Access to saved selection with Java Script

[Guest]

Hello,

I'm a newbie with Java Script, and I'm looking if there is a solution to access to all items included in a saved selection ?

I've tried differents ways without success

Thanks for your help.

[michele.mauri]

i'm not sure what you means with "saved selection".

You can have the list of selected object with this function:

var docSelected = app.activeDocument.selection;

it returns an array of objects.

Hope this is what you need

[Muppet_Mark-QAl63s]

I think the question is about the save selection in the app menubar that you can return to retrieve the same objects over and over… And to that I would think NOT…

[Guest]

Yes I talk about the fonction in the selection "menubar".

And your answer is not a good news !

In fact I'm using "groupItems" with name selection to achieve my goal. 

Thanks for your help.

[CarlosCanto]

I have good news, you could "tag" your saved selection objects in the GUI, then select them when needed via script.

[Guest]

Thanks for your answer.

Could you tell me more ? I have tried to find something in the help menu > Object Model without success

[Muppet_Mark-QAl63s]

What you want to be looking up in the object model is 'tags' and how to use someArtItem.tags.add(); Apply some names or values so that you can loop and retrieve later… Tip. don't use spaces in the name property…

[Guest]

Thanks again.

I will try the 'tag" way, but in fact documents have already saved selection...

[CarlosCanto]

sorry, I meant "note" instead of tag. yes, saved selections already exist, do the following

in the GUI

- select your saved selection

- add a note

in your script

- go tru all items and select the ones matching the note

VBA sample:

    For Each pgitem In Idoc.PageItems
        If pgitem.Note = "circles" Then
            pgitem.Selected = True
        End If
    Next

[Muppet_Mark-QAl63s]

Carlos, its almost the same thing but I would have gone for what you suggested the first time with 'tags'… You could give selected items a name or a note so that you can retrieve later but in both these cases each item can only have the 1 where as with tags items could have multi tags so a single item could be re-selected as part of numerous selected groupings… Any how an example of tagging a selection…

#target illustrator var docRef = app.activeDocument; var     docSel = docRef.selection; //$.writeln(docSel.length+' Selected Items…'); if (docSel.length > 0) tagSelection(docSel,'Foo'); docRef.selection = null; app.redraw(); var     docTags = docRef.tags; //$.writeln(docTags.length+' Item Tags…'); if (docTags.length > 0) selectTaggged(docTags,'Foo'); //docRef.tags.getByName('Foo').parent.selected = true; function tagSelection(docSel,ts) {      for (var i = 0; i < docSel.length; i++) {           var selTag = docSel.tags.add();           selTag.name = ts;           selTag.value = ts;      } } function selectTaggged(docTags,tv) {      for (var i = 0; i < docTags.length; i++) {           if (docTags.value == tv) {                docRef.tags.parent.selected = true;           }      } }

An open document is presumed…

[Guest]

Hello Mark and Carlos, I appreciate your help.

But with your solution, the user must select by him-self object first, and I want to make batch with this script without interaction.

With your helpfull advice I have write and it's not so bad !

#target illustrator doc = app.activeDocument; for ( i = 0; i < doc.groupItems.length; i++ ) { elemt = doc.groupItems; groupName = new String( elemt.name ) ; if ( groupName.indexOf ("PdG") == 0) { elemt.selected = true; var newItem; var newDoc = app.documents.add(); elemt.selected = false; newItem = elemt.duplicate( newDoc, ElementPlacement.PLACEATEND ); doc2=app.activeDocument;    var myVisibleBounds = doc2.pageItems[0].visibleBounds; doc2.artboards[0].artboardRect = myVisibleBounds; //aiDocument = app.activeDocument; //aiDocument.close( SaveOptions.DONOTSAVECHANGES ); var exportOptions = new ExportOptionsJPEG(); var type = ExportType.JPEG; var fileSpec = new File('/Users/gaguad19/Documents/'); exportOptions.antiAliasing = false; exportOptions.qualitySetting = 70; app.activeDocument.exportFile( fileSpec, type, exportOptions ); } else {      alert("Encore raté");     }}

Now I must try to name the JPEG with the Illustrator file name !