Selecting items in a popup window

Questions & Suggestions
1

The application I'm using (Finale) has lots of popup windows with tons of options...like disclosure triangles revealing more options, radio buttons, check boxes, dropdown menus, etc.

  1. Is there a way to select items on a popup window similar to "Select or Show a Menu Item"? If not, what is the best way to select items within a popup window .... other than "click at found image"?

  2. If an item that needs to be selected toggles between two states (like a disclosure triangle or checkbox), how do I create a predictable macro involving that toggle regardless of it's toggle status?

2

You may be able to use UI controls via AppleScript to do things like select the third button in the fourth group etc.

You can use Press Button and the Button condition for checkboxes and buttons.

Popup menus are tricky to control, basically you have to click on them and then use Type Ahead.

Lists are generally even worse.

3

Thank you Peter. I am not quite ready to delve into AppleScript. But the other suggestions are great. Just to clarify some of the things that Peter says for us newbies:

  1. when he refers to the “button condition”, I discovered that he is probably talking about the “If Then Else” action, which has an option called “New Conditions”, which when clicked provides you with the button condition. This works for checkboxes as well. After checking the condition of your button/checkbox, you can then execute any action you would like, including the “Press Button” action to effect your button/checkbox.

  2. when he refers to “type ahead”, he is just saying that some UI controls respond to your typing. For example if you have a list of states, instead of scrolling through to the bottom in order to click on say West Virginia, you can just type “W” and it will skip down to West Virginia. So if you have a list of items that use disclosure triangles to reveal subset items, you can use KM actions like “Insert Text by Typing” and “Type a Keystroke” to select the exact item you need. Many times the left/right arrow keys allow you to hide/show subsets.

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