Question

I know I am probably missing this hugely,

but anyone knows why this keeps returning an error?

$ node -v && node
v0.4.6
> var cmd = 'osascript -e "open location \"http://google.com\""';
> require('child_process').exec(cmd, function (error, stdout, stderr) { console.log(error); });

//Error message
> { 
    stack: [Getter/Setter],
    arguments: undefined,
    type: undefined,
    message: 'Command failed: 15:20: syntax error: A “:” can’t go after this identifier. (-2740)\n',
    killed: false,
    code: 1,
    signal: null 
}

Perhaps it has something to do with the double quotes in the cmd?

Answer 1

Probably just a quoting issue. This one works for me:

$ node -v && node
v0.4.8
> var cmd = 'osascript -e \'open location \"http://google.com\"\'';
> require('child_process').exec(cmd, function (error, stdout, stderr) { console.log(error); });

Btw, if you just want to open a URL, there is no need to go through AppleScript. Just use the open command:

> var cmd = 'open \"http://google.com\"';