Scriptable Applications

Many shrink-wrapped, commercial applications do not add AppleScript support until later versions and with internal tools developed in-house it is an even lower priority. Many of these internal tools have a quick and dirty UI and none, or little, online help so being scriptable is not very likely.

With Cocoa applications adding AppleScript support is relatively easy and quick to implement. This is certainly the case in applications that are strongly based around a business logic model with data objects, as many internal tools are, and are already Key Value Coding compliant. Cocoa AppleScript support will do lots of the work for you.

So why should an in-house developer make their applications scriptable?

AppleScript support will free up developer time. If I write a scriptable application, the staff members who use the app or Oliver, Alex or Paddy of our ICT department can add new features or work around bugs without waiting for me to deploy the next version. I can spend my time implementing features that really need to be done rather than a feature to 'duplicate every cinema screening in Cinema One on every second Wednesday in the month'.

AppleScript support is a springboard or stepping stone to an Automator Action that even more users can make use of with even less training. Actions can be built by the users or by our ICT department.

If I ever left the Watershed, being able to implement some new features using AppleScript would give the users and ICT a breathing gap before a new developer could be employed and was up to speed with the application.

There are many other reasons to make any application scriptable that are often just applied to commercial development. These are just some reasons to add AppleScript support to internal tools.