answer file: how to get the arabic name of a file

Question

p. 157

(Mac OS 10.8) I have an UTF8 file created with TextEdit called "ثسسشه.txt" in the answer file dialog (it's actually "txt.ثسسشه" on the desktop).

Answer file returns "/Users/jhausser/Desktop/?????.txt" and of course my script doesn't find the file to read it.

Except changing the file name manually to something more occidental on the desktop, I didn't find a simple way to deal with this problem. Should I use embedded applescript instead of answer file ?

It's probably an important question for people not using latin characters.

Answer 1

I have created a library for this. Indeed, AppleScript seems to be the way to go. The problem is that you have to recreate a complete file management system parallel to LiveCode's existing features. Whenever you need to file, you need to use a reference to that file and make your AppleScript look up the correct file path using that reference. You will also need a system to read and write, move, delete and copy files. It is a huge amount of work.

Edit: I gave this a little more thought. It would be possible to write an AppleScript to duplicate the file to a temp folder, rename it and use the file from there.

Comments

luckily I don't have this problem in my usual activity. I tumbled on this problem in your book...
Is your library available somewhere ?

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Currently, it is not available, as it is unfinished, but you can let me know if you have a real need for it.