Feature Request: Ability to Copy Description + Text Snippet with Command

(1) My current eBay templates utilize a text snippet inserted into the html below the description. This snippet is used to automatically insert my TOS into each eBay listing below the description.

I’d like to have the ability to copy a eBay listing’s description + any text snippets in the listing to the clipboard after selecting “Select All” in the menu or hitting Command + A on the keyboard.

This could be accomplished by an additional menu command and key combo.

Perhaps a special Select All command might need to also be added (Select All +) to indicate the text snippets were also selected.

(2) In the last two weeks I have began recycling some unsold eBay inventory on another site and have quickly sold $587 of goods with buyers picking up all items up. I paid no fees, but this site has no automated listing software like GS. GS can however be used to store titles and description for items listed there, which in most cases are already in GS as they are items that were previously listed on eBay.

I’d like to setup a different template for these items which uses a different text snippet TOS for this site. A special menu command to copy the template’s description and text snippet would easy allow for this.

Presently the only way to copy this would be include the TOS in the description. That is impractical as even the bulk find and replace feature of GS8 does not work. The only way to bulk find and replace content is using a AppleScript which is very slow. Tasks should remain all inside GS.

(3) As I sell many vintage one-of-a-kind items I recycle the descriptions and pictures into blog posts where I earn money from advertising networks. eBay has been doing this for ears with eBay listings on sites such as Worthpoint. All my images are watermarked to make them less attractive to Worthpoint.

As with number two I’d also like to use a different template that utilizes a different text snippet for these eBay listings recycled to my blog as article to read by collectors. Exporting such listings to blogs would be greatly helped by a command to copy the description + the any text snippets to the clipboard.

(4) I already use GS to keep track of items I sell at various consignment shops. As listings are withdrawn from sale on eBay I simply add them to a folder for a specific shop. For items never listed on eBay I duplicate one of my existing eBay template to store that item’s title and description along with a reference picture. With thousands of items in multiple shops I need some way to keep track of them all.

Once again the ability to copy the description + any text snippets would come in handy. I use text from these listing’s descriptions to generate Avery labels which are applied to sales tags for each individual shop. I would like to add a snippet for each shop.

CONCLUSION:

Adding such a feature would make GS a more valuable tool as it allows you to use GS for other inventory management that is related to eBay.

I recently paid for GS8 but it is unusable due to the infamous RETURN POLICY NOT SPECIFIED error.

Could you please add this feature to GS7?

This could also be accomplished by updating the AppleScript for GS7.

In the mockup below textblocks(UniversalTermsNewWindowManual) is used to refer to a specific textblock. The phrase “textblocks” would be a property of the selected listing and the name inside the brackets would be a specific textblock attached to that listing. A nonexisting textblock, such as a incorrectly typed textblock, should return a blank string rather than causing a error or crashing GS.

This code would add a item’s description + a specific textblock to the clipboard so that it be easily pasted from GS.

Getting the description of the currently selected listing returns the raw html from the edit mode. The script below would need to modified to strip the html out (see additional post below on using the private comment).

tell application "GarageSale 7"
	repeat with theListing in (get selected ebay listings)
		set origline to get the description of theListing
		set snippet to get the textblocks(UniversalTermsNewWindowManual) of theListing
	end repeat
end tell

get the clipboard
set the clipboard to origline & snippet

I decided try using the private comment area to act a sort of textblock that could be copied to the clipboard as the private comment is a property of a listing in the current GS Applescript dictionary.

This code gets the html description from the edit mode of the selected listing. It changes the
tags to two line returns and strips out the rest of the html tags. It then adds the text and the listing’s private comment to the clipboard.

tell application "GarageSale 7"
	repeat with theListing in (get selected ebay listings)
		set des to get the description of theListing
		set comment to get private comment of theListing
	end repeat
end tell

set theText to replaceText("<br>", return & return, des)

on replaceText(find, replace, textString)
	set prevTIDs to AppleScript's text item delimiters
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to find
	set textString to text items of textString
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to replace
	set textString to "" & textString
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to prevTIDs
	return textString
end replaceText

on removeMarkupFromText(theText)
	set tagDetected to false
	set theCleanText to ""
	repeat with a from 1 to length of theText
		set theCurrentCharacter to character a of theText
		if theCurrentCharacter is "<" then
			set tagDetected to true
		else if theCurrentCharacter is ">" then
			set tagDetected to false
		else if tagDetected is false then
			set theCleanText to theCleanText & theCurrentCharacter as string
		end if
	end repeat
	return theCleanText
end removeMarkupFromText

get the clipboard
set the clipboard to removeMarkupFromText(theText) & comment

This script can be used to replace the private comment. It displays a replacement dialog with three blank lines which are preselected so you can immediately delete them. This is allow for multi-line text to be more easily entered and viewed. You can add additional blank lines by adding addition “& return” code after the existing three.

tell application "GarageSale 7"
	repeat with theListing in (get selected ebay listings)
		set comment to get private comment of theListing
	end repeat
end tell

set origtext to comment

set theReply2 to (display dialog "Enter new replacement text" default answer return & return & return buttons {"Cancel", "Continue"} default button "Continue")
set replaceText to text returned of theReply2

to searchReplace(thisText, searchTerm, replacement)
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to searchTerm
	set thisText to thisText's text items
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to replacement
	set thisText to "" & thisText
	set AppleScript's text item delimiters to {""}
	return thisText
end searchReplace

tell application "GarageSale 7"
	repeat with theListing in (get selected ebay listings)
		set origline to comment
		set the private comment of theListing to my searchReplace(origline, origtext, replaceText)
	end repeat
end tell

Bulk setting private comment instead of replace:

tell application "GarageSale 7"
	repeat with theListing in (get selected ebay listings)
		set comment to get private comment of theListing
	end repeat
end tell

set origtext to comment

set theReply2 to (display dialog "Enter new replacement text" default answer return & return & return buttons {"Cancel", "Continue"} default button "Continue")
set replaceText to text returned of theReply2

tell application "GarageSale 7"
	repeat with theListing in (get selected ebay listings)
		set origline to comment
		set the private comment of theListing to replaceText
	end repeat
end tell

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