copying appearance from text frame to another in scripting

[abdullah5E9D]

guys I search for this all day and I can't find how to copy appearance from a text frame or any other object into another i know how to apply effects by XML but idk how to copy thise effects  

[femkeblanco]

You can use a graphic style, which includes fill, stroke, effects and transparency. You will need to create a graphic style manually (see here).  Once you have a named graphic style (e.g "Custom Graphic Style"), you can apply it to text frames. This applies it to a selected text frame:

app.activeDocument.graphicStyles["Custom Graphic Style"].applyTo(app.activeDocument.selection[0]);

[abdullah5E9D]

thanks man 🙂 i know this one , but how i can copy any object appearance to another without making it graphic style ? 

[femkeblanco]

Fill and stroke are easy enough to "copy".  But copying effects requires access to live effect XML on the fly.  Is that possible?  I would guess probably not, but I am happy to be proven wrong.  

[abdullah5E9D]

i don't realy have an answer to this 😞 but I search alot for this but it's seems you can just apply effects through xml but not copy it and 'scripts don't have the ability to view more complex appearances like pattern fills' as @Disposition_Dev  say , regards

[Mike_Gondek]

Dont know much about XML to apply effects, but you can double click the eyedropper change default OFF to ON for to pick up and apply appearance.

Sounds really interesting what you are working on, love when people use appearance.

[abdullah5E9D]

Thank you so much, I appreciate this But i wont it by scripting ❤ do you know how i reach eyedropper in scripting 

[Disposition_Dev]

each textFrame has a property called textRange which has a property called characterAttributes.

characterAttributes is an object that contains all of the properties that define the appearance of the text. If you copy those values from one textFrame to another, it should work pretty well. HOWEVER... scripts don't have the ability to view more complex appearances like pattern fills, stacked appearances with multiple fills/strokes/effects, etc. But for simple copying of font, font size, tracking, kerning, character height, etc etc, this function seems to do ok:

#target Illustrator
function applyAppearance(srcItem,destItem)
{
	for(var x in srcItem.textRange.characterAttributes)
	{
		destItem.textRange.characterAttributes[x] = srcItem.textRange.characterAttributes[x];
	} 	
}

applyAppearance(app.activeDocument.textFrames["src"],app.activeDocument.textFrames["dest"]);

[abdullah5E9D]

You are a legend man, using this with the expand appearance menu command i think its going to be great but its seems it work with every thing expect gradient , any thougts how i can copy gradient from text frame to another , and thnk you soo much ❤❤

[Disposition_Dev]

for gradients... i suggest using a graphic style and dispensing with the logic i posted above.. lol

It's possible to create a graphic style on the fly and then apply that graphic style to any items you want, all from a script. So if you're just worried about not wanting to manually create graphic styles so that you can apply them via script, i got you covered.

[femkeblanco]

Hi@Disposition_Dev.  How can you create a graphic style with a script?  The documentation explicitly states that:  "Scripts cannot create new graphic styles." 

https://ai-scripting.docsforadobe.dev/jsobjref/GraphicStyle/ 

[Disposition_Dev]

Select item that has the appearance you want. Run action that creates a graphic style from current selection, then rename the new graphic style with:

var gs = app.activeDocument.graphicStyles;

gs[gs.length - 1].name = "new name";

I've been meaning to add this logic to my public illustrator scripts on github. I'll try to get that done this weekend. 

[femkeblanco]

Ahh. Cheating with actions.  But seriously, thanks for the tip.

[CarlosCanto]

instead of copying the appearance from A to B, why don't you duplicate A and change it's contents to B? wouldn't that work similarly?

[Disposition_Dev]

That's a great point Carlos. Nothing immediately comes to mind that would break that.. 

[CarlosCanto]

right? unless we're missing something it should work

[sttk3 · Accepted solution]

Solution 1

Use "app.executeMenuCommand" to generate a graphic style for the source item, and apply that style to the destination item.

This script will duplicate the appearance of the front item of the two selected items to the back item.

(function() {
  if(app.documents.length <= 0) {return ;}
  var doc = app.documents[0] ;
  var sel = doc.selection ;
  if(sel.length != 2) {return ;}
  
  var tempGraphicStyle = addGraphicStyle(doc, sel[0]) ;
  tempGraphicStyle.applyTo(sel[1], true) ;
  tempGraphicStyle.remove() ;

  doc.selection = sel ;
})() ;

/**
  * create a new graphic style based on the target item and return it
  * @Param {Document} doc target document
  * @Param {PageItem} targetItem target item
  * @Return {GraphicStyle}
*/
function addGraphicStyle(doc, targetItem) {
  var res ;
  try {
    // suppress dialog
    var oldLevel = app.userInteractionLevel ;
    app.userInteractionLevel = UserInteractionLevel.DONTDISPLAYALERTS ;

    // select only the target item and execute 'Adobe New Style Shortcut'
    doc.selection = [targetItem] ;
    app.executeMenuCommand('Adobe New Style Shortcut') ;

    // return the last graphic style
    res = doc.graphicStyles[doc.graphicStyles.length - 1] ;
  } catch(e) {
    alert(e) ;
  } finally {
    app.userInteractionLevel = oldLevel ;
  }
  return res ;
}

[sttk3 · Accepted solution]

Solution 2

Use the third party plugin "OnegaiSDK". This allows control of the appearance through scripting.

The behavior of this script is the same as in Solution 1.

(function() {
  if(app.documents.length <= 0) {return ;}
  var doc = app.documents[0] ;
  var sel = doc.selection ;
  if(sel.length != 2) {return ;}
  
  var pluginName = 'OnegaiSDK' ;
  sel[0].sendScriptMessage(pluginName, 'copyStyle', '') ;
  sel[1].sendScriptMessage(pluginName, 'pasteStyle', '') ;
})() ;