Change focus to Body section of front most Compose window in Apple Mail

[gingerbeardman]

I find it cumbersome to move to the Body section of a new message in Apple Mail.

 

Sure, you can use Tab to move through the fields of the window, but if you have Full Keyboard Access on, that can be many. You may also often add cc: and bcc: which also alters how many presses of Tab are required to land in the body section. Also, if you Tab too many times then you start adding tab characters in your email. Argh!

 

So, I wanted to find a way to instantly focus the body section.

 

I used Apple's Accessibility Inspector (comes as part of Xcode) to find out the UI element I needed to target, and the property I needed to change to apply focus. Then it was just a mater of a few lines of AppleScript.

 

Here it is, wrapped in a workflow that can be summoned by a hotkey. I chose Cmd+` but you can configure it to your liking.

 

Download: Focus Body.alfredworkflow (2013-08-29)

 

AppleScript:

tell application "System Events"
	tell process "Mail"
		set value of attribute "AXFocused" of UI element 1 of scroll area 4 of front window to true
	end tell
end tell

Edited August 29, 2013 by gingerbeardman

[gingerbeardman]

V2: improved apple script to only run if the frontmost window isn't your inbox.

[gingerbeardman]

Added Focus Subject (2013-08-29)

 

which works in a similar way to focus the Subject field.

Edited August 29, 2013 by gingerbeardman

[dirk]

Added Focus Subject which works in a similar way to focus the Subject field.

 

or switch:

 

activate application "Mail"

tell application "System Events"

tell process "Mail"

if title of window 1 does not contain "Inbox" then

if value of attribute "AXFocused" of text field 1 of front window is true then

set value of attribute "AXFocused" of UI element 1 of scroll area 4 of front window to true

else

set value of attribute "AXFocused" of text field 1 of front window to true

end if

end if

end tell

end tell

Edited August 20, 2013 by dirk

[gingerbeardman]

That's a nice approach, but it assumes a you'll always want to switch from the body to the subject line. This is not always the case for me.

 

Thanks for your idea, though!

[gingerbeardman]

V3 of both workflows added. 

 

They no longer activate Mail.app, so your window z-order is respected.

[gingerbeardman]

or switch:

 

I checked this code and it does work, my apologies for dismissing it previously.

 

Here's V4 as a single workflow, but it is only for Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks:

 

Toggle Focus Body/Subject

 

Cheers,

matt

Edited October 22, 2013 by gingerbeardman

[Cor roC]

Hey Gingerbeardman --- I sent a pm re: this script. Currently not working on my end, likely a PICNIC problem. Would love to pick your ear if you have a few minutes. Thanks!

[Vero]

Hey Gingerbeardman --- I sent a pm re: this script. Currently not working on my end, likely a PICNIC problem. Would love to pick your ear if you have a few minutes. Thanks!

 

 

Hi Cory, could you please fill in your Powerpack email address in your forum profile before taking part in Powerpack-related discussions? Thanks!

[gingerbeardman]

Hey I've not tested this on El Capitan as far as I can remember.

 

Happy to help where I can, though!

Edited February 25, 2016 by gingerbeardman