Re: Reading word at mouse pointer w/o Universal Access

FROM : Adam Leonard
DATE : Mon Mar 03 00:00:50 2008

Just so you know, the Accessibility API has AXMakeProcessTrusted(), 
which will enable access to the API for just your application. It 
requires that it be called from a process running as root, so the user 
needs to enter his/her password, but otherwise it is fully automatic.

I blogged about it a while ago here: http://caffeinatedcocoa.com/blog/?p=12
There is also some sample code included.

Adam Leonard

On Mar 2, 2008, at 6:24 AM, Ryan Homer wrote:

> Steve,
>
> While I agree that the user should decide whether or not to allow 
> the application to access another's text, to me, that's exactly what 
> they are doing if they decide to use the application. It is going to 
> be a dictionary-type application, so if the user installs it, s/he 
> would be fully aware that its use would entail moving the mouse 
> pointer over a word in another application. The application would be 
> just about useless without that feature - so might as well delete it 
> if you don't want that feature. It's just that I don't want to 
> require that the user have to enable access for assistive devices. 
> The first time I came across that, I was hesitant to enable that 
> without knowing more about it and how many more services I would be 
> keeping running all the time in the background, etc. This made me 
> hesitant to even use the application that wanted to turn this on.
>
> On 28-Feb-08, at 8:59 PM, Steve Christensen wrote:
>

>> I don't have specific knowledge but, yes, I would expect that the 
>> dictionary support is a trusted part of the OS, thus can be hooked 
>> into every application.
>>
>> As far as I know, if you want to touch another application's UI, 
>> you have to go through accessibility. From the OS's point of view 
>> yours is just another application, so it seems reasonable that the 
>> user should decide whether or not to allow your application to see 
>> what's going on in another.
>>
>> steve
>>
>>
>> On Feb 28, 2008, at 5:33 PM, Ryan Homer wrote:
>>

>>> Let me clarify that it doesn't seem to be the Dictionary 
>>> application that's reading the word at the mouse pointer but 
>>> rather the OS itself or some daemon, perhaps, when  Ctrl-Option-D 
>>> is pressed. It might be the process called DictionaryPanel that 
>>> seems to always be running.
>>>
>>> Anyway, if anyone can point me to the appropriate functions/
>>> methods/classes that might be involved in doing such a thing w/o 
>>> the aforementioned techniques, please let me know.
>>>
>>> On 28-Feb-08, at 8:27 PM, Ryan Homer wrote:
>>>

>>>> I've read this post (http://lists.apple.com/archives/accessibility-dev/2006/Aug/msg00007.html
>>>> ) about using the accessibility options to read the text under 
>>>> the cursor. However, this requires that the user enable access 
>>>> for assistive devices in System Preferences. The application must 
>>>> therefore check for that. It also seems quite complicated; I 
>>>> don't want to have to deal with glyphs and the like - I only want 
>>>> the text under the cursor, full stop.
>>>>
>>>> The Dictionary application is able to read a word under the 
>>>> cursor without enabling access for assistive devices.
>>>>
>>>> Does anyone therefore know of an alternative way to do this?
>>>>
>>>> Thanks in advance.

>>
>> _______________________________________________
>>
>> Cocoa-dev mailing list (<email_removed>)
>>
>> Please do not post admin requests or moderator comments to the list.
>> Contact the moderators at cocoa-dev-admins(at)lists.apple.com
>>
>> Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription:
>> http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/cocoa-dev/hzc.lists
>> %40gmail.com
>>
>> This email sent to hzc.<email_removed>

>
> _______________________________________________
>
> Cocoa-dev mailing list (<email_removed>)
>
> Please do not post admin requests or moderator comments to the list.
> Contact the moderators at cocoa-dev-admins(at)lists.apple.com
>
> Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription:
> http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/cocoa-dev/<email_removed>
>
> This email sent to <email_removed>
>