great!!!! - save the script here: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Illustrator CS5\Presets\en_US\Scripts\ ... View more

got it Monika, thanks, good to know. ... View more

What is a script? - the text below the screen shot, in post 11. It is a sequence of commands Illustrator reads and excutes accordingly. What and where is the Adobe ExtendScript Toolkit - a program to create/edit scripts. It comes with Illustrator, it should be in the adobe folder neighborhood. Save what with a meaningful name. - the script Doubleclick where and on what? - on the saved script Does this then create a button or keystroke command in Illustrator? - it adds a menu item in Illustrator under, File->Scripts menu Does it change the actual marquee? - no, you draw the "marque" with the Rectangle Tool ... View more

ok, - copy the script from previous post - open Adobe ExtendScript Toolkit - paste the copied script - save the script with a meaningful name to run double click on the script. if you want to run it from within Illustrator -> File -> Scripts Menu - save the script here: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Illustrator CS5\Presets\en_US\Scripts\ - restart Illustrator folder path is for Windows...I guess mac would be similar path ... View more

hahaha good analogy, for starters, does the script do what you wanted to do? based  on the screen shot ... View more

Hi Monika, there it is then, good option. I've never touched a Mac but I've seen a bar at the bottom with shortcuts? in it.Can you put a shortcut to the trusted scripts folders in there? and if you can, does it act like a menu (like in windows) listing the files in that folder? or it will merely open the folder? ... View more

here's a usage sample, I don't remember where I got it from to give proper credits. var myList = ["Item 1","Item 2","Item 3","Item 4","Item 5","Item 6","Item 7","Item 8","Item 9","Item 10"]; var win = new Window('dialog', 'myDlg'); var ddL = win.add('dropdownlist',undefined,myList); ddL.onChange = function(){alert("Item changed");} win.center(); win.show(); ... View more

I took a little too long, here's my version #target illustrator var docRef = app.activeDocument; alert(docRef.name); var docList = "Enter the Destination Document Index \n \n"; var docCount = app.documents.length; for (i=0 ; i<docCount ; i++)      {           docList = docList + i + " - " + app.documents + "\n";      }            var docIndex = Window.prompt (docList, 0, "Copy layer to same or other document") if (docIndex == null || docIndex >= docCount)      {           alert("Enter a number between 0 and " + (docCount-1) + " and press Enter");                } else      {           var destDoc = app.documents[docIndex];           //alert(destDoc.name);           with(docRef)                {                     var ln = 'Layer 1'                     var ol = layers.getByName(ln);                     var nl = destDoc.layers.add();                     nl.name = ln //+' Copy';                     for (var a = ol.pageItems.length-1; a >= 0; a--)                          {                               ol.pageItems.duplicate(nl, ElementPlacement.PLACEATBEGINNING);                          }                }      } ... View more

I don't think there's an easy way, you'll have to resort to math. FXG probably uses Math too. ... View more

welcome to the forum, this is not VBS, it is VBA...but you'll get the idea Sub move3ptPathsToOtherLayer()     Dim iapp As New Illustrator.Application     Dim idoc As Illustrator.Document     Dim ilayer As Illustrator.Layer     Dim ipath As Illustrator.PathItem     Set idoc = iapp.ActiveDocument 'get active document     Set ilayer = idoc.Layers("specificLayer") 'get specificLayer     ilayerzorder = idoc.Layers.Index(ilayer) 'get layer zOrder placement     ilayer.ZOrder aiSendToBack 'move to the bottom     For i = idoc.PathItems.Count To 1 Step -1 'loop thru all pathItems backwards         Set ipath = idoc.PathItems(i) 'get path         If ipath.StrokeWidth = 3 Then 'check for size             ipath.Move ilayer, aiPlaceAtBeginning 'move to specificLayer if size = 3 points         End If     Next     'move layer back to its original position     ilayer.Move idoc.Layers(ilayerzorder), aiPlaceBefore     Set ipath = Nothing     Set ilayer = Nothing     Set idoc = Nothing     Set iapp = Nothing End Sub ... View more

