Combining Workflows in Automator

I am trying to figure out if there is a way to combine workflows in Apple's Automator application. Basically I saved out the automation as an application and it works like this: I can drag a folder of images onto it and it scales and renames them. At the end of the automation I would like to trigger another workflow. The issue is that the previous workflows images are taken as input to the new workflow. How can I run multiple workflows without using the output of the previous workflow as the input for the current. Thanks

Is there some reason why the standard method - right-click on the Run Workflow action and choose Ignore Input from the popup - doesn't work?

Similar Messages

HT2488 How do I create a workflow in Automator or a script in AppleScripts to download an excel file from a specific webpage?

I would like to create a workflow in Automator or a script in AppleScript (or a combination of the two), that opens Safari to a specified page and downloads an excel file from this page and saves the downloaded document to my desktop.
Is this something that be done? If so, how?
I have so far been able to build a workflow in Automator to open Safari and added an AppleScript that takes Safari to a specific page that has an Excel document.
I can't figure out where to go from here... Any help would be apprecitated.
Thanks!

Would you have the web address the excel sheet is on?
Is there a simular web page you could point to if not?
Would there be a copy of the file on an FTP page. This would be easier.
curl
http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/mac-os-x-terminal-download-file/
http://www.thegeekstuff.com/2012/04/curl-examples/
http://curl.haxx.se/docs/manpage.html
Macintosh-HD -> Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal
# Press return to run a command.
the curl is a terminal command ( Unix ). It allows you to read a file off of the web.
man curl
provides cryptic information on the commnad curl.
press the space bar to advance a page.
press letter to q to quit.
What you may have to is to read in the web page as a text file. Go "fishing" through the page to find the excel file you need. Once you find the file, you can use curl to read the file.
curl is a very full featured command. (read complex to figure out ).
It is easier to diagnose problems with debug information. I suggest adding log statements to your script to see what is going on. Here is an example.
    Author: rccharles
    For testing, run in the Script Editor.
      1) Click on the Event Log tab to see the output from the log statement
      2) Click on Run
    For running shell commands see:
    http://developer.apple.com/mac/library/technotes/tn2002/tn2065.html
on run
    -- Write a message into the event log.
    log " --- Starting on " & ((current date) as string) & " --- "
    -- debug lines
    set desktopPath to (path to desktop) as string
    log "desktopPath = " & desktopPath
    set unixDesktopPath to POSIX path of desktopPath
    log "unixDesktopPath = " & unixDesktopPath
    set quotedUnixDesktopPath to quoted form of unixDesktopPath
    log "quoted form is " & quotedUnixDesktopPath
    try
        set fromUnix to do shell script "ls -l " & quotedUnixDesktopPath
        display dialog "ls -l of " & quotedUnixDesktopPath & return & fromUnix
    on error errMsg
        log "ls -l error..." & errMsg
    end try
end run

Create a workflow on automator. Download attachments from email and import to iphoto

I would like to create a workflow on automator to do the following task: save email attachments (photos) from an specific inbox to downloads, for example, and then, import to iphoto.
I would like to do this on automator rather than applescript.
I have tried using "get an especific mail item" and then "get attachments", but it does not work.
Thank you very much

I would like to create a workflow on automator to do the following task: save email attachments (photos) from an specific inbox to downloads, for example, and then, import to iphoto.
I would like to do this on automator rather than applescript.
I have tried using "get an especific mail item" and then "get attachments", but it does not work.
Thank you very much

Combine PDF Pages automator step strips annotations

Oh, I was so excited when I noticed the Combine PDF Pages command in Automator.
Then I was less excited when I discovered that if any of the pages has annotations created in Acrobat Pro, those annotations are removed from the newly combined PDF.
Since Preview, for some strange reason, is not AppleScript-able, Automator is the only way I see to do this.
Acrobat is somewhat scriptable to a degree but does not have a combine PDFs command in the dictionary.
So, has anyone figured out a way to automate the merging of PDFs via a script, workflow, app, etc -- while RETAINING the annotations? I am triggering this from FileMaker as part of a work process we're developing, so manually merging the PDFs kind of defeats the purpose.
Anyone have any suggestions?
Thanks,
Jeff

