App'ing with py2app

Today I wanted to write a small little tool that I could stick into my MacOSX dock and simply drag’n drop stuff onto it. Since the whole processing in the background is already done using some Python libs I wanted to see how I could get a simply Python script into that dock. The problem here is, that MacOSX has two different areas in the dock:

  • One for handling applications
  • and one for files and folder (like the trash bin)

… and MacOSX recognizes scripts as the later one. Everything following in the first category seems to be a really .app.


And to convert a simple script into an App, there is a nice tool called py2app. After installing it simply run py2applet Script.py and you will get a nice little Script.app.

You can also tell py2applet to simply put a symlink to your script into the resulting App (-A) which might make developing just a little bit easier.

Another cool thing about it: If you drag for example a file from Finder onto that App in the dock, it will show up in sys.argv :D