Deep Linking Hook

[rkaplan]

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Automators #86: Micro-Automations - Relay FM

[Sheng]

Thanks you. I think I need the help from @LucB Any ideas Sir? Thanks in advance

[mdbraber]

@rkaplan

Rosemary Orchard says in this podcast that she has found situations where the same script command works with Applescript but will not work with JXA due to bugs in the way JXA is implemented by Apple. Thus she prefers Applescript over JXA.

This was the exact reason why I was hesitant to switch to JXA at first - and it still might happen, but so far my experience has mainly pointed out bugs which seem to be fixable if the developer wants to (thanks @cgrunenberg)

@rkaplan

Have you (or others) experienced similar situations? Any specific examples of known situations where Applescript works but the JXA version does not?

@chrillek listed a few of those. My gripe indeed is that Library support in JXA is poorly implemented (e.g. a Library only exports individual functions, not objects). This means having to resort to ‘hacks’ like: Loading other javascript modules? · Issue #1 · JXA-Cookbook/JXA-Cookbook · GitHub (which works and is OK for me).

I’ve often thought what @chrillek was on about when referencing JXA in comparison to AS on this forum. But I’ve completely rewritten 3 of my main scripts from AS and JXA recently and the scripts have become better to read, less error-prone and (much!) more flexible. So although JXA might still pose problems, I’m happy that I’ve switched.

Also, recently I’ve added some iOS specific interactions using Scriptable which is also JS-based and it does help that all my other scripting now is in JS too.

@chrillek

Then, if we’re talking ObjC, there’s the question of blocks: AS has them, some ObJC methods require them, but I have no idea how to provide them with JXA.

I’d never heard of Obj-C blocks before now, but reading from e.g. Objective-C Blocks it seems they’re basically the same as lambda function in other languages (like Python, which I understand a bit). @chrillek would ObjC-block be helpful, considering you could also bring ObjC into JXA and use anonymous functions there? I’m sure I’m missing something as I haven’t been needing something like ObjC-blocks, but just wondering.

@chrillek

It might actually be worth exploring other JS approaches like node.

I think being able to keep things as lightweight as possible in things that I use often like Smart Rules using something like Node seems like a heavy-weight solution.

[BLUEFROG]

my experience has mainly pointed out bugs which seem to be fixable if the developer wants to

You are referring to a limited range of experience. I generally would not anticipate specific JXA fixes.

[Sheng]

Dear @cgrunenberg and @LucB,
There is one issue with this script. Hook can’t get the link from a folder in DT (for PDF file and video file, it works well). Any idea for this issue?

[BLUEFROG]

I’m not seeing any issue with getting the reference URL from a group in DEVONthink. However, I also just rewrote the Get Name and Get Address scripts…

Get Address

tell application id "DNtp"
	if exists content record then
		-- A content record is also a property of the application
		-- Content record applies to all think windows
		-- If a document window is open, there IS a content record
		-- A viewer window requires the view/edit pane to be visible to have a content record
		return reference URL of content record
	end if
	
	if class of think window 1 is equal to viewer window then
		if selection of think window 1 ≠ {} then
			set sel to (selected record 1) -- Get only the first selected record
			return reference URL of sel
		else
			-- The group selected in the Navigate sidebar is the root of the window
			return reference URL of root of think window 1
		end if
	end if
end tell

Get Name

tell application id "DNtp"
	if exists content record then
		-- A content record is also a property of the application
		-- Content record applies to all think windows
		-- If a document window is open, there IS a content record
		-- A viewer window requires the view/edit pane to be visible to have a content record
		return name of content record
	end if
	
	if class of think window 1 is equal to viewer window then
		if selection of think window 1 ≠ {} then
			set sel to (selected record 1) -- Get only the first selected record
			return name of sel
		else
			-- The group selected in the Navigate sidebar is the root of the window
			return name of root of think window 1
		end if
	end if
end tell

Does that work for you?

[Sheng]

Dear @BLUEFROG,

Thanks but it is actually not what I wanted. Your new scripts are somehow similar with the default scripts in Hook which means I can retrieve the group or file markdown link (clickable URL) but without deeper parameters in it.

However, what I wanted, also the topic of this discussion here, is that I can retrieve the page link from the PDF file or the frame link from the video file. In addition, the name can be changed accordingly by adding the page number or frame offset time such as [DT Help page 3](x-devonthink-item://<uuid>page=3), something like this.

For group, since there is no parameter of page or frame, just remain like [DT folder](x-devonthink-item://<uuid>).

You can refer to the scripts that @cgrunenberg wrote below.

