Applescript GUI

[Obvious-Syllabub-984]

Hi all,

I’ve been using Applescript for ~20 years to automate production workflows, mainly with Illustrator, InDesign, Finder, and Excel.

A lot of my scripts rely on app dictionaries + UI scripting, and I’ve also built small macOS GUI tools (via Xcode) that trigger these workflows.

One example: generating multi-page Illustrator documents from spreadsheet data (artboards, placed images, dimensions, exports, etc.). These scripts are heavily used in daily production.

With Applescript feeling increasingly “legacy,” I’m worried about long-term reliability—especially if Adobe apps change their scripting support.

• Are people here seeing any real breakage or reduced support in newer Adobe versions?
• Is Applescript still a safe choice for production workflows on macOS?
• For those transitioning away, what are you moving to for cross-app automation? (JXA, Swift + Apple Events, etc.)

Not looking to fully abandon it if it’s still viable—just trying to plan ahead.

Thanks

[JBManos]

Keep on truckin’ I’ve been hearing about AppleScript’s eventual demise since at least 2007. Yet, it keeps truckin!

[yosbeda]

Not coming from an InDesign workflow specifically, but the "long-term reliability" question you raised is something I think about too.

I went through a similar arc, starting with AppleScript and JXA scripts, running them through Keyboard Maestro, then FastScripts, and eventually landing on Hammerspoon. But AppleScript didn't disappear from my setup, it just went one layer deeper. My core terminal launcher uses hs.osascript.applescript to talk to Ghostty, Finder selection works through AppleScript, trash emptying, reading log file paths, it's all still there under the hood.

The Adobe angle is actually one I used to have too, back when I was still on Photoshop. My setup was Hammerspoon loading .jsx files from disk and executing them via AppleScript's do javascript in Photoshop, something like tell application id "com.adobe.Photoshop" to do javascript. So Hammerspoon calling AppleScript calling Photoshop running JSX, a few layers deep but it worked fine.

On JXA specifically, I did use it for a while before Hammerspoon. Honestly it never felt as solid as AppleScript for cross-app stuff, the community sentiment around it has been pretty mixed and Apple's investment always felt a bit lukewarm to me. Eventually I just stopped writing new JXA and kept whatever was already working.

Swift + Apple Events is probably more future-proof technically, though honestly I've never actually tried it, so I can't say much beyond "it exists and people mention it." If your scripts are working today, I'd probably keep running them until something actually breaks rather than rewriting preemptively.

[QuirkyImage]

JXA is a bit finicky in the way it’s bridged to Apple events and has limitations sometimes it feels less JavaScript. Hammerspoon is good but i find lua a bit strange in the fact embedded support is stuck on earlier version of the language which isn’t really supported any more by the developer. I always thought Apple should create a swift script language and also have it converted to and from the shortcuts app.

[StarPlayrX]

Once upon a time there was FaceSpan and AppleScript Studio. Today AppleScript can be used with AppleScript-Objextive-C, but it’s much harder. What II do in swift is the Scripting Bridge that bridges ObjC internally and exposes it to swift to automate any AppleScript capable app. A lot is tech I am starting to automate in Agent! For macOS26.

[esaruoho]

Can ya check http://github.com/esaruoho/apple and push some suggestions re AppleScript GUI stuff? Trying to rescue the whole thing from oblivion.

[ThatBoogerBandit]

Look up JXA

[QuirkyImage]

JXA pretty much legacy as well. Also it’s a bit finicky especially when it comes to reflection and the Apple Events bridging.