I've learned that iTunes XML file is actually a plist, and instead of trying to parse the raw XML, I could use property lists.
I'm able to access the "Tracks" section, but I'm able to unable to do anything simple like extracting a track name. Admittedly, I'm stumbling around a bit, but this is the code I've gotten to so far:
tell application "System Events"
tell property list file property_file
tell contents
set my_tracks to value of property list item "Tracks"
repeat with t in my_tracks
set theName to value of property list item "Name" of t
display dialog theName
end repeat
end tell
end tell
end tell
Any pointers as to what I'm doing wrong?
If it helps, sample XML:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple Computer//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.
com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
<key>Major Version</key><integer>1</integer>
<key>Minor Version</key><integer>1</integer>
<key>Application Version</key><string>9.0.2</string>
...
<dict>
<key>2471</key>
<dict>
<key>Name</key><string>Check The Rhime</string>
<key>Artist</key><string>A Tribe Called Quest</string>
...
</dict>
<key>2473</key>
<dict>
<key>Name</key><string>A Short History of Nearly Everyth
ing (Unabridged), Part 1</string>
<key>Artist</key><string>Bill Bryson</string>
...
</dict>
When you do the value of property list item
, AppleScript converts the whole thing into a native AppleScript value; in this case, the value is a record. Thus, you simply need to tweak the inside a little bit:
property property_file : ¬
(POSIX path of (path to home folder) & ¬
"Music/iTunes/iTunes Music Library.xml")
tell application "System Events"
tell property list file property_file
tell contents
set my_tracks to value of property list item "Tracks"
repeat with t in items of my_tracks
display dialog (|Name| of t)
end repeat
end tell
end tell
end tell
Doing items of my_tracks
produces a list of the values of the record; |Name| of t
is just record access. Unfortunately, doing this plist processing seems to be very slow, since the XML file is so massive.