Found It!
Ok, so it seems "insert pages" is in the Acrobat dictionary; I was looking for an equivelant of "Combine Files into Single PDF". Anyway, here's draft one of the script. I'll probably make it less clunky next week, but this is basically how it works:
set nFile to ""
set pCount to 0
set pdfList to {}
set pdfNameList to {}
set sourcePath to "SL:Users:joeuser:Desktop:fix ccd:Source:"
set targetPath to "SL:Users:joeuser:Desktop:fix ccd:Target:"
set coverFileName to "cover.pdf"
tell application "Finder"
move file (sourcePath & coverFileName) to folder targetPath
          set my pdfList to every file in folder sourcePath
          repeat with f in pdfList
                    set pdfNameList to pdfNameList & (name of f)
          end repeat
end tell
tell application "Adobe Acrobat Pro"
--activate
open (my targetPath & my coverFileName) with invisible
          set targetDoc to last document
          set my pCount to (number of pages) of targetDoc
          get my pdfNameList
          repeat with f in my pdfNameList
                    set c to number of documents
                    open (sourcePath & f) with invisible
                    repeat until c < (number of documents)
                    end repeat
                    set newDoc to last document
                    set nPages to (number of pages) of newDoc
insert pages targetDoc after my pCount from newDoc starting with 1 number of pages nPages
                    set my pCount to (my pCount) + nPages
close newDoc
          end repeat
save targetDoc
close targetDoc
end tell
tell application "Finder"
          set f to file (my targetPath & my coverFileName)
          set name of f to "New Merges PDF.pdf"
end tell

Combine PDF trough Automator

How do I combine PDF's trough the Automator - Step for Step.... thx alot
Greets Simon

Simply double-click or drag the "Combine PDF Pages" action from the "PDF" action library into your workflow. Then do the same for Finder's "Open Finder Items" action. Click File > Save As Plug-in, give it a name, confirm that it's a plug-in for Finder, and click Save.
Now whenever you control-click on a selected group of PDFs in Finder, you can click Automator > [your workflow] and it will open them as a combined document.

Combining Text in Automator for Excel import.

I'm attempting to create an automator workflow that will string some text together so that it can be imported into an Excel worksheet. Here's my workflow so far.
• New Text File
Creates file temp.txt
• Run AppleScript
Opens file temp.txt
• Get Specified Text (specified text below)
Read Today
Read Tomorrow
Read This Week
Read This Month
• Filter Paragraphs (needed so the text is not treated as one big line of text and is displayed in the next step correctly)
Return Paragraphs that are not empty
• Choose from List (all 4 items displayed correctly, all selected by default)
Select one item
• Set Contents of TextEdit Document (temp.txt) (append)
• Get Specified Text (specified text below (a semi-colon))
• Set Contents of TextEdit Document (temp.txt) (append)
• Get Specified Text (specified text below)
keywords go here
• Set Contents of TextEdit Document (temp.txt) (append)
• Get Contents of TextEdit Document (results below)
Read Today
keywords go here"
(Once I get this part working, I will add a URL onto it also).
So, all my content has arrived here, but on three different lines. But because it is on three different lines, it does not import into Excel correctly. I can't concatenate this using the usual AppleScript method because I would have to declare these items as variables. I've tried various ideas, but I cannot get the three above to append to one line, like this…
Read Today;keywords go here
without manual intervention, which sort of defeats the reason for trying to automate this.
I hope I've explained this well enough that it makes sense.
Any help or ideas are appreciated.

Well, it is good to know that it can be done in Applescript, though I have not found a way to accomplish this. All examples I have seen (Googling and AppleScript 1-2-3 book) use set statements using static strings, and then concatenating those statements together. Since my values are dynamic, those examples don't help.
What I have to work with are these lines of text in a new document.
Read Today
keywords go here
The text will vary from run to run.
What I need to end with is… (for use in Excel, import text files action)
Read Today;keywords go here (line1 & line2 & line3)
So, I don't know how to proceed from here, unless I can do something like set var1 to line1 of temp.txt, set var2 to line2 of temp.txt, etc.

Combination/Matrix Generation Automation?

