is it possible to pass queries to apps ?

[rob213]

With websites, no problem. Can I do it with apps ?

For example a translation app. I would like to open the app and paste directly into the search box (which opens automatically) the text I want to translate.

thank you

[Vero]

@rob213 If you share what translation app you're referring to, fellow users who know the app might be able to tell you whether there's a way to do it

 

Cheers,
Vero

[rob213]

@Vero

 

I took the translation web site https://www.dict.cc/ and converted it to an app which I call dictcc.app using the web site → app converter called Fluid

 

It works very well and I don't end up with 50 open dict.cc tabs in Chrome at the end of the day (opened every time I do a search)

 

I would like to 

- call up Alfred

- type dict spacebar “word to translate”dict

 

I am able to do it as a URL, but as I mentioned, I end up with 50 dictcc tabs open at the end of the day.

 

please note that as soon as I open the “app” the cursor is in the searchbox

 

thank you Vero

 

[Vero]

@rob213 That's still a browser though, not an app that could allow AppleScript support, etc...

 

Might want to take a look at the existing translation workflows, including one for dict.cc - they're not that recent, so might need to some adjustments, but would be a better starting point.

 

 

And for DeepL, which I'm not familiar with personally but many people seem to really like:

https://github.com/m9dfukc/deepl-alfred-workflow

 

Cheers,
Vero

[rob213]

great @Vero thanks very much

[deanishe]

2 hours ago, rob213 said:

I took the translation web site https://www.dict.cc/ and converted it to an app which I call dictcc.app using the web site → app converter called Fluid

 

So you're not trying to enter the query into a app's search box, you're trying to enter it into a webpage's search box. These are very different things.

 

The simplest way to do that would be to write an AppleScript that activates an existing dict.cc tab in Chrome (or creates a new one if none exists), then opens the new search URL in that tab. That would solve your problem of having 50 dict.cc tabs open.

 

Personally, I leave the tabs open because I often want to come back to the last two or three. So I wrote a script that closes all tabs whose domain = linguee.de and run that occasionally to tidy up.

 

When you have a question in the future, please explain the actual goal you're trying to achieve (I don't want 50 dict.cc tabs open) instead of asking about a solution you think might work.

[rob213]

thank you @deanishe