Speed Doubler and AppleScript: a follow-up

Last time, we mentioned a possible problem with Speed Doubler 8.1.2 not recognizing that AppleScript is installed - because the TM symbol was omitted from the end of its name in newer versions of AppleScript. The solution was to add a TM symbol to the name. Several readers (including Rick Zeman, Jonathan Nathan and Ted Edward) reported another work-around: move up AppleScript to the start of the load order (using Conflict Catcher).

If simply re-ordering the load order works, why does adding the TM symbol also succeed? Connectix's Kathy Westergaard offered the following explanation:

"Speed Doubler 8 does not check for the presence of AppleScript by name; rather it checks for an appropriate Gestalt selector installed by the AppleScript extension. The only reason Speed Doubler 8 should fail to detect that AppleScript is loaded is if AppleScript loads after the Speed Doubler 8 control panel.

The problem described on MacFixIt is most likely due to Conflict Catcher or some other extensions manager reordering the new AppleScript extension to load last. This can happen if the user updates an existing System Folder to MacOS 8.5 or performs a clean install and then uses Conflict Catcher, MOSH, Clean Install Assistant or some other program to merge the old system with the new. Since the Mac OS 8.5 AppleScript file is named differently than earlier versions of the Mac OS, Conflict Catcher treats the new AppleScript as a new extension and adds it to the end of the extension load process. When the user notices that two copies of AppleScript are loading, s/he disables the old one. This causes AppleScript to load after the Speed Doubler 8 control panel where the presence of AppleScript is checked. Since AppleScript is not yet loaded, Speed Doubler will post an alert to that effect. Renaming the AppleScript extension to AppleScript™ causes Conflict Catcher to treat it as the old extension and load it in the proper order, thus resolving the problem. The user can also tell Conflict Catcher to reset the load order to normal or manually change the load order of the AppleScript extension."

By the way, John Schneider found a similar problem with his GlobalFax software: it installed a duplicate copy of the AppleScript extension, apparently because it did not recognize the name of the one already installed.

You might also want to check out an Apple TIL article (#58066)on the AppleScript name change. (Thanks, John Queenan.)