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I try to implement these two very simple commands in an Automator service to be run by a keyboard short (takes a screenshot and OCRs it):

screencapture -i /tmp/tesseract.png
tesseract /tmp/tesseract.png stdout|tr -d \\f|pbcopy

This works great when I execute these commands in the Terminal, but not when I make it an Automator service (sorry this is in German). Automator window I don't understand: Why does it work in the one case and not in the other? Does it have anything to do with tesseract?

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  • Add the absolute path to tesserac - /path/to/tesseract /tmp/tesseract.png stdout|tr -d \\f|pbcopy
    – fd0
    Commented Jul 30, 2020 at 18:32
  • 1
    When you say it doesn't work, what is it not doing? Test if tesseract is in your path: put on the first line the command echo $PATH. Post the output.
    – Allan
    Commented Jul 30, 2020 at 19:36
  • Automator might not have access to your clipboard and thus the pbcopy might not do anything
    – John Keates
    Commented Jul 31, 2020 at 9:14

1 Answer 1

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Any executable that is not within the PATH passed to the Run Shell Script action, which is /usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin, you must use the fully qualified pathname of the executable.

In this case, e.g. /path/to/tesseract

You should be able to get its path in Terminal using:

which tesseract

As tesseract is not a default of macOS, it may be in /usr/local/bin/, however which tesseract should report its fully qualified pathname.

Instead of using the fully qualified pathname, or in conjunction with, you can also add a PATH statement to the top of the Run Shell Script action, e.g. for a bash shell:

PATH="${PATH}:/usr/local/bin/"

You could also just substitute everything to the right of the = sign for what the output in Terminal, e.g. echo $PATH is. Then the Run Shell Script action has the same PATH as Terminal.

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