the previous post — email file from finder — showed how to use applescript to quickly attach a selected finder item to an email — adding a recipient, subject and basic content along the way. this post will show how to adapt that script to allow for multiple attachments and multiple recipients.

here’s the original script :

set mgPeople to {}
set mgFirsts to {}
set mgAddresses to {}

tell application "Address Book"
  repeat with mgPerson in people
    tell mgPerson
      repeat with mgEmail in emails
        copy name to the end of mgPeople
        copy first name to the end of mgFirsts
        copy value of mgEmail to the end of mgAddresses
      end repeat
    end tell
  end repeat
end tell

-- thanks to Mark J. Reed 
-- http://lists.apple.com/archives/applescript-users/2007/Mar/msg00086.html
set text item delimiters of AppleScript to (ASCII character 10)
set mgSortedPeople to paragraphs of (do shell script "echo " & quoted form of (mgPeople as string) & "| sort  -d -f")
set text item delimiters of AppleScript to ""
-------------

choose from list mgSortedPeople with prompt "who you emailing then?"
if result is not false then
  set mgChosenOne to item 1 of result
else
  error number -128
end if

repeat with x from 1 to count of mgPeople
  if item x of mgPeople = mgChosenOne then
    set mgFirstName to item x of mgFirsts
    set mgChosenEmail to item x of mgAddresses
  end if
end repeat

tell application "Finder"
  set mgSelection to the selection
  set text item delimiters of AppleScript to ":"
  if class of (item 1 of mgSelection) is folder then
    set mgSubject to text item -2 of ((item 1 of mgSelection) as string)
    set mgContent to "Hi " & mgFirstName & return & return & "Here's that folder we were talking about." & return & return
  else
    set mgSubject to text item -1 of ((item 1 of mgSelection) as string)
    set mgContent to "Hi " & mgFirstName & return & return & "Here's the file you're waiting for." & return & return
  end if
  set text item delimiters of AppleScript to "."
  set mgSubject to text item 1 of mgSubject
  set text item delimiters of AppleScript to ""
end tell

tell application "Mail"
  activate
  set mgMessage to make new outgoing message with properties {subject:mgSubject, content:mgContent, visible:true}
  tell mgMessage
    make new to recipient with properties {name:mgChosenOne, address:mgChosenEmail}
    make new attachment with properties {file name:(mgSelection as alias)} at after last paragraph of content
    save
  end tell
end tell

that script first creates three lists — names, first names and email addresses. the list of first names was used to create the salutation in the email (“Hi whoever”). but this script allows for multiple recipients so the salutation will change (in this script we’ll use “Hi all”). so, the start of the script will be stripped back to this :

set mgPeople to {}
set mgAddresses to {}

tell application "Address Book"
  repeat with mgPerson in people
    tell mgPerson
      repeat with mgEmail in emails
        copy name to the end of mgPeople
        copy value of mgEmail to the end of mgAddresses
      end repeat
    end tell
  end repeat
end tell

-- thanks to Mark J. Reed 
-- http://lists.apple.com/archives/applescript-users/2007/Mar/msg00086.html
set text item delimiters of AppleScript to (ASCII character 10)
set mgSortedPeople to paragraphs of (do shell script "echo " & quoted form of (mgPeople as string) & "| sort  -d -f")
set text item delimiters of AppleScript to ""
-------------

the next thing we need to do is allow the user to select multiple email recipients. that’s as simple as changing the end of that choose from list command. we also need to change the way we capture that data — it’s no longer a list with only one item :

choose from list mgSortedPeople with prompt "who you emailing then?" with multiple selections allowed
if result is not false then
  set mgChosenOnes to result
else
  error number -128
end if

as per standard mac functionality, you can select multiple items in the dialog by holding down the command key :

we’re going to dump the next repeat loop from the original script — we’ll integrate that functionality once we start talking to Mail. here’s the new code we need for addressing the finder. this time we’re going to capture the name of the folder containing the finder selection to use as our subject line :

tell application "Finder"
  set mgSelection to the selection
  set text item delimiters of AppleScript to ":"
  if class of (item 1 of mgSelection) is folder then
    set mgSubject to text item -3 of ((item 1 of mgSelection) as string)
  else
    set mgSubject to text item -2 of ((item 1 of mgSelection) as string)
  end if
  set text item delimiters of AppleScript to ""
end tell

the original script allowed for one attachment and one recipient, so the last portion of the script — the bit that created the actual email — was quite simple. with this version we need two repeat loops — one to process the multiple recipients and one to process the multiple attachments :

tell application "Mail"
  activate
  set mgContent to "Hi all" & return & return & "Please find attached ..." & return & return
  set mgMessage to make new outgoing message with properties {subject:mgSubject, content:mgContent, visible:true}
  tell mgMessage
    repeat with mgChosenOne in mgChosenOnes
      repeat with x from 1 to count of mgPeople
        if item x of mgPeople = (mgChosenOne as string) then
          set mgChosenEmail to item x of mgAddresses
          make new to recipient with properties {name:mgChosenOne, address:mgChosenEmail}
        end if
      end repeat
    end repeat
    repeat with mgitem in mgSelection
      make new attachment with properties {file name:(mgitem as alias)} at after last paragraph of content
    end repeat
    save
  end tell
end tell

your homework for this week is to come up with a way to make the salutation personal if only one recipient is selected (eg. “Hi John”) but generic if multiple recipients are selected (eg. “Hi all”).

next time we’ll look again at how to turn this script into a service for easy accessibility from within the finder.