I am new to Applescripting. I am trying find a way to embed several buttons onto ones desktop. When one of these buttons is pressed a URL, SWF, or App will launch. I am not sure if this is something that can be done with applescript but one of my professors suggested that I investigate it. If it is possible, I was wondering how it can be done, and how much control I would have over the appearance of the buttons. The help is greatly appreciated.
Hello and welcome to the wonderful world of applescript,
I am not sure if i understand you correctly?
Buttons on the desktop, do you mean icons that you double-click to launch?
If that is the case then you can easily create an applescript that opens an aplication, url or swf.
A simple example of this type of script would be
tell application "Safari"
set the URL of the front document to "http://www.macscripter.net"
end tell
or
tell application "Safari"
open file ":path:to the:file.swf"
end tell
Then when you have tested your script and it does what you want it to do, save it as an application.
You can then create an icon using photoshop and iconbuilder http://www.iconfactory.com/iconbuilder.asp
from there you can get info on the script you wrote and paste your icon as usual.
Then place the script with new icon on your desktop and whenever you double click on it it will open whatever you have it set to open.
hope this helps,
JO
iNotify offers the ability to create desktop buttons which drive scripts. It includes editable sample scripts that address your needs.
– Rob