macOS Automator + AppleScipt for text find&replace

[tgelston]

I have the dream of having an automator and Applescript combo that takes text from the clipboard, runs a little find and replace and puts the modified text back on the clipboard. Specifically I want to convert copied HTML links to BBCode.



I found the following AppleScript

(*
searchReplaceText(searchTerm, replaceTerm, theText)
Replaces a string found in a text by another string.
This handle supports lists of search/replace terms.

Parameters:
searchTerm: the text to search for
replaceTerm: the text to use as replacement
theText: the text to search/replace

Examples:
searchReplaceText("foo", "bar", "You are a foo") --> "You are a bar"
searchReplaceText({"foo", " a "}, {"bar", " one "}, "You are a foo") --> "You are one bar"
*)

to searchReplaceText({"foo", " a "}, {"bar", " one "}, "You are a foo")
	set searchTerm to searchTerm as list
	set replaceTerm to replaceTerm as list
	set theText to theText as text
	
	set oldTID to AppleScript's text item delimiters
	repeat with i from 1 to count searchTerm
		set AppleScript's text item delimiters to searchTerm's item i
		set theText to theText's text items
		set AppleScript's text item delimiters to replaceTerm's item i
		set theText to theText as text
	end repeat
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to oldTID
	
	return theText
end searchReplaceText

I can use Automator to grab the contents of the clipboard but I can't seem to make the above script do anything AND I have no idea how to pass it the text from the clipboard.

This isn't do or die important but it has become something that is stuck in my brain and I would like to figure it out.

Thanks,
Tobias

 

[angelwatt]

Check out this write-up for transferring contents to/from the clipboard.