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Display dialog, await user input how to get no timeout?

I have a script i run on login, it brings up a dialog that requests user input, how can I stop it timing out if nothing happens?

iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Apr 12, 2013 8:22 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Apr 24, 2013 8:04 AM

When you add a giving up after parameter to the display dialog command, the result includes a gave upkey in the returned result, i.e.


display dialog"whatever"giving up after20

--> {button returned:"OK", gave up:false}

... so your later button tests are failing. You should just be checking against a particular key (button returned) of the result instead of the entire returned result (which is actually a record with various keys/values).

15 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Apr 24, 2013 8:04 AM in response to MattJayC

When you add a giving up after parameter to the display dialog command, the result includes a gave upkey in the returned result, i.e.


display dialog"whatever"giving up after20

--> {button returned:"OK", gave up:false}

... so your later button tests are failing. You should just be checking against a particular key (button returned) of the result instead of the entire returned result (which is actually a record with various keys/values).

Apr 12, 2013 1:17 PM in response to MattJayC

I have the same problem, and tested both of pjdube's suggestions.


tell application "Finder"


activate


with
timeout of 300 seconds


display dialog "testing…" buttons {"OK"} default button "OK"


end
timeout

end tell


worked but resulted in an error dialog when the timeout expired.


tell application "Finder"


activate


display dialog
"testing…" buttons {"OK"} default button "OK"giving up after 300

end tell


timed out with an error dialog at 120 seconds, per my previous experience.


tell application "Finder"


activate


with
timeout of 301
seconds-- must be longer than the "giving up" delay


display dialog "testing…" buttons {"OK"} default button "OK"giving up after 300


end
timeout

end tell


worked and the dialog went away cleanly at 300 seconds. This is what I will now use.

Apr 12, 2013 2:43 PM in response to twtwtw

twtwtw wrote:


Your problem is the Finder tell block. use Display Dialog outside of the Finder tell block and it works as expected.


This is good scripting practice anyway: best to use osax command (like display dialog) ouside of application tell blocks. It removes the possibility of errors of this sort.


Thanks. That works fine if Display Dialog is run by itself, but I can't get something like the following script to run properly, either from Script Debugger or from an applescript app. It beeps and the dialog will not appear until the the app it was run from is in front. Hence the need to run it inside a tell block. What am I missing?


tell application "Safari" to activate

delay 1

display dialog "testing…" buttons {"OK"} default button "OK" giving up after 150

Apr 12, 2013 3:08 PM in response to billearl

There's a trick you can try (one I haven't tested, but it should work). Put the display dialog in a handler so that it's no longer in the application's scope.


tell application "Safari"


activate

my displayMe()

end tell


on displayMe()


display dialog "testing…" buttons {"OK"} default button "OK" giving up after 150

end displayMe

Apr 12, 2013 3:56 PM in response to red_menace

red_menace wrote:


You just need to tell your application to activate before displaying the dialog, just like you are telling Safari to activate, for example


tellcurrent applicationtoactivate-- tell me to activate


That works. Thanks.


It turns out the root of my problem is using osascript to run scripts, which is the usual way I do that, not from Terminal but from a menu I've set up.


For example, using


osascript ~/Desktop/Test.scpt >/dev/null 2>&1


to run this script file,


tell application "Safari" to activate

delay 1

tell me to activate

delay 1

display dialog "testing…" buttons {"OK"} default button "OK" giving up after150

does not display the dialog.


Same result using osascript to run this script,


tell application "Safari"


activate

my displayMe()

end tell


on displayMe()


display dialog "testing…" buttons {"OK"} default button "OK" giving up after 150

end displayMe


but using osascript to run this script does display the dialog (without the timeout issues).


tell application "Finder"


activate

with timeout of 301 seconds-- must be longer than the "giving up" delay


display dialog "testing…" buttons {"OK"} default button "OK" giving up after 300

end timeout

end tell


Sorry for taking this thread off-track. I hope some of this has helped the OP.

Apr 12, 2013 4:32 PM in response to red_menace

red_menace wrote:


Ah - this is one of those situations where it helps to explain exactly what you are doing. You can't use osascript for any user interaction, so the usual work-around (other than to run scripts the regular way) is to tell some other application to do it, for example System Events (since it is a faceless background application).


Yup, I have used System Events for that sort of purpose. Thanks again.


I've learned (and maybe re-learned) a few things from this discussion, including an osascript-compatible kludge for timeout.

Apr 24, 2013 1:19 AM in response to billearl

Sorry long delay to get back to my question that I asked,


Still having issues, original I used the timeout action, and that keeps the script working.... However it still times out and then when I use the

giving up after150


I've not tested it to see if it prevents an early timeout, but clicking a the dialog and my script, just stops working there and does nothing else.



--These files need to change on boot.

