Programmatically add keyboard shortcut to Mac System Preferences

Question

If I go to System Preferences, Keyboard, Keyboard Shortcuts, then Application Shortcuts, I can define custom shortcuts to be used on a Mac.

Any way to access this functionality via Applescript?

Answer 1

The shortcuts are stored in NSUserKeyEquivalents dictionaries in ~/Library/Preferences/.GlobalPreferences.plist and the property lists of applications.

defaults write -g NSUserKeyEquivalents -dict-add Duplicate '~@d' Minimize '\0'
defaults write com.apple.finder NSUserKeyEquivalents '{"Show Package Contents"="@\r";}'

The shortcut format is described in the Cocoa Text System article.

Answer 2

System Preferences isn't scriptable with Applescript natively, you have to interact with it by GUI Scripting. GUI Scripting is really a last resort that allows you to interact with controls by explicitly declaring and calling them, and it doesn't take much to throw off a GUI script. It is difficult to implement even for experienced Applescript programmers. You'll find a few introductory tutorials out there in the web, but not much else.