apps. This will provide access to documents in data to those apps, and to perform actions within them.” Top of the list is Script Menu. The box was checked to allow it to control DEVONthink 3.app, but not the one for Mail.app. Once I checked Mail.app, the Script menu works.


Checking in El Capitan, the only similar permissions I found were under Privacy > Accessibility, where you can “allow the apps below to control your computer.” Script Editor.app is listed, but it is not checked on my machine, yet the Script menu works there. So this appears to be a new wrinkle sometime post-El Capitan. I was unable to find evidence of the issue or a solution online, so I expect it must be fairly recent, probably Catalina.

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User profile for user: kmccracken1951
kmccracken1951 Author
User level: Level 1
16 points

Aug 2, 2020 5:53 PM in response to kmccracken1951

I found the solution! It was in fact a problem in Privacy Settings, but not Full Disk Access as I first suspected: I started looking at the other settings and discovered the settings for Automation. You have to allow “apps … to control other apps. This will provide access to documents in data to those apps, and to perform actions within them.” Top of the list is Script Menu. The box was checked to allow it to control DEVONthink 3.app, but not the one for Mail.app. Once I checked Mail.app, the Script menu works.


Checking in El Capitan, the only similar permissions I found were under Privacy > Accessibility, where you can “allow the apps below to control your computer.” Script Editor.app is listed, but it is not checked on my machine, yet the Script menu works there. So this appears to be a new wrinkle sometime post-El Capitan. I was unable to find evidence of the issue or a solution online, so I expect it must be fairly recent, probably Catalina.

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Applescripts not working in Scripts menu in Catalina

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