@cgrunenberg

tell application id "DNtp"
	set theWindow to think window 1
	if exists content record of theWindow then
		set theURL to reference URL of content record of theWindow
		set thePage to current page of theWindow
		set theTime to current time of theWindow
		if thePage is not -1 then
			set theURL to theURL & "?page=" & (thePage as string)
		else if theTime is greater than 0.0 then
			set theURL to theURL & "?time=" & (theTime as string)
		end if
		return theURL
	else if (count of selected records) is 1 then
		return reference URL of selected record 0
	end if
end tell

[chrillek]

As to blocks: there are some objc frameworks where they’re needed as kind of callback functions. And I was not able to figure out how to do that in JXA. Anonymous functions don’t work.

The rest (Scriptable, nose) is too off-topic here.

[mdbraber]

@BLUEFROG

You are referring to a limited range of experience. I generally would not anticipate specific JXA fixes.

That’s indeed true Jim. So far most JXA issues I’ve encountered come down to bugs, rather than inherent problems with JXA.

[cgrunenberg]

@mdbraber

So far most JXA issues I’ve encountered come down to bugs, rather than inherent problems with JXA.

That’s quite different to my experience - so far most “fixes” for JXA were just workarounds as it was actually a shortcoming/bug of JXA. E.g. like this one:

Setting PDF data with JXA does not work

A boiled down version of my script: const app = Application("DEVONthink 3"); r = app.createRecordWith({name: "DEVONtechnologies", URL:"https://www.devontechnologies.com", type:"bookmark"); let rWindow = app.openWindowFor({record: r}); app.createRecordWith({name: r.name(), URL:r.url(), type:"PDF document", data: rWindow.pdf()}); Thanks for testing Criss!

DEVONthink will handle this but shouldn’t have to.

[mdbraber]

@cgrunenberg

That’s quite different to my experience - so far most “fixes” for JXA were just workarounds as it was actually a shortcoming/bug of JXA. E.g. like this one:

I see - we’re talking about the same thing here, from my perspective it seems like a bug, but as a developer from your perspective I now understand they are JXA bugs. Too bad the JXA implementation seems so brittle

@cgrunenberg

DEVONthink will handle this but shouldn’t have to.

You mean that DT is actually fixing a JXA shortcoming by use of a workaround?

[cgrunenberg]

@mdbraber

You mean that DT is actually fixing a JXA shortcoming by use of a workaround?

Exactly.

[bobg1]

I did read the manual and support documents but I cannot find a way to link specific Markdown sections or rich text paragraphs. Is there an explanation or link you can point me to so I can create a “deep” link to a specific section of a document? Thank you!

[cgrunenberg]

@bobg1

I did read the manual and support documents but I cannot find a way to link specific Markdown sections or rich text paragraphs.

That’s e.g. possible via the contextual menu in the text editor or via the Table of Contents inspector too.

[bobg1]

Thank you!

[oriexm]

Dear Sheng, I found [johnsidi]'s ( @ hook forum) script worked well for me to get URLs for a specific PDF page using hook. Maybe it will work for you.

tell application id "DNtp"
	if exists (content record of window 1) then
		-- current open item
		if type of (content record of window 1) is PDF document then
			set RecordLink to the reference URL of (content record of window 1)
			set PDFpage to current page of window 1
			set DEVONthinkLink to RecordLink & "?page=" & PDFpage
			return DEVONthinkLink
			
		else
			return reference URL of (content record of window 1)
		end if
	end if
	
	if class of window 1 is in {viewer window, search window} then
		set selected_items to selection of window 1
		if (count of selected_items) = 1 then
			if type of item 1 in selected_items is PDF document then
				
				-- current selected item
				set RecordLink to the reference URL of item 1 in selected_items
				set PDFpage to current page of viewer window 1
				set DEVONthinkLink to RecordLink & "?page=" & PDFpage
				return DEVONthinkLink
			else
				return reference URL of item 1 in selected_items
			end if
			
		end if
	end if
	
	-- selected group
	return reference URL of root of window 1
end tell

[Sheng]

Thanks @oriexm
Scripts @cgrunenberg provided above could already get the PDF page through Hook.

[splnkr]

The new browser Arc has a “copy to highlight” feature which works pretty good. Is this maybe a good option for DT, too?

In Arc it generates your post as:

(main address)/t/deep-linking-hook/69403/10#:~:text=You%20can%20actually%20create%20links%20in%20DEVONthink%20to%20e.g.%20PDF%20pages%2C%20Markdown%20sections%2C%20rich%20text%20paragraphs%20or%20to%20a%20video%20frame."

It seems like a search query so it should work only for longer highlights and not for example one word. But its good enough I think.

[cgrunenberg]

Item links support already ?search=text queries, a script could be used to generate them for the currently selected text.

[splnkr]

That’s nice. The only problem is that I don’t have any scripting skills. Sadly, I’m one of those who can only rely on other knowledgeable people.

Does somebody know how to do this? That would be really nice.

@LucB ?