I took the liberty to modify grizzlyburr script #target Illustrator // script by grizzlyburr? myDoc = app.activeDocument; findDims(app.selection); function findDims(objs) {     for (i=objs.length-1; i>=0; i--) { //loop through your collection of objects            var vb = objs.geometricBounds; // left, top, right, bottom         var w = (vb[2] - vb[0]);         var h = (vb[1] - vb[3]);         if (objs.parent.typename != "GroupItem") { // Check if parent is a groupItem             descFrame = myDoc.textFrames.add(); // Create the text frame                         var W = w/72;             var H = h/72;             W = W.toFixed(4);             H = H.toFixed(4);                         descFrame.contents = "W: "+ W + " in\rH: " + H + " in";  // Adds contents to frame               descFrame.position = [objs.left, objs.top + descFrame.height + 5]; // Positions the frame           }     } } ... View more

if what you described is all you need, an Action can do it. If that is part of a script then you would have to use AS or VBS since they can play actions. Is there a way to scale a group with Scale Strokes & Effects turned on via JavaScript? from the JS guide resize (scaleX, scaleY [,changePositions] [,changeFillPatterns] [,changeFillGradients] [,changeStrokePattern] [,changeLineWidths]     // default will leave the strokes unchanged, give it a number act as "Scale Strokes" [,scaleAbout]) ... View more

it works in CS5 too ... View more

it has it uses, on most paths, Offset Path tool creates lots of those overlapping points. It is a clean up script. ... View more

the script does not "join" path points, it "merges" path points. What SATO Hiroyuki means is that if two points on the same path are close enough to each other or overlapped, one of them will be removed. one of those two will be removed if they're within the value hard coded in line 25. ... View more

Mark's script works as advertised, I got all 7 segments separated by tabs - HK Profondita sgambatura da fianco a fondo abbottonato (0197) (0002) (04) ... View more

you're welcome ... View more

wow, such an old post, all the OP and others requests are now possible with CS5. here you go, for you and other CS4 users #target Illustrator //  script.name = shrinkABtoFitArt_CS4.jsx; //  script.description = resizes active artboard to fit the the Art (+ margins); //  script.required = one document with at least one piece of art; //  script.parent = carlos canto // 5/3/11; //  script.elegant = false; if (app.documents.length > 0)     {         //alert("more than 0");           var idoc = app.activeDocument;           var pageItemsCount = idoc.pageItems.length;         if (pageItemsCount>=1)             {                     var msg = "Enter Artboard Margins \n";                     msg += "\nEnter negative numbers to cancel";                                          var margins = Number(Window.prompt (msg, 10, "CS4 Shrink Arboard to Fit"));                     if (margins>=0)                          {                                                              var activeABindex = idoc.artboards.getActiveArtboardIndex();                               var newAB = idoc.artboards[activeABindex];                               var iartBounds = idoc.visibleBounds;                                                              var ableft = iartBounds[0]-margins;                               var abtop = iartBounds[1]+margins;                               var abright = iartBounds[2]+margins;                               var abbottom = iartBounds[3]-margins;                                                              newAB.artboardRect = [ableft, abtop, abright, abbottom];                                                              var myZoom = idoc.activeView.zoom;                               idoc.activeView.zoom = myZoom+.01;                               idoc.activeView.zoom = myZoom;                          }                     else                          {                               alert("nos vamos");                          }              }          else             {                 alert("there is no art in the active document");              }      } else     {         alert ("there are no open documents");     } ... View more

set it up as shown below, for your sample use 4 vairables, one for the Region, one for the language and two for the the text items. 2 regions, 3 sets of languages each, yields 6 Datasets. keskifo wrote: It seems that the formatting such as bold, italic and so on is not exported into the data set which is quite embarrassing. the Data Set is just that...data. Format your text holder as desired, it won't change when you change data sets. ... View more

can you post a screen shot? and include sample data from excel ... View more

oh, ok, this will do var myString = "This text <b>needs<b> to be bold. This text <b>also<b> needs to be bold. This <i>text<i> needs to be italic, and finally this <u>text<u> needs to be underlined."; var firstIndex = 0; var nextIndex = 0; var lastIndex = myString.lastIndexOf ("<"); var mysubString = ""; var start = 0; while (nextIndex!=lastIndex)      {                firstIndex = myString.indexOf (">", start);                nextIndex = myString.indexOf ("<", firstIndex);                mysubString = myString.substring(firstIndex+1, nextIndex);                alert (mysubString);                start = nextIndex+3;      } ... View more

I don't understand alert(myString); // returns everything in the thextFrame --> "<b>my text<b>" alert(mysubString); // returns only the text between the <b> tags --> "my text" ... View more

something more like this var idoc = app.activeDocument; var text = idoc.textFrames[0]; var myString = text.contents; // "<b>my text<b>"; var mysubString = myString.slice(3,myString.length-3); alert(mysubString); alert(myString); ... View more

same way, same code. I'll work regardless of the string, regardless of the tag <?>, it is based on character count. slice is saying "give me a string starting at the 4th character, stop after the 4th character before the end" now if you want to evaluate for <b> before you do something with it, slice the first 3 character to see if it is equal to "<b>" then do your thing accordingly. ... View more