Watch for File Changes

[johnlindquist]

Watch a Single File

The // Watch metadata enables you to watch for changes to a file on your system.

// Name: Speak File
// Watch: ~/speak.txt

import "@johnlindquist/kit"

let speakPath = home("speak.txt")

try {
  let content = await readFile(speakPath, "utf-8")
  if (content.length < 60) {
    // We don't want `say` to run too long 😅
    say(content)
  }
} catch (error) {
  log(error)
}

Open speak-file in Script Kit

Watch a Directory

The // Watch metadata uses Chokidar under the hood, so it supports the same glob patterns.

// Name: Download Log
// Watch: ~/Downloads/*

import "@johnlindquist/kit"

// These are optional and automatically set by the watcher
let filePath = await arg()
let event = await arg()

if (event === "add") {
  await appendFile(home("download.log"), filePath + "\n")
}

Open download-log in Script Kit

[NachoVazquez]

👏 praise: Hi @johnlindquist! Thanks for this tool. I love it.

❔ question: Do we need some special treatment for spaced words in our path?

For example: // Watch: ~/Applications/JetBrains Toolbox/WebStorm.app/Contents/Info.plist is not working for me.

Thanks again!

[johnlindquist]

Hmm, can you try running:

 ~/.kenv/bin/just-notify

in your terminal? This should at least confirm the SDK is working...

I'll have to investigate why OSX isn't detecting that Kit.app is sending notifications 🤔

---

The reason just-notify looks like it's "hanging" is because the process that triggers the notification stays active until the notification lifecycle is complete. It takes about ~10 seconds.

notify is a simple wrapper around https://www.npmjs.com/package/node-notifier, so it's waiting for "clicks" and other interactions while the notification is "running".

If you want to hide the prompt after a notify, use hide()

notify("hello")
hide()

[johnlindquist]

Also, if you want to "mock" a notification, you can use widgets:

// Name: Notify Widget

import "@johnlindquist/kit"

let w = await widget(md(`## Something happened!`), {
    height: 100
})

await wait(3000)

w.close()

Open notify-widget in Script Kit

[NachoVazquez]

Well, I applied the old trick and restart my laptop. It works now 😆 . It was probably the OS notification service hanging.

However, all these tricks will be very handy!! Thank you!

[NachoVazquez]

I like the notify widget, I'll use it in my experiments!

Btw, the script I'm building will listen for updates in my Jetbrain Toolbox - WebStorm installation and update the terminal script with the right version.

The problem: The ws script needs to be in the system path, but the one that I'm using /usr/local/bin is not writable by JetBrain Toolbox.

There are simpler solutions, but I like to have my shell scripts in a single place. Therefore I will listen to any updates to WebStorm and update the script.

[johnlindquist]

Very cool. Glad a good old-fashioned restart kicked osx back into action 😅.

Let me know (in a new thread) if you have any other ideas/help. I'm always happy to explore new scripts.

Also, we're starting up a Discord server if you'd like to chat/lurk on Script Kit stuff :) https://discord.gg/q6cgGtzP