Scripting InDesign on Mac in 2022

Hi @zixdesign_atwork , for me installing the ESTK extension was easy—as @m1b suggests it’s the launch.json setup that makes Visual Studio a bit more difficult. If you choose File>Open Folder... you can open a folder of scripts into the Explorer pane, but before you can run or debug scripts inside of the folder you have to make and configure the folder’s launch.json file

The first time you try to run a script inside the folder, the launch.json file for the folder is created and you need to choose ExtendScript Debug to get the default configuration

I change the default to this:

{
    // Use IntelliSense to learn about possible attributes.
    // Hover to view descriptions of existing attributes.
    // For more information, visit: https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?linkid=830387
    "version": "0.2.0",
    "configurations": [
      {
        "type": "extendscript-debug",
        "request": "launch",
        "name": "Run Current Script",
        "program": "${file}",
        "stopOnEntry": false,
      }
    ]
  }

Then choose InDesign as the target application from the Status Bar, and the folder’s InDesign scripts will run with F5:

I'll add some encouragement, too:

1. I use the latest MacOS and Visual Studio Code/ESDebugger as my IDE so you certainly won't be alone!

2. VSC as an IDE is, in my opinion, *a trillion* times better than ESTK: it's really fast, has incredible editing capabilities, eg. regex searching, multiple cursors, linting.

3. Adobe is close to releasing a major re-write of the ESDebugger extension (2.0) which will address many of the current debugger's shortcomings.

I believe that VSC has made the set up process easier recently, which I haven't looked into yet, but if you get stuck, my comment here might help.

The current ESDebugger extension shows the object model while actually debugging, but it's a bit flaky so hopefully v2.0 will make that much better, too.

- Mark

Hi,

No, you are not alone developing on the Mac OS.😊

Personally I have switch to Visual code ES debugger. Initlally, it was difficult to switch to the new platform from old ESTK, but with time it is like same as before. 

Visual Studio is just an editor, you can install and use the new version of VS ES debugger from the following link

https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=Adobe.extendscript-debug

How to use this, all explian in the same link. Initially you will also not like because we all are used to old ESTK debugger, but it is good to come out of the comfort zone and try something new..😊

Hope it won't be difficult for you to start.