Language Guide

CHAPTER 4

Commands

Command Deﬁnitions 101

APPLESCRIPT COMMAND SYNTAX

[ get ] expression [ as className ]

APPLICATION COMMAND SYNTAX

[ get ] referenceToObject [ as className ]

PARAMETERS

expression An expression whose value is to be returned in the

result variable.

Class: Any AppleScript expression

className A class identiﬁer that speciﬁes the desired value class for

the returned data.

Class: Class

Default value: The default value class for the object or objects

referenceToObject

A reference to an object whose value is to be returned in the

result variable.

Class: Reference

RESULT

The result is the value of the speciﬁed reference or expression.

If the referenceToObject parameter speciﬁes a single object only (such as word 1

or the last word), the result is a single value. If the speciﬁed object doesn’t

exist, for example, if the reference is word 12 and there are fewer than 12

words in the speciﬁed container, no result is returned.

If the referenceToObject parameter refers to more than one object (such as the

words whose first letter is "B"), the result is a list of values. The

ﬁrst item in the list is the value of the ﬁrst object speciﬁed, the second item is

the value of the second object speciﬁed, and so on. If the speciﬁed objects don’t

exist, for example, if the reference is the words whose first letter is

"B" and there are no words that begin with “B”, the result is an empty list.

Class: The class speciﬁed by the className parameter or a list of values of that

class. If the application cannot return data in the value class speciﬁed by the

className parameter, it returns a value or values of the default value class.