Hi everyone:
The current problem in front of me is that I have a set of string elements, say N of them, while the task is to automatically generate ALL combinations with length ranging from 1 to (N-1). If, for example, given 'a, b, c, d', the following output is desirable:
a, b, c, d, e, ab, ac, ad, bc, bd, cd, abc, abd, acd, bcd
I attempted nested loops but so far unsuccessful unfortunately. How can this be done? Many thanks in advance!!
Regards,

Thanks for the URL. It lists what I basically want to
achieve...except the order should not matter in my
case, i.e. 'abc' = 'cba' and only 1 of the two should
stay. Can you please give out a bit more hints on
adjustment of the CombinationGenerator source code on
that link?Look at the first example on the link where the class is used. I tested using it for getting combinations of three characters with abcdef as input String. Here's the output I get.
abc
abd
abe
abf
acd
ace
acf
ade
adf
aef
bcd
bce
bcf
bde
bdf
bef
cde
cdf
cef
def
I think that's what you are expecting.
public class TestCombo {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        char[] elements = {'a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f'};
        int[] indices;
        CombinationGenerator x = new CombinationGenerator (elements.length, 3);
        StringBuffer combination;
        while (x.hasMore ()) {
            combination = new StringBuffer ();
            indices = x.getNext ();
            for (int i = 0; i < indices.length; i++) {
                combination.append (elements[indices]);
System.out.println (combination.toString ());

Need help with "batch saving workflow" quicktime / automator

Hi, my goal:
I have a lot of folders with (windows) DV-avi files I need to change container to apple mov.
The best way - I found out - to just change the container from avi to mov - without touching the video and audio stream or metadata - is:
open the file in quicktime pro 7
save as self contained movie (same filename, same location).
wait til finished.
open next file...
As far as I understand, the script should open and handle many files automatic, file by file - always waiting til process is finished, before starting with next file.
A probably similar thing I found is a script for batch encode..... but I need batch save , because I don't want to "touch" the source media
on run {inputFiles}
if inputFiles is equal to {} then
    set inputFiles to (choose file with prompt "Select the file(s) to convert:" with multiple selections allowed without invisibles)
end if
open inputFiles
end run
on open droppedItems
tell application "Finder" to set inputFolder to (container of first item of droppedItems) as Unicode text
set outputFolder to (choose folder with prompt "Select output folder:" default location (inputFolder as alias)) as Unicode text
set exportPreset to (choose from list {"Movie", "iPhone", "iPod", "HD 480p", "HD 720p"} with prompt "Choose QuickTime Export Preset:") as Unicode text
if exportPreset is equal to "false" then
    return
end if
repeat with currentItem in droppedItems
    repeat until getProcessPercentCPU("CoreMediaAuthoringSessionHelper") is equal to ""
      delay 30
    end repeat
    tell application "Finder" to set fileName to name of currentItem as Unicode text
    convertFile(currentItem, outputFolder & fileName & ".mov", exportPreset)
    delay 30
end repeat
end open
on convertFile(inputFile, outputFile, exportPreset)
tell application "QuickTime Player"
    set thisMovie to open inputFile
    export thisMovie in (outputFile) using settings preset exportPreset
    close thisMovie
end tell
end convertFile
on getProcessPercentCPU(processName)
do shell script "/bin/ps -xco %cpu,command | /usr/bin/awk '/" & processName & "$/ {print $1}'"
end getProcessPercentCPU
As I can’t get it to work myself, I ask for help…….
Appreciate your answer
all the best from austria

You don't need to go through the double export process. You can either place the edited and rendered 720p sequence in the 352x288 sequence and then export, or you can scale the image down on export in the QuickTime Conversion export module, or in Compressor. Any QuickTime can read uncompressed video.

Applescript .app stopping Automator workflow

Hi. I'm still a novice at Applescript, but getting better with Automator, and trying to combine the two to get the result I need, and I'm almost there except this one little glitch:
I've got an Automator workflow that involves an Applescript application (.app) which for some unknown reason halts the rest of the workflow despite it seemingly working right. The Applescript does little more than quit a specific application, which it does. But when I run the workflow from Automator I get the error: "Connection is Invalid"
Any help here would be greatly appreciated - is there something I should do differently with the script? Or should I handle this differently in Automator?
Thanks!
Below is the text of the script:
tell application "OmniOutliner"
tell every document
try
save
on error errormessage number errornumber
display dialog errormessage buttons {"OK"} default button 1
end try
end tell
end tell
quit application "OmniOutliner"

