Subtracting 5mm from pagewidth CS4

[TᴀW]

Hi there.

I've got the page width of a document:

app.activeDocument.documentPreferences.pageWidth

I would like to subtract 5mm from it.

How do I do that?

I can't set the ruler units, because this script is running in a ScripUI dialog box that's running while the user is able to work in InDesign (using #targetengine)

Now, app.activeDocument.documentPreferences.pageWidth - "5mm" doesn't work.

So it looks like I have to use a UnitValue object.

But

x = UnitValue (5, "mm")

app.activeDocument.documentPreferences.pageWidth - x

doesn't work either.

So it looks like I need to convert the pageWidth into a UnitValue also.

But how do I know what units are being used?

The only option I can see is to go through all the possible MeasureUnits enumerations and compare.

But is there a simpler way of doing all this?

Many thanks,

Ariel

[Peter Kahrel]

app.scriptPreferences.MeasurementUnits = MeasurementUnits.millimeters

app.activeDocument.documentPreferences.pageWidth -= 5;

Peter

[Harbs.]

That .MeasurementUnits should have been .measurementUnits...

Be very careful not to mess up existing scripts with this!!!

I'd always wrap these changes in a try/catch/finally:

try{
  var scriptUnits = app.scriptPreferences.measurementUnits;
  app.scriptPreferences.measurementUnits = MeasurementUnits.millimeters
  app.activeDocument.documentPreferences.pageWidth -= 5;
}catch(err){}
finally{
  app.scriptPreferences.measurementUnits = scriptUnits;
}

[Peter Kahrel]

> That .MeasurementUnits should have been .measurementUnits...

And so it should have been indeed.

As to your other comment, I don't see the harm to other scripts in setting the measurement units: the units are set just for the script you're running. But, bother, does it maybe set the units for the session? Anyway, every script should set its own measurements.

Peter

[TᴀW]

Thanks very much guys. I didn't know about scriptPreferences. Looks like

that should do the trick!

[Harbs.]

pkahrel wrote:

Anyway, every script should set its own measurements.

scriptPreferences.measurementUnits didn't exist prior to version 7 (I think). Legacy scripts all use viewPreferences.verticalMeasurementUnits and viewPreferences.horizontalMeasurementUnits. With scriptPreferences set to a different measurement unit, things will start to break in weird and unexpected ways.

I don't know about you, but I have not updated all my scripts to take this into account...

I'd always make sure that the value is returned to AutoEnum.AUTO_VALUE at all costs...

Harbs