Your Script Doctor

RADIO BUTTON CONTROL

InDesign’s dialog has a wealth of widgets that can be used for giving the user multiple choices. To provide a single choice within a group of items, the radiobutton control may be the item of choice.

In place of the code in the above that follows –enter widget information here, substitute the following:

--enter widget information here
tell (make dialog column) --column
   make static text with properties {static label:thePrompt, static alignment:left align}
   set myButtonGroup to make radiobutton group
   tell myButtonGroup
	   make radiobutton control with properties {static label:item 1 of theItems}
	   make radiobutton control with properties {static label:item 2 of theItems}
	   make radiobutton control with properties {static label:item 3 of theItems}
   end tell
end tell --column

Then to record the user’s choice, substitute:

--record user information here 
set borderChoice to selected button of myButtonGroup
set theInfo to {item (borderChoice + 1) of theItems}

Notice that in both of the examples above, the actual item chosen from the list is being returned. Optionally, you might want to simply return the index of the item returned since the list is defined at the top of the script. Often, in working with the result of a multiple choice, it is easier to work with the index (integer value) rather than working with the string. Just make sure that you add 1 to the index as AppleScript starts list indexes at 1 instead of zero.

MULTIPLE CHOICES

To allow the user one or more choices, the checkbox control can be used. Adding to the code above we now have a dialog with both radio button and checkbox controls. Notice, in this example that the script returns the index of the radio button chosen.

set checkItems to {"Center Horizontal", "Center Vertical"}
set checkPrompt to "Center Alignment:"
set theItems to {"No border", "Rounded Corner", "Standard Corner"}
set thePrompt to "Choose border style from list"
set canCancel to true
set theChoice to userDialog("Border Style", canCancel, thePrompt, theItems, checkPrompt, checkItems)
if theChoice is {} then
   activate
   display alert "User Cancelled"
else
   copy theChoice to {borderIndex, doH, doV}
end if
on userDialog(dlgName, canCancel, thePrompt, theItems, checkPrompt, checkItems)
   tell application "Adobe InDesign CC 2019"
      activate
      set dlgRef to make dialog with properties {name:dlgName, can cancel:canCancel}
      --establish script preferences
      set origLevel to user interaction level of script preferences
      set user interaction level of script preferences to interact with all
      tell dlgRef
	--enter widget information here
	tell (make dialog column)
	    tell (make border panel)
		make static text with properties {static label:thePrompt, static alignment:left align}
		set myButtonGroup to make radiobutton group
		tell myButtonGroup
		     make radiobutton control with properties {static label:item 1 of theItems}
	             make radiobutton control with properties {static label:item 2 of theItems}
	             make radiobutton control with properties {static label:item 3 of theItems}
		end tell
	    end tell --border panel
	    tell (make border panel)
		tell (make dialog column)
		    make static text with properties {static label:checkPrompt, static alignment:left align}
		end tell
		tell (make dialog column)
		    set doHoriz to make checkbox control with properties {static label:item 1 of checkItems}
			set doVert to make checkbox control with properties {static label:item 2 of checkItems}
		end tell --dialog column			
	    end tell --border panel
	end tell --column
    end tell --dialog

    --open the dialog 
        set userResponse to show dlgRef
	if userResponse = true then
	    --record user information here 
	    set borderIndex to (selected button of myButtonGroup) + 1
	    set doH to checked state of doHoriz
	    set doV to checked state of doVert
	    set theInfo to {borderIndex, doH, doV}
	 else
	    set theInfo to {}
	 end if
	 --close the dialog
	 destroy dlgRef
	 --reset script preferences
	 set user interaction level of script preferences to origLevel
	 --if user cancelled theInfo will be an empty list
	 return theInfo
    end tell
end userDialog