Trying to write a script to open a random URL from a text file

Scriptable
1

Hello,

I’m new to Scriptable and Javascript in general. I’ve written this same script using Python on my PC, but I really want to use it on my iphone instead using scriptable.

The end goal is to open a random URL from a text file. (The URLs are chess drills from a chess website I subscribe to.)

This is what my code looks like. I’m storing the file urls.txt in the same folder as the script. When I run this on my iphone, absolutely nothing happens.There are no errors. If someone can spot something I’m doing wrong, I would be most appreciative!

// Variables used by Scriptable.
// These must be at the very top of the file. Do not edit.
// icon-color: deep-gray; icon-glyph: magic;
// This script opens a random URL from a text file

async function run() {
  // Read the contents of the text file
  let file = await File.read("urls.txt");
  let lines = file.split("\n");

  // Pick a random line from the file
  let index = Math.floor(Math.random() * lines.length);
  let url = lines[index];

  // Open the URL in the default web browser
  Safari.open(url);
}

run();

A sample of the contents of the urls.txt file looks like this:

https://chessly.com/dashboard/learn/courses/812a7981-0439-4de4-a86b-35b9833eea25/lessons/2ac9b6fe-e34d-44a9-a129-03960380c817
https://chessly.com/dashboard/learn/courses/812a7981-0439-4de4-a86b-35b9833eea25/lessons/228cb940-12c2-4280-ae1e-a2771ada3022
https://chessly.com/dashboard/learn/courses/812a7981-0439-4de4-a86b-35b9833eea25/lessons/22575f74-9064-4213-87fd-ae08b65bae4f
https://chessly.com/dashboard/learn/courses/812a7981-0439-4de4-a86b-35b9833eea25/lessons/e2139217-977a-4a8b-82c8-7ed70db725f4
https://chessly.com/dashboard/learn/courses/812a7981-0439-4de4-a86b-35b9833eea25/lessons/14a28fb0-1646-459c-88e2-2cbddfc2f081
https://chessly.com/dashboard/learn/courses/812a7981-0439-4de4-a86b-35b9833eea25/lessons/d922e1d3-23b6-4fbb-a8e4-4e822761afac
1 Like
2

Change this line

let file = await File.read("urls.txt");

with this

let fm = FileManager.iCloud()
let filePath = fm.joinPath( fm.documentsDirectory(), "urls.txt")
let file =  fm.readString(filePath);
3

Hello! thank you so much for the help. I made the recommended substitution, but now when I run the script, I get the following error:

"2022-12-20 09:01:03: urls.txt is stored in iCloud but the file have not been downloaded. Use downloadFileFromiCloud(filePath) on a FileManager to download the file before accessing it."

So I tried asking ChatGPT what might be wrong and it suggested that I edit my script adding the command mentioned in the error. My new script looks like this:

// Variables used by Scriptable.
// These must be at the very top of the file. Do not edit.
// icon-color: deep-gray; icon-glyph: magic;
// This script opens a random URL from a text file

async function run() {
  // Read the contents of the text file
  let fm = FileManager.iCloud()
  let filePath = fm.joinPath(fm.documentsDirectory(), "urls.txt")

  // Download the file from iCloud
  await fm.downloadFileFromiCloud(filePath)

  // Read the contents of the file
  let file = fm.readString(filePath);
  let lines = file.split("\n");

  // Pick a random line from the file
  let index = Math.floor(Math.random() * lines.length);
  let url = lines[index];

  // Open the URL in the default web browser
  Safari.open(url);
}

run();

But sadly, once again, when I run this nothing happens–no error message. I tried running a script that would verify Scriptable has access to my iCloud by writing a simple test.txt test file. And that worked fine.

I’m going to try to break this down into some very simple commands to see which one is failing. At this point I don’t know if it’s failing to read the URL from the file, or failing to open the URL. So I’ll try to figure out a test for each of these separately. I’m of course happy and grateful for any other tips or advise! Cheers. :slight_smile:

4

Just a hunch here. Can you try calling the run function with await? Basically await run();.

Although it shouldn’t matter, I’m just thinking the script might be terminating prematurely after the call to run and the promise is not being resolved.

5

Oh wow! Progress! Thank you!

Now it’s just telling me the URL is invalid. So it’s parsing and reading the file correctly–that’s great!

I must have my URL syntax slightly off or something…

Error on line 20:14: The URL is invalid: https://chessly.com/dashboard/learn/courses/812a7981-0439-4de4-a86b-35b9833eea25/lessons/78bffe55-3637-4712-b954-a6d56aa10f69

Progress is encouraging :blush:

6

Alrighty I figured it out. The URL error was because I wasn’t properly logged into the chess site on my phone. It’s working properly now–but only if I’m logged in. :+1:

But the real MVP is @supermamon! Thank you for the suggestion to use await run();–that was the source of all my woes with this one. :grin: