[Pythonmac-SIG] CFURL Pain

[Paul Berkowitz]

On 3/2/05 6:00 AM, "has" <hengist.podd at virgin.net> wrote:

>>  In this case, the API *asks* for an Alias.  So, yeah, you do
>> actually want an Alias.
> 
> No, the TextEdit dictionary says 'alias', but the dictionary is
> merely documentation, not the API itself, and dictionaries are
> regularly incorrect. It should almost certainly read 'file'. IIRC,
> the sdef format doesn't even list 'alias' as one of the standard
> primitive types, so I've no idea where TextEdit gets it from.
> Probably a blow on the head or something.

The type 'alias' for the Save command in the Standard Suite is a long,
longstanding bug in AppleScript. It should say 'file specification', or
'file', I guess.  There's a special problem in AppleScript applications
which have their own 'file' keywords meaning something else (like Outlook
Express and Entourage), as you can imagine. Fortunately there is an equally
longstanding coercion, performs by AppleScript itself, that allows you to
use a string or Unicode text there. In OS X, the coercion is now to fileURL,
I believe. Whether this coercion takes place at a deep enough level
(AppleEvent?) that it will work also for appscript and MacPython, I don't
know. If you try it, what happens? In _any_ AppleScriptable application, you
can always just use the text file path for 'save' in AppleScript, and it
works. 

-- 
Paul Berkowitz