--:Applications:Adobe Photoshop CS6:Presets:Scripts:SAVEAS.jsx

--:Applications:Adobe Photoshop CS6:Presets:Scripts:SaveOnly.jsx

--:Volumes:StudioC:Users:StudioC:Workflow:Folder Actions:0_HeliconHotFolder.scpt


set CS6Applications to ((path to applications folder as text) & "Adobe Photoshop CS6:Presets:Scripts")

set HeliconLabeler to ((path to home folder as text) & "Workflow:Folder Actions")


set HeliconAbdul to ((path to me as text) & "Contents:Resources:Scripts:abdul:0_HeliconHotFolder.scpt")

set HeliconMatt to ((path to me as text) & "Contents:Resources:Scripts:matt:0_HeliconHotFolder.scpt")

set HeliconShah to ((path to me as text) & "Contents:Resources:Scripts:shah:0_HeliconHotFolder.scpt")


set PS6SaveAsAbdul to ((path to me as text) & "Contents:Resources:Scripts:abdul:SAVEAS.jsx")

set PS6SaveOnlyAbdul to ((path to me as text) & "Contents:Resources:Scripts:abdul:SaveOnly.jsx")


set PS6SaveAsMatt to ((path to me as text) & "Contents:Resources:Scripts:matt:SAVEAS.jsx")

set PS6SaveOnlyMatt to ((path to me as text) & "Contents:Resources:Scripts:matt:SaveOnly.jsx")


set PS6SaveAsShah to ((path to me as text) & "Contents:Resources:Scripts:shah:SAVEAS.jsx")

set PS6SaveOnlyShah to ((path to me as text) & "Contents:Resources:Scripts:shah:SaveOnly.jsx")


tell application "System Events"

if name of current user is equal to "StudioA" then ¬

set MacName to "true"

if name of current user is not equal to "StudioA" then ¬

set MacName to "false"

end tell


with timeout of (60 * 61) seconds

display dialog "Who is using the Computer?" buttons {"Abdul", "Matt", "Shah"} with icon caution

if result = {button returned:"Abdul"} then

if MacName = "true" then

tell application "Finder"


duplicatefilePS6SaveAsAbdultofolderCS6Applications with replacing


duplicatefilePS6SaveOnlyAbdultofolderCS6Applications with replacing

end tell

else if MacName = "false" then

tell application "Finder"



duplicatefileHeliconAbdultofolderHeliconLabeler with replacing


duplicatefilePS6SaveAsAbdultofolderCS6Applications with replacing


duplicatefilePS6SaveOnlyAbdultofolderCS6Applications with replacing

end tell

display alert "Turn Camera on"

delay 1


tell application id "breezesys.com.dslrremotepro" to activate


menu_click({"DSLRRemotePro", "Camera", "Set date/time and owner string..."})

delay 1

tell application "System Events"


keystroke "a" usingcommand down

delay 1.5

keystroke "Shot_By_Abdul"

delay 1.5


keystrokereturn


end tell

end if


else if result = {button returned:"Matt"} then

if MacName = "true" then

tell application "Finder"


duplicatefilePS6SaveAsMatttofolderCS6Applications with replacing


duplicatefilePS6SaveOnlyMatttofolderCS6Applications with replacing

end tell

else if MacName = "false" then

tell application "Finder"


duplicatefileHeliconMatttofolderHeliconLabeler with replacing


duplicatefilePS6SaveAsMatttofolderCS6Applications with replacing


duplicatefilePS6SaveOnlyMatttofolderCS6Applications with replacing

end tell

display alert "Turn Camera on"

delay 1


tell application id "breezesys.com.dslrremotepro" to activate


menu_click({"DSLRRemotePro", "Camera", "Set date/time and owner string..."})

delay 1

tell application "System Events"


keystroke "a" usingcommand down

delay 1.5

keystroke "Shot_By_Matt

"

delay 1.5


keystrokereturn

end tell

end if






else if result = {button returned:"Shah"} then

if MacName = "true" then

tell application "Finder"


duplicatefilePS6SaveAsShahtofolderCS6Applications with replacing


duplicatefilePS6SaveOnlyShahtofolderCS6Applications with replacing

end tell

else if MacName = "false" then

tell application "Finder"


duplicatefileHeliconShahtofolderHeliconLabeler with replacing


duplicatefilePS6SaveAsShahtofolderCS6Applications with replacing


duplicatefilePS6SaveOnlyShahtofolderCS6Applications with replacing

end tell

display alert "Turn Camera on"

delay 1


tell application id "breezesys.com.dslrremotepro" to activate


menu_click({"DSLRRemotePro", "Camera", "Set date/time and owner string..."})

delay 1

tell application "System Events"


keystroke "a" usingcommand down

delay 1.5

keystroke "Shot_By_Shah"

delay 1.5


keystrokereturn

end tell

end if


end if

end timeout

--handlers


on menu_click(mList)

local appName, topMenu, r



-- Validate our input

if mList's length < 3 then error "Menu list is not long enough"



-- Set these variables for clarity and brevity later on

set {appName, topMenu} to (items 1 through 2 of mList)

set r to (items 3 through (mList's length) of mList)



-- This overly-long line calls the menu_recurse function with


-- two arguments: r, and a reference to the top-level menu

tell application "System Events" to my menu_click_recurse(r, ((process appName)'s ¬

(menu bar 1)'s (menu bar itemtopMenu)'s (menutopMenu)))

end menu_click


on menu_click_recurse(mList, parentObject)

local f, r



-- `f` = first item, `r` = rest of items

set f to item 1 of mList

if mList's length > 1 then set r to (items 2 through (mList's length) of mList)



-- either actually click the menu item, or recurse again

tell application "System Events"

if mList's length is 1 then


clickparentObject's menu itemf

else

my menu_click_recurse(r, (parentObject's (menu itemf)'s (menuf)))

end if

end tell

end menu_click_recurse

Display dialog, await user input how to get no timeout?

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