Creat Sym link for Dropbox

blueteq · November 5, 2010, 12:34pm

Hi,
I am new to Apple Scripting, so by doing some reading and searching online managed to put this together.

I managed to manually setup my DropBox(DBX) account as a sync tool for some of my desktop app preferences.
DBX supports Symbolic Links to sync files outside the standard DBX folder.
This works great to get an application like Adium to sync account information and extras between multiple computers.

This is what I have come up with so far.
I know that this line is wrong, actually not even close.

I dont know how to drop the trailing slash from the POSIX output
I am not giving it the final sym link name.

Not sure how to do this, found a few examples with if statement but cannot figure out how to integrate it into this script.

The script that works directly in terminal for reference:

This is the full script,

– Just a pop-up to explain whats going to happen.
display dialog “This script will move a selected folder to a specified location, then create a symbolic link from the original location”

tell application “Finder”

– Set vairables and select the source and destination folders and then move the folder
set localfolder to choose folder default location (path to home folder) with prompt "Select Original Application Support Folder:"
set dropboxfolder to choose folder default location (path to home folder) with prompt "Now Select the DropBox Application Support Folder:"
try
	move localfolder to dropboxfolder
on error errMsg number errNum
	display dialog "Error: " & errNum & return & errMsg
end try
– Shell Script to create symbolic link
do shell script "ln -s" & quoted form of POSIX path of dropboxfolder & quoted form of POSIX path of localfolder
end tell

thanks

regulus6633 · November 5, 2010, 3:18pm

If I’m understanding your situation, I think you want to select a folder in your user’s application support folder and have a symbolic link for that folder created in your dropbox application support folder. If so then the following should work. The main problem that I see with your “ln” command is that it has no spaces in it (you need spaces between the paths and also the ln command) and the source path should come before the destination path. I would write that script like this… notice that the Finder is only needed for one line of the script so we do not “tell application Finder” to do everything, we only tell it to do that one line.

set dropboxAppSupportFolder to (path to home folder as text) & "Dropbox:Library:Application Support:"

-- verify that the Dropbox folder exists
try
	alias dropboxAppSupportFolder
on error
	error "The dropbox application support folder does not exist. Please create it before running this script."
end try

-- select the folder that you want to create the sybolic link for
set inPath to choose folder default location (path to application support folder from user domain) with prompt "Choose a folder. A symbolic link will be created for it in Dropbox's Application Support folder."

-- get the name of the inPath so we can calculate the outPath
tell application "Finder" to set folderName to name of inPath
set outPath to dropboxAppSupportFolder & folderName

-- verify that the outPath does not exist
try
	alias outPath
	error "The folder already exists in the dropbox application support folder. Please try again."
end try

-- Shell Script to create symbolic link
do shell script "ln -s " & quoted form of POSIX path of inPath & space & quoted form of POSIX path of outPath

blueteq · November 6, 2010, 2:00am

Thanks for the reply, Learnt a so much from it!

I now understand more about the “do shell script” command.

I still would like the user to choose their own Dropbox location as this is something they can change on the install.
Below is the final script that actually does what I need, however the second step to select the destination folder can be automated… which I will play around with.

Thanks again for the help!

– Just a pop-up to explain whats going to happen and backup warning
display dialog “Ensure you have a backup of the Folders you will be moving” with icon 0
display dialog “This script will move a selected Application Support Folder to a selected DropBox Folder.” with icon 1 buttons {“Step One”}

– Set vairables and select the source and destination folders and then move the folder

set localfolder to choose folder default location (path to application support folder from user domain) with prompt “Select Original Application Support Folder:”
set dropboxfolder to choose folder default location (path to home folder) with prompt “Now Select the DropBox Application Support Folder:”
tell application “Finder”
try
move localfolder to dropboxfolder
on error errMsg number errNum
display dialog "Error: " & errNum & return & errMsg
end try
end tell

set AppSupportFolder to (path to home folder as text) & “Library:Application Support:”

– verify that the Application folder exists
try
alias AppSupportFolder
on error
error “The application support folder does not exist. Please create it before running this script.”
end try
display dialog “Now Select the moved folder you wish to link back to the Local Application Support Folder” buttons {“Step Two”}

– select the folder that you want to create the sybolic link for
set inPath to choose folder default location (path to home folder from user domain) with prompt “Choose a folder. A symbolic link will be created for it in the Application Support folder.”

– get the name of the inPath so we can calculate the outPath
tell application “Finder” to set folderName to name of inPath
set outPath to AppSupportFolder & folderName

– verify that the outPath does not exist
try
alias outPath
error “The folder already exists in the application support folder. Please Check the Applications folder manually and ensure the folder has moved correctly”
end try

– Shell Script to create symbolic link
do shell script "ln -s " & quoted form of POSIX path of inPath & space & quoted form of POSIX path of outPath