Get modifier keys, which have been pressed while starting an app / applescript

Question

I need to get a list of keys (e.g. the shift key, alt, command ...) which have been pressed when i started an app, especially an ApplesScript on Mac OS X.

Answer 1

A shorter form of Mike Woodfill's answer:

set {shiftDown, ctrlDown, altDown, cmdDown} to words of (do shell script "python -c 'import Cocoa;m=Cocoa.NSEvent.modifierFlags();print m&Cocoa.NSShiftKeyMask>0,m&Cocoa.NSControlKeyMask>0,m&Cocoa.NSAlternateKeyMask>0,m&Cocoa.NSCommandKeyMask>0'")

Note, that you get the modifiers as strings, so you have to compare them like this if (altDown = "True") then ...

If you really want boolean modifiers, look at this code:

set mods to {}
repeat with m in words of (do shell script "python -c 'import Cocoa;m=Cocoa.NSEvent.modifierFlags();print m&Cocoa.NSShiftKeyMask,m&Cocoa.NSControlKeyMask,m&Cocoa.NSAlternateKeyMask,m&Cocoa.NSCommandKeyMask'")
    set end of mods to m as number as boolean
end repeat
set {shiftDown, ctrlDown, altDown, cmdDown} to mods

Answer 2

See post #5 by StefanK at MacScripter / Tiger shiftKey detect error. He wrote a command line tool called checkModifierKeys which may be what you need. The code is posted too so you can adjust it if needed.

Answer 3

You can use the following code to detect is modifier keys are being held down using "vanilla" applescript.

on isModifierKeyPressed()

set modiferKeysDOWN to {command_down:false, option_down:false, control_down:false, shift_down:false}

if (do shell script "/usr/bin/python -c 'import Cocoa; print Cocoa.NSEvent.modifierFlags() & Cocoa.NSAlternateKeyMask '") > 1 then
    set option_down of modiferKeysDOWN to true
end if

if (do shell script "/usr/bin/python -c 'import Cocoa; print Cocoa.NSEvent.modifierFlags() & Cocoa.NSCommandKeyMask '") > 1 then
    set command_down of modiferKeysDOWN to true
end if

if (do shell script "/usr/bin/python -c 'import Cocoa; print Cocoa.NSEvent.modifierFlags() & Cocoa.NSShiftKeyMask '") > 1 then
    set shift_down of modiferKeysDOWN to true
end if

if (do shell script "/usr/bin/python -c 'import Cocoa; print Cocoa.NSEvent.modifierFlags() & Cocoa. NSControlKeyMask '") > 1 then
    set control_down of modiferKeysDOWN to true
end if

return modiferKeysDOWN
end isModifierKeyPressed