NAME

Mac::AppleEvents::Simple - MacPerl module to do Apple Events more simply

SYNOPSIS

        #!perl -w
        use Mac::AppleEvents::Simple;
        use Mac::Files;  # for NewAliasMinimal()
        $alias = NewAliasMinimal(scalar MacPerl::Volumes);
        do_event(qw/aevt odoc MACS/, "'----':alis(\@\@)", $alias);

        # [...]
        use Mac::AppleEvents;  # for kAENoReply()
        $evt = build_event(qw/aevt odoc MACS/, "'----':alis(\@\@)", $alias);
        $evt->send_event(kAENoReply());
        

DESCRIPTION

This is just a simple way to do Apple Events. The example above was previously done as:

        #!perl -w
        use Mac::AppleEvents;
        use Mac::Files;
        $alias = NewAliasMinimal(scalar MacPerl::Volumes);
        $evt = AEBuildAppleEvent(qw/aevt odoc sign MACS 0 0/,
                "'----':alis(\@\@)", $alias) or die $^E;
        $rep = AESend($evt, kAEWaitReply()) or die $^E;
        AEDisposeDesc($rep);
        AEDisposeDesc($evt);

The building, sending, and disposing is done automatically. The function returns an object containing the parameters, including the AEPrint() results of AEBuildAppleEvent() ($event->{EVENT}) and AESend() ($event->{REPLY}).

The raw AEDesc forms are in ($event->{EVT}) and ($event->{REP}). So if I also used the Mac::AppleEvents module, I could extract the direct object from the reply like this:

        $dobj = AEPrint(AEGetParamDesc($event->{REP}, keyDirectObject()));

So you can still mess around with the events if you need to.

The sending of the event uses as its defaults (kAEWaitReply(), kAENormalPriority(), 3600*9999). To use different parameters, use build_event() with send_event().

Setting $Mac::AppleEvents::Simple::SWITCH = 0 prevents target app from going to the front on _send_event().

Sending an event with send_event() or do_event() will check for errors automatically, and if there is an error and the -w flag is on (or $^W is nonzero), the error will be sent to STDERR. This will also only happen if the event return an error in the standard errn or errs keywords. If your app returns errors in another way, you can roll your own warning system. This example assumes the direct object in the reply is the error if it is a negative integer:

    my $event = do_event( ... );
    my_warn_for_this_app($event);

    sub my_warn_for_this_app {
        my $event = shift;
        my $error = AEGetParamDesc($event->{REP}, keyDirectObject);
        if ($error) {
            my $err = $error->get;
            if ($err =~ /^-\d+$/ && $^W) {
                warn "Application error: $err";
            }
            AEDisposeDesc($error);
        }
    }

REQUIREMENTS

MacPerl 5.2.0r4 or better, and Mac::Apps::Launch 1.50.

FUNCTIONS

[$EVENT =] do_event(CLASSID, EVENTID, APPID, FORMAT, PARAMETERS ...)

Documented above. More documentation to come as this thing gets fleshed out more.

$EVENT = build_event(CLASSID, EVENTID, APPID, FORMAT, PARAMETERS ...)

This is for delayed execution of the event, or to build an event that will be sent specially with send_event(). Build it with build_event(), and then send it with send_event() method. Not sure how useful this is yet.

$EVENT->send_event([REPLY, PRIORITY, TIMEOUT]);

For sending events differntly than the default, which is (kAEWaitReply(), kAENormalPriority(), 3600*9999), or re-sending an event. The parameters are sticky for a given event, so:

        $evt->send_event(kAENoReply());
        $evt->send_event();  # kAENoReply() is still used

get_text(STRING);

This basically just strips out the curly quotes. It returns the first text in curly quotes it finds in scalar context, and all of them in a list in list context.

EXPORT

Exports functions do_event(), build_event(), get_text().

HISTORY

v0.52, September 30, 1998

Re-upload, sigh.

v0.51, September 29, 1998

Fixed problems accepting parameters in send_event. Sped up switching routine significantly.

v0.50, September 16, 1998

Only LaunchApps() when sending event now if $SWITCH is nonzero or app is not already running.

Added warnings for event errors if present and if $^W is nonzero. Only works if event errors use standard keywords errs or errn.

v0.10, June 2, 1998

Changed new() to build_event(), and ae_send() to send_event().

Made default AESend() parameters overridable via send_event().

v0.03, June 1, 1998

Added $SWITCH global var to override making target app go to front.

v0.02, May 19, 1998

Here goes ...

AUTHOR

Chris Nandor <pudge@pobox.com> http://pudge.net/

Copyright (c) 1998 Chris Nandor. All rights reserved. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. Please see the Perl Artistic License.

SEE ALSO

Mac::AppleEvents, Mac::OSA, Mac::OSA::Simple, macperlcat.