Adobe 23101764 Scripting Guide - Page 69

Photoshop CS Scripting Guide

65

Scripting Photoshop

The Application object

3

AS:

set docRef to current document

VB:

Set docRef = appRef.ActiveDocument

JS:

d

ocRef = app.activeDocument;

You can also switch back and forth between documents by setting the active document.

AS:

set current document to document "My Document"

VB:

appRef.ActiveDocument = appRef.Documents("My Document")

JS:

app.activeDocument = app.documents["My Document"];

Application preferences

The application object contains a property for Photoshop preferences. The preferences

property is itself an object and has many properties. The name of the preferences object for the

three languages is the following:

AS:

settings

VB:

Preferences

JS:

preferences

The properties in the preferences object correlate to the preferences found by displaying the

Photoshop “Preferences” dialog in the user interface (select the “Edit > Preferences” menu in

Photoshop).

Display dialogs

It is important to be able to control dialogs properly from a script. If a dialog is shown your

script stops until a user dismisses the dialog. This is normally

ﬁ

ne in an interactive script that

expects a user to be sitting at the machine. But if you have a script that runs in an unsupervised

(batch) mode you do not want dialogs to be displayed and stop your script.

Using the

display dialogs

(

DisplayDialogs/displayDialogs

) property on the

application object you can control whether or not dialogs are displayed.

If you set

display dialogs

to

always ( psDisplayAllDialogs/ALL )

, Photoshop

will show all user related dialogs. This is typically not what you want.

If you set

display dialogs

to

error dialogs (DisplayErrorDialogs/ERROR)

,

then only dialogs related to errors are shown. You would typically use this setting when you

are developing a script or if your script is an interactive one that expects a user to be sitting at

the machine while running the script.

If you set

display dialogs

to

never ( DisplayNoDialogs/NO ),

then no dialogs

are shown. If an error occurs it will be returned as an error to the script. See section

2.10.4,

“Error handling” on page 29

for more information on catching errors.

Section	Page
Photoshop CS Scripting Guide	1
Table of contents	3
Introduction	5
1.1 About this manual	5
1.1.1 Conventions in this guide	5
1.2 What is scripting?	6
1.3 Why use scripting?	7
1.4 What about actions?	7
1.5 System requirements	8
1.5.1 Mac	8
1.5.2 Windows	8
1.6 JavaScript	9
1.7 Choosing a scripting language	9
1.8 Legacy COM scripting	10
1.9 New Features	10
1.10 What’s Next	11
Scripting basics	12
2.1 Documents as objects	12
2.2 Object model concepts	12
2.2.1 Object classes	12
2.2.2 Object inheritance	13
2.2.3 Object elements or collections	13
2.2.4 Object reference	13
2.3 Object Model	14
2.3.1 Additional Containment Classes	16
2.3.2 Hello World Sample Scripts	18
2.4 Documenting scripts	21
2.5 Values	22
2.6 Variables	24
2.6.1 Assigning values to variables	24
2.6.2 Using variables to store references	25
2.6.3 Naming variables	25
2.7 Operators	26
2.8 Commands and methods	26
2.8.1 Conditional statements	27
2.8.2 Control structures	28
2.9 Handlers, subroutines and functions	29
2.10 Debugging and Error Handling	30
2.10.1 AppleScript debugging	31
2.10.2 Visual Basic debugging	32
2.10.3 JavaScript Debugging	33
2.10.4 Error handling	33
2.11 What’s Next	34
Scripting Photoshop	35
3.1 Photoshop scripting guidelines	35
3.2 Viewing Photoshop objects, commands and methods	35
3.2.1 Viewing Photoshop’s AppleScript dictionary	36
3.2.2 Viewing Photoshop’s type library (VB)	37
3.2.3 Viewing the JavaScript Environment	37
3.3 Your first Photoshop script	39
3.3.1 AppleScript	39
3.3.2 Visual Basic	40
3.3.3 VBScript	42
3.3.4 JavaScript	43
3.4 Advanced Scripting	45
3.4.1 Advanced JavaScript	45
3.4.2 Advanced Visual Basic	50
3.4.3 Advanced AppleScript	54
3.5 Object references	59
3.5.1 AppleScript	59
3.5.2 Visual Basic and JavaScript	60
3.6 Working with units	61
3.6.1 Unit values	61
3.6.2 Unit value useage	64
3.6.3 Changing ruler and type units	65
3.7 Executing JavaScripts from AS or VB	66
3.7.1 Passing arguments to JavaScript	67
3.7.2 Executing one-line JavaScripts	68
3.8 The Application object	68
3.9 Document object	72
3.9.1 Saving documents and save options	72
3.9.2 Document information	74
3.9.3 Document manipulation	75
3.10 Layer objects	76
3.10.1 Setting the Active layer	79
3.10.2 Layer sets	79
3.10.3 Linking layers	80
3.10.4 Applying styles to layers	81
3.10.5 Rotating layers	81
3.11 Text item object	81
3.11.1 Setting the contents of the text item	83
3.11.2 Setting text stroke colors	84
3.11.3 Setting fonts	84
3.11.4 Warping text	85
3.12 Selections	85
3.12.1 Defining selections	86
3.12.2 Stroking the selection border	88
3.12.3 Inverting selections	88
3.12.4 Expand, contract and feather selections	88
3.12.5 Filling a selection	90
3.12.6 Rotating selections	91
3.12.7 Loading and storing selections	91
3.13 Working with Filters	92
3.13.1 Selecting channel(s) to filter	92
3.13.2 Other filters	93
3.14 Channel object	93
3.14.1 Channel types	93
3.14.2 Setting the active channel	94
3.14.3 Creating new channels	94
3.15 Color objects	95
3.15.1 Setting a Color	95
3.15.2 Getting and converting colors	97
3.15.3 Comparing Colors	98
3.15.4 Getting a Web Safe Color	98
3.16 History object	98
3.16.1 Filling a selection with a history state	99
3.17 Clipboard interaction	100
3.17.1 Copy	100
3.17.2 Copy merged	100
3.17.3 Cut	101
3.17.4 Paste	101
3.17.5 Paste into command	102

Adobe 23101764 Scripting Guide - Page 69

appRef.ActiveDocument = appRef.DocumentsMy Document

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