First,
'... is there something I should do differently with the script? ...' - Based only on the material provided - the AppleScript code (the 'save' line) assumes no 'Untitled' 'OmniOutliner' windows, otherwise the drop down 'Save' sheet will result with a 'Script Editor' error message of -> 'AppleScript Error. OmniOutliner Professional got an error: AppleEvent timed out.'. This error, or something similar, may be what is generating the 'Automator' 'Connection is Invalid' error message.
Try the code below, in place of your AppleScript source code - with any needed modifications (such as 'OmniOutliner' in place of 'OmniOutliner Professional').
-- Code starts here --
tell application "OmniOutliner Professional"
close (every document whose (name begins with "Untitled" and canUndo is false)) saving no -- Close any newly created documents, which have not been modified.
set {tDocuments, dNames} to {documents, name of documents} -- Create lists of opened documents and the documents titles (names).
repeat with i from 1 to (count tDocuments) -- Cycle through the tDocuments list.
if ((item i of dNames) contains "Untitled") then -- If a newly created document, and recently modified - then, save it with a date stamped name, to the 'Desktop'..
save (item i of tDocuments) in ((((path to desktop folder from user domain) as string) & (do shell script "date +%Y%m%d%H%M%SOmniOutliner.oo3")))
else if ((canUndo of (item i of tDocuments)) is true) then
save (item i of tDocuments) -- If a previously created document, and recently modified.
end if
end repeat
end tell
quit application "OmniOutliner Professional" -- Any opened but not modified documents, or any recently saved documents - will be closed here.
-- Code ends here --
Note: No detailed checking is provided, above, for files that contained 'Untitled' within the filenames, and were then opened in 'OmniOutliner Professional'; as opposed to, any newly created document - which will contain 'Untitled' as its name or the beginning of its name. Such is left as an exercise for the student.
Second,
'... should I handle this differently in Automator?' - Please provide the 'Automator' workflow Actions.

Applescript works in Automator but not as Application workflow

I have a pretty simple Application workflow in automator that runs this applescript:
set front_app to (path to frontmost application as Unicode text)
tell application front_app
activate
set bounds of window 1 to {0, 0, 1280, 800}
end tell
as you can see all it does is it maximizes the current window. it works when I run the script from within automator, but when i save it as an application and run that it says the applescript errored.
Why is my simple automator not working as an application?
Message was edited by: Pyrolistical

When you run that script as an application it comes to the front and is therefore the frontmost application: it doesn't have a window to be maximised.
You would need to specify the actual application to have its window maximised:
tell application "Safari"
activate
set bounds of window 1 to {0, 0, 1280, 800}
end tell
Trying to find out which was the frontmost application before you launched the AppleScript application is going to to be difficult.

Automator Workflow for Quicktime 7.6.4

Hello.
I need to hang my head in shame, for I am normally pretty good with computers. I started looking up automator, but this is the only task I have even needed to do often enough to resort to automator.
So I am being lazy and I would LOVE you forever if you could just tell me what I need to make a custom workflow for automator.
Here are some details in case you don't see them Quicktime is 7.6.4 Automator 2.0.4 OS 10.5.8
As you can guess, this laptop is pretty old. I pretty much only use it to project videos at events now.
What I need is for automator to always turn the loop function on when Quicktime opens any new video. (Or if I am PEBCAK on this, how the heck do I make that happen if not with automator....?)
Super Awesome Bonus Points, but not as crucial for my sanity...
One that opens the A/V controls ---> turn the playback speed down as low as it will go on every file.
Thanks, it would mean not having to time bathroom breaks at events in fear of the random video files stopping and it looking all ghetto and non-functioning (ie like it was a Windows computer)
I know VLC is an alternative but HD videos on that always have frame rate and crashing issues, even after messing with the settings. Plus the 1 window at time is an issue too...though it's more the combo of those 2 problems in tandem.
Thanks!

No. It won't install.
Very interesting. The docs on 7.6.4 do not mention OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard)

Automator problem--action works OK in Workflow but not in iCal Plug-In

The "Find To Dos in iCal" action works fine when executed from a Workflow within Automator, but fails to produce results when executed as a plug-in from within iCal. Specifically, I'm using "Due Date is Next Week" as the selection criteria and when executed from the workflow all to dos with due dates in the next 7 days are found, but no to dos are found when executed as a plug-in.
I assume this is a Leopard bug, so I've submitted an Automator Bug Report.
Does anyone have a solution or work-around for this problem?

