Dynamic Variable Naming

Hi @mrlagace , not sure if this helps, but could you do it with dropdowns? this uses the built in InDesign dialog class to build a dropdown from your object:

var signatures = [
    {
        number: 1,
        sections: [
            {
                name: 'A',
                //needs to be a string list
                pages: [ '1', '2', '3', '4', '5', '6', '7', '8' ]
            }
        ]
    }
]


makeDialog();

var sigDropdown;
var sigList;

function makeDialog(){
    var theDialog = app.dialogs.add({name:"Signatures", canCancel:true});
    with(theDialog){
        with(dialogColumns.add()){
            with(borderPanels.add()){
                with(dialogColumns.add()){
                    staticTexts.add({staticLabel:"Signature " + signatures[0].number + " Pages"});
                }
                with(dialogColumns.add()){
                    sigList =  signatures[0].sections[0].pages
                    sigDropdown = dropdowns.add({stringList:sigList, selectedIndex:0, minWidth:80});
                }
            }
        }
    }

    //the dialog results
    var res = theDialog.show();
    if(res == true){
        sigDropdown = sigList[sigDropdown.selectedIndex];
        main()
	}else{
        theDialog.destroy();
    }
}


function main(){
    alert("Chosen Page: " + sigDropdown);
    return 
}

"… but how do I drill that down to get the value for the respective Page?"

Hi Michael,

I'm not sure what you are asking here, but if you want to address a page where you start out with a number only, you could work like this, if the number denotes the position of the document page in the document:

var myPageNumber = 1;
var pageToAddress = app.documents[0].pages[ myPageNumber-1 ];

The numbering of the index of a page starts with 0 .

Now that you have the page stored in variable pageToAddress you always have access to that page even if you move it around in the document:

pageToAddress.move( LocationOptions.AT_END );
pageToAddress.rectangles.add({ geometricBounds : [0,0,"100mm","100mm"]});

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

Hi Michael,

dynamic variable naming?

Hm. Some thoughts:

One could write a script in ExtendScript that could rewrite itself because you have access to the file class.

But to what purpose? If a user should interact with a script this is not necessary at all, I think. But I can be wrong, because I do not understand your use case.

If no user interaction should take place one could write a startup script with some event handlers that could react to things that happen with a document. You see, I am just poking around…

Also note, that you can use method insertLabel() and extractLabel() to store and retrieve data or even code with page items, documents or even the application.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

Here's a article on dynamic variable names in javascript. At a quick glance it isn't clear to me that your use case needs any of that though.

Where and when does the user choose Option A or B? I'm picturing a dialog asking which option, then, after choosing that, changing to show a UI just for that chosen option. This can be done with normal variables naming.

You can make an object with *keys* named "optionA" and "optionB" that could be referenced dynamically.

var options = {
    A: {
        pages: [
            {
                // page 1
                something: ...
            },
            {
                // page 2
                something: ...
            }
        ]
    },
    B:         pages: [
            {
                // page 1
                something: ...
            },
            {
                // page 2
                something: ...
            }
        ]
    }
}

Then access it like this:

var currentOption = "B";
var currentPages = options[currentOption].pages;

But then again, it would be more normal to have an Array of options, each which had a "name" or "label" of "A", "B" etc. I'd have a look at the data structures you are using and see if there's a better way.

Or, if I'm missing your point entirely, please ignore. 🙂

- Mark

Unclear what the use case is. Have you looked into text variables to see if they can accomplish your task?  

https://helpx.adobe.com/indesign/using/text-variables.html