CotEditor Scripts

A collection of scripts for CotEditor providing formatting, linting, and editing utilities accessible from the Script menu, along with an installer to deploy them.

These scripts are primarily useful for editing code rather than plain text. Anyone comfortable with the command line should find them straightforward to install, customize, and extend.

How CotEditor Scripts Work

Open Help → CotEditor Help and look under Script CotEditor, particularly:

• Customize the Script menu — naming conventions, keyboard shortcuts, and menu separators
• Automate tasks using UNIX scripts — how CotEditor passes document content to scripts and reads back results

Repository layout

src/              Template scripts with @@tool@@ placeholders (tracked in git)
Scripts/          Generated by installScripts — real tool paths (gitignored)
installScripts    Detects tool paths and builds Scripts/ from src/
README.md

The installer routes files automatically based on filename:

• Numbered files (starting with a digit) are installed directly into the CotEditor Application Scripts directory and appear in the Script menu
• Non-numbered files are installed into the _lib/ subdirectory and are hidden from the menu — these are helper scripts called by the numbered scripts

You can remove, add, or renumber the numbered scripts to suit your needs by editing files in src/ and re-running installScripts.

Menu scripts

The scripts are organized into sections separated by menu dividers. You can renumber them to change the order or move scripts between sections. Leading numbers, keyboard shortcuts, and .sh are stripped from the filename in the Scripts menu.

Formatting and linting

05)Format.@~F.sh       Format document using syntax-appropriate tool
10)LineWrap.@~L.sh     Wrap lines at 70 characters
15)shellcheck.sh       Lint shell scripts with shellcheck
20)-                   Menu separator

Markdown file editing

25)singleTicks.sh      Wrap selection in single backticks
30)tripleTicks.sh      Wrap selection in triple backticks
35)-                   Menu separator

Pasting code into an AI chat

40)copyWithXML.sh      Copy selection wrapped in an XML tag, e.g. <bash>...</bash>

Cleaning up AI chat exports

45)convertXML.sh       Convert XML tag blocks to fenced code blocks
50)removeToolUsage.sh  Remove tool-use noise from AI chat exports
55)-                   Menu separator

Debugging

60)printenv.sh         Print environment variables (useful when debugging PATH issues)

Helper scripts (installed into _lib/, hidden from menu)

prettier.sh            Format with prettier (CSS, HTML, JSON, Markdown, YAML)
prettier-eslint.sh     Format JavaScript with eslint then prettier
prettier-awk.sh        Format AWK files with prettier-plugin-awk

fmt-wrap_70.sh         Wrap lines at 70 characters
prettier-wrap_70.sh    Wrap long lines with prettier --prose-wrap always

gofmt.sh               Format Go files
ruff.sh                Format Python files
rustfmt.sh             Format Rust files
shfmt.sh               Format shell scripts
swiftformat.sh         Format Swift files

remove_tools.awk       Remove AI tool-use blocks and collapse excess blank lines

See the scripts themselves for details on their purpose and requirements.

Dependencies

The helper scripts delegate to external CLI tools. Install whichever tools correspond to the languages you work with:

Tool	Language(s)
prettier	CSS, HTML, JavaScript, JSON, Markdown, YAML
prettier-plugin-awk	AWK (optional, requires prettier)
eslint	JavaScript
gofmt	Go
ruff	Python
rustfmt	Rust
sd	required by 45)convertXML.sh
shfmt	Shell
swiftformat	Swift
shellcheck	Shell (linting)

You do not need all of them — 05)Format.@~F.sh detects the file type and calls only the relevant tool. Helper scripts whose required tools aren't installed will be skipped automatically by the installer.

Installation

./installScripts

Run with --dry-run first to preview what will happen:

-h, --help      Show help and exit
-d, --dry-run   Preview what would be copied without making changes
-v, --verbose   Show all actions including skipped files

The installer:

1. Detects tool locations using command -v and prints a summary showing where each tool was found (or reporting it as missing)
2. Generates Scripts/ from src/ by substituting @@tool@@ tokens with the detected paths. Helper scripts whose required tools aren't installed are skipped with a clear message
3. Copies the generated scripts into the CotEditor Application Scripts directory, updating only files whose content has changed

Because CotEditor launched by clicking a file inherits only a minimal PATH (/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin), substituting real tool paths into the scripts at install time is what makes them reliably work regardless of how you manage your tools (Homebrew, Volta, MacPorts, Cargo, system installers, etc.).

If you later install a new tool or move an existing one, just re-run ./installScripts and the paths will be refreshed.

Adding or removing scripts

Edit files directly in src/ — installScripts regenerates Scripts/ from src/ on each run, so any changes in Scripts/ alone will be lost. The installer routes files automatically:

• Give a file a numeric prefix like 75)myScript.sh to make it a menu entry
• Name it without a leading digit (e.g. myHelper.sh) to make it a hidden helper in _lib/

If your new helper relies on a CLI tool, wrap the invocation with a token:

"@@toolname@@" --some-flag "$1"

then add toolname to the KNOWN_TOOLS array near the top of installScripts.

JavaScript formatting

JavaScript formatting requires eslint with a configuration file and its dependencies. The simplest setup is to clone this repo into ~/Projects and run npm install there:

cd ~/Projects/CotEditorScripts   # or wherever you cloned the repo
npm install

prettier-eslint.sh searches ~/Projects automatically (two levels deep) for an eslint.config.mjs and uses the first one it finds. If you have multiple eslint configs and want to use a specific one, set ESLINT_CONFIG in your shell profile:

export ESLINT_CONFIG="$HOME/Projects/myproject/eslint.config.mjs"