You might get better and quicker feedback from
the
Flash forums.

Aperture import automator workflow available

I recently put together an Aperture import workflow in Automator which I thought other people might find useful, it can be downloaded with instructions here:
http://tonyswash.info/ImportPlugin.zip
What this does is act as a plug-in for Image Capture. When you plug in your camera and Image Capture launches this plug-in is available. When selected it will:
Copy some or all of the images in your camera to your hard drive
Prompt you for a name for the images (i.e. wedding, vacation etc)
It will then produce sequential numbered files list based on the name you entered (i.e. wedding-0001, wedding-002, etc). The default setting is to start from 1 but you can start from any number.
It will then launch Aperture
It then prompts you for a new project name (which is the default setting or you can select an existing project) into which it will import the images. You can also select so that the Images copied to your hard drive (ie those not in Aperture) are deleted
It will then close Image Capture
It will then eject your camera
Hope this is useful to someone
Duel G5 2.5 Powermac and MacBookPro Mac OS X (10.4.5)

Yes, I found this out today. Any Finder Workflow that I start with "Get Selected Finder Items" does not work. Hope they fix this soon ...that's an important one to work.

Automator workflow question?

I tried to create a workflow in automator but I had no luck so far. So I need some help to create an automator workflow for;
go to a specific web page and save the page as pdf to desktop and than close the safari.
I've tried as "record/watch what I do" in automator but when I click on the safari on dock the "watch me" script misses it and presses mail.app
Help please. Thanks in advance.

Give this one a try - it uses a *Run AppleScript* action to script Safari's print dialog:
1) *Get Specified URLs* (drag URL here - only the last one will be saved)
2) *Display Webpages*
3) *Run AppleScript*: <pre style="</div>
font-family: Monaco, 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;
font-size: 10px;
font-weight: normal;
margin: 0px;
padding: 5px;
border: 1px solid #000000;
width: 680px; height: 340px;
color: #000000;
background-color: #DAFFB6;
overflow: auto;"
title="this text can be pasted into the AppleScript Editor">
on run {input, parameters} -- save the current Safari page as PDF
waitForPage()
tell application "Safari"
tell application "System Events"
keystroke "p" using {command down} -- activate the Print... menu item
delay 0.25
click menu button "PDF" of sheet 1 of window 1 of application process "Safari" -- open the PDF menu
delay 0.25
keystroke (ASCII character 31) -- down arrow
keystroke (ASCII character 31) -- down arrow
keystroke return -- activate the Save As... menu item
delay 0.25
keystroke return -- press the save button
end tell
quit
end tell
end run
to waitForPage()
delay 1
repeat
tell application "Safari" to set windowName to the name of window 1
if windowName does not contain "Untitled" then exit repeat
delay 1
end repeat
repeat
tell application "Safari" to set windowName to the name of window 1
if windowName does not contain "Loading" then exit repeat
delay 1
end repeat
repeat
tell application "Safari" to do JavaScript "document.readyState" in document 1
if result is "Complete" then exit repeat
delay 1
end repeat
end waitForPage
</pre>

Automator Workflow

Hi
I have created a workflow for automator to send me an email for birthdays coming up in the next 2 weeks, if i save this as an app it runs fine
But when is put an event into iCal to alarm and open either the automator workflow or application, it doesnt work
I am at a loss as to why ?
Any clues ! (Its on OSX Snow Leopard 10.6 and iWork 09)
Regards
Dave

Unless I am mistaken that first action is actually Find Address Book Items in disguise. Once dropped in place the name changes to either Find People or Find Groups depending upon whether it is set to groups or people. That seems to be the step that is causing problems for me. When I remove it the new workflow sends.
Here's what I have right now although it does not give me the option of searching two months ahead like one of my previous workflows did. I added a blank line after Stop If iInput is Empty just to make it easier to read.
Find People with Birthdays
Send Birthday Greetings
Send Outgoing Messages
Stop If Input Is Empty
Find People With Birthdays
Get Contact Information
New Mail Message
Send Outgoing Messages
The block of steps that includes Stop If Input Is Empty sends a birthday greeting to people having a birthday. The second block sends me a confirmation email with the contact information of the people who were sent greetings. If you want to see what the original workflow looks like check out http://www.atpm.com/12.08/automator.shtml

Combining Workflows in Automator

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