Commenting multiple photos in iPhoto ’11

When the App Store for Mac came out, I was excited at the chance to buy iPhoto without paying for the other apps that I didn't need. My excitement quickly turned to remorse as I encountered bug after bug after bug. Additionally, iPhoto removed useful functionality like the ability to use command shortcuts to switch between photos in "View" mode: in iPhoto it is now impossible to add comments to a number of photos in succession without a lot of mousing around.

I wrote an Applescript to partially overcome this limitation. It takes the selection and gives a dialog box for commenting each one. If the selection is contiguous it will properly display the photos in full screen mode as you comment them.

(*
Quickly comment the selected photos in iPhoto '11, viewing them in full screen if the selection is contiguous. Authored by Seth R Johnson, licensed under Simplified BSD.
*)
tell application "iPhoto"
 activate
 -- this works best with contiguous photos
 set sel_photos to selection
 if number of sel_photos is 0 or (class of item 1 of sel_photos is not photo) then
  error "Please make sure photos are selected."
 end if
 -- press the space bar to make the photos full screen
 tell application "System Events" to keystroke " "
 repeat with this_photo in sel_photos
  tell this_photo
   set c to comment of this_photo
   display dialog "Enter the comment for photo '" & (title of this_photo) & "':" default answer c buttons {"Cancel", "Apply"} default button 2
   set new_comment to text returned of result
   if c is not new_comment then
    set the comment of this_photo to new_comment
   end if
  end tell
  -- Press the right arrow key to advance to the next photos in the album
  tell application "System Events" to keystroke (ASCII character 29)
 end repeat
end tell