Scripting / Shortcutting Language

[cw]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: Intel
Email Client: Exchange

Dear all,

after much searching around, I had to give up on a (seemingly) very simple issue: given that entourage cannot create custom buttons, I want to create a script OR a shortcut that selects "Tools -> Spelling Language -> German" from the menu.

Setting the language is apparently not scriptable per se, so I tried the following script:

tell application "System Events"
tell process "Microsoft Entourage"
select menu item "German" of menu 1 of menu item "Spelling Language" of menu 1 of menu bar item "Tools" of menu bar 1
end tell
end tell

This works like a charm if you press "run" in the script editor BUT if you run it from inside entourage you get the spinning wheel and nothing happens. Does anybody have an idea, why?

Having been disappointed by that route I tried the "create keyboard shortcut" option using system preferences. I can apparently select everything by assigning a shortcut to it, EXCEPT for the languages - again, nothing happens here, even though the entry "German", for example, beautifully picks up the shortcut I've assigned to it in the menu.

Any help would be much appreciated! [Haven't tried Keymaster yet, as I don't want to shell out money yet for something that seems so simple ]

Cheers,
Christian

 

[William Smith [MVP]]

after much searching around, I had to give up on a (seemingly) very
simple issue: given that entourage cannot create custom buttons, I
want to create a script OR a shortcut that selects "Tools -> Spelling
Language -> German" from the menu.

Hi Christian!

No AppleScript is necessary for a simple shortcut.

Go to Apple menu --> System Preferences... --> Keyboard & Mouse -->
Keyboard Shortcuts.

Click the " + " sign to create a new keyboard shortcut. Select
"Microsoft Entourage" as the specific application. Enter the Menu Title
"German" and assign a keyboard command. I suggest
Control-Option-Command-G. It's easy and unused.

The command should appear immediately.

Hope this helps!

--

bill

Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
YouTalk <http://nine.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/youtalk>
Twitter: follow <http://twitter.com/meck>

 

[cw]

Hi Christian!

No AppleScript is necessary for a simple shortcut.

Go to Apple menu --> System Preferences... --> Keyboard & Mouse -->
Keyboard Shortcuts.

Click the " + " sign to create a new keyboard shortcut. Select
"Microsoft Entourage" as the specific application. Enter the Menu Title
"German" and assign a keyboard command. I suggest
Control-Option-Command-G. It's easy and unused.

The command should appear immediately.

Hope this helps!

Hi Bill,

thanks for the reply, but this is exactly what I did (see my original post "Having been disappointed..." ). I created a shortcut, it showed up in Entourage, I pressed the shortcut keys - and nothing happened! I tried it with another menu command ("Scrapbook", for example) and it worked... So that's a little strange...

Cheers,
Christian

 

[Diane Ross]

thanks for the reply, but this is exactly what I did (see my original post
"Having been disappointed..." ). I created a shortcut, it showed up in
Entourage, I pressed the shortcut keys - and nothing happened! I tried it with
another menu command ("Scrapbook", for example) and it worked... So that's a
little strange...

Finding a shortcut that does not conflict with another shortcut is the
hardest part. It's important to note that Entourage does not check for
conflicts between keyboard shortcuts that you define and keyboard shortcuts
that are defined by Entourage. Therefore, if a conflict exists, the result
of using the shortcut is undefined. If you use many shortcuts, you may want
to list them using Allen Watson's script, List Keyboard Shortcuts.
<http://tinyurl.com/4f6kjh> The script produces a report on all the
shortcuts you have defined for scripts, in sorted order by shortcut keys.
Duplicate shortcut definitions thus can be detected and corrected, and you
can avoid further duplicates by checking the list before defining a new
shortcut.

See this page for help with creating shortcuts:

Shortcuts Page <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/get_started/shortcuts.html>

 

[cw]

Hi Diane,

thanks - but again, the assigned shortcut key combination worked beautifully with "Scrapbook" as menu target, but did NOT work with "German" as menu target. Can anyone replicate this? Or is this a known bug?

Cheers,
Christian

 

[Diane Ross]

thanks - but again, the assigned shortcut key combination worked beautifully
with "Scrapbook" as menu target, but did NOT work with "German" as menu
target. Can anyone replicate this? Or is this a known bug?

We've seen some strange things with Entourage under different languages. If
you can describe the steps exactly, I can submit this as a bug. Be sure to
include all the info. Attach an Apple System Profiler report.

dianeross at mvps dot org <-- fix before replying.

Prefix your subject with: newsgroup response

 

[William Smith [MVP]]

thanks for the reply, but this is exactly what I did (see my original
post "Having been disappointed..." ). I created a shortcut, it
showed up in Entourage, I pressed the shortcut keys - and nothing
happened! I tried it with another menu command ("Scrapbook", for
example) and it worked... So that's a little strange...

Hi Christian!

Apologies. I do see that now. I read through your message to quickly.

And I see that the actual command doesn't work in my setup too although
the keyboard command does appear next to the "German" menu item.

I would say this is a bug in Entourage. Please be sure to let Microsoft
know you'd like to see this fixed in future versions by using the Help
--> Send Feedback mechanism in any Office application.

--

bill

Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
YouTalk <http://nine.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/youtalk>
Twitter: follow <http://twitter.com/meck>