Apps Running

[NovaScotian]

Command-Tab presents a view of the GUI apps that are currently running
Is there an way to get a list of the apps that appear there in an AppleScript or shell script?

[biovizier]

I don't know if it will get them all, but how about something like this for starters...

tell application "System Events"
	-- visible apps
	set theList to name of processes whose visible is true
	
	-- normally visible but "hidden" apps that still appear in Cmd-Tab
	set notvisibles to name of processes whose visible is false
	
	repeat with currentProcess in notvisibles
		set itsproperties to properties of process currentProcess
		if (background only) of itsproperties is false then
			set theList to theList & currentProcess
		end if
	end repeat
end tell

set result to theList

Edit: This may end up giving the same result...

tell application "System Events" to set theList to name of processes whose background only is false

[NovaScotian]

Thanks for the response Biovizier. After playing with it for a few minutes, I realized that I had not asked the question intelligently (completely off the mark, in fact).

I have a JavaScript called "Readability"** that produces a configurable large page of the main event on a web page with surprising accuracy. I like to use it reading newspaper articles and NetNewsWire feeds, and it works with either. Because I'm a keyboard command fan I often run scripts from Quicksilver and I'd like the script to target either Safari or NetNewswire, whichever has the frontmost window (the one I want to read). I haven't found a clean way to do that.
_________
** Readability comes as a link to be dragged to the Bookmarks Bar of a browser, but having done that, you can copy the JavaScript from the bookmark for use in an AppleScript like this (with either Safari or NetNewsWire in the tell): tell application "NetNewsWire" to tell document 1 to do JavaScript "......"

[biovizier]

Quote: Originally Posted by NovaScotian I'd like the script to target either Safari or NetNewswire, whichever has the frontmost window (the one I want to read).

Hmm, that sounds like a tough one... I see other properties that can be tested for processes, such as "frontmost" or "focused" (this one seems to be "missing value" for everything) that might work for the active app, but unless one or the other is actually the active application, I can't think of a way to determine which one is closer to the front (i.e. whose icon is closer to the left in Cmd-Tab) either...

[NovaScotian]

I eventually came up with this, Biovizier:

set JS to "javascriptfunction(){readStyle='style-novel';readSize='size-large';readMargin='margin-wide';_readability_script=document.createElement('SCRIPT');_readability_script.type='text/javascript';_readability_script.src='http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/js/readability.js?x='+(Math.random());document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(_readability_script);_readability_css=document.createElement('LINK');_readability_css.rel='stylesheet';_rea  dability_css.href='http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/css/readability.css';_readability_css.type='text/css';_readability_css.media='screen';document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(_readability_css);_readability_print_css=document.createElement('LINK');_readability_print_css.rel='stylesh  eet';_readability_print_css.href='http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/css/readability-print.css';_readability_print_css.media='print';_readability_print_css.type='text/css';document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(_readability_print_css);})();"



tell application "System Events" to set last_app to item 1 of (get name of processes whose frontmost is true)

if last_app is "Safari" then

   tell document 1 of application "Safari" to do JavaScript JS

else if last_app is "NetNewsWire" then

   tell document 1 of application "NetNewsWire" to do JavaScript JS

else

   beep 3

end if

"tell document 1 of application last_app to do JavaScript ..." wouldn't compile for some reason.

[tw]

just as a matter of sanity, you can write Nova's script as follows:

set JS to "readStyle='style-novel';
	readSize='size-large';
	readMargin='margin-wide';
	_readability_script=document.createElement('SCRIPT');
	_readability_script.type='text/javascript';
	_readability_script.src='http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/js/readability.js?x='+(Math.random());
	document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(_readability_script);
	_readability_css=document.createElement('LINK');
	_readability_css.rel='stylesheet';
	_readability_css.href='http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/css/readability.css';
	_readability_css.type='text/css';
	_readability_css.media='screen';
	document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(_readability_css);
	_readability_print_css=document.createElement('LINK');
	_readability_print_css.rel='stylesh  eet';
	_readability_print_css.href='http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/css/readability-print.css';
	_readability_print_css.media='print';
	_readability_print_css.type='text/css';
	document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(_readability_print_css);"

tell application "System Events" to set last_app to item 1 of (get name of processes whose frontmost is true)

if last_app is "Safari" then
	
	tell document 1 of application "Safari" to do JavaScript JS
	
else if last_app is "NetNewsWire" then
	
	tell document 1 of application "NetNewsWire" to do JavaScript JS
	
else
	
	beep 3
	
end if

setting it inside an anonymous function is not necessary, and Safari will parse the line breaks perfectly well. NetNewsWire I can't speak to, however - might need the anonymous function there.

[NovaScotian]

Perfectly acceptable to NetNewsWire (as I suspected). I've made the change in my script to enhance its readability :-)

Thanks