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Use Atom with the Desktop Checker

  • Updated

You can use the Acrolinx Desktop Checker to check content from editors that don't have their own integration. Here we'll run through an example of checking content from GitHub in the Atom editor.

Note

You should be comfortable working in the command line or terminal for this procedure.

Note

This is designed to be a workaround, so it won't work for all cases.

Prerequisites

You'll need the Script package so that you can run scripts in Atom based on their file name. We'll use this package to open a file in the Acrolinx Desktop Checker from Atom.

To install the Script package in Atom:

  1. Open the Atom editor.

  2. In the top menu, click Packages > Command Palette > Toggle.

  3. Type Install Packages and Themes and press Enter.

  4. Search for the package "script" and click Install.

Create a Profile to Run the Acrolinx Desktop Checker

We'll create a profile with the Script package. This is basically like defining a terminal command that you can run from within Atom. We want this command to open the file you're viewing in Atom within the Acrolinx Desktop Checker.

To create a profile for the Desktop Checker:

  1. Open Atom from the command line or terminal, and run it with the project path you want to check. You need to open Atom like this, and not by clicking on the icon, so that Atom has full access to your environment variables.

    For example, on Windows you might open a local documentation folder by running something like this:

    Example

    atom C:\Users\me\Documents\Documentation\latest_version

  2. Open the Configure Run Options configuration panel.

    In the top menu, you can click Packages > Script > Configure Script.

    Alternatively, you can use the following hotkey combination:

    Windows/Linux

    shift-ctrl-alt-o

    macOS

    shift-cmd-i

  3. In the Command field, enter path to the Desktop Checker app.

  4. In the Command Arguments field, enter the following argument: -f {FILE_ACTIVE}

    This is the Desktop Checker argument to open a file.

    Your Run Options should now look like this:

    21693365.png

  5. Click Save as profile to save the profile and give it a name, so that you can use it again later.

Run the Profile on a File

Now that you can open a file in the Desktop Checker from Atom, let's try it out.

To open a file in the Desktop Checker from Atom:

  1. Select the file in Atom that you want to check.

  2. Open the Run with profile selector.

    In the top menu, you can click Packages > Script > Run with profile.

    Alternatively, you can use the following hotkey combination:

    Windows/Linux

    shift-ctrl-alt-b

    macOS

    shift-cmd-k

  3. Select the Acrolinx Desktop Checker profile you saved earlier.

  4. Click Run.

You should see the Acrolinx Desktop Checker open, and your file waiting for you in it, ready to check.