Text Me

Text me

Sends to the user's iMessage self-chat via osascript and Messages.app. No browser, no computer-use, no synthetic input - it is a local script.

~/.claude/skills/text-me/scripts/text-me.sh "message"
~/.claude/skills/text-me/scripts/text-me.sh "here's the render" /path/to/file.mp4
~/.claude/skills/text-me/scripts/text-me.sh "" /path/a.wav /path/b.mp4   # files only

The script stages, sends, waits for delivery, prints per-file status, and cleans up. Recipient defaults to ${TEXT_ME_TO:?set TEXT_ME_TO to your iMessage number} (your own number); override with TEXT_ME_TO.

The one thing that matters: staging

Messages.app is sandboxed. An AppleScript file alias does NOT mint a sandbox exception the way the UI's drag / open-panel does. Send a file from ~/Desktop, ~/Music, ~/Documents, or /tmp and Messages accepts the send, fails to open the file, and writes error=25 / transfer_state=6 - the bubble reads Not Delivered.

Copy the file into a path in Messages' entitlements first, then send from there. ~/Library/Messages/ is the one that actually works:

S=~/Library/Messages/Attachments/_textme && mkdir -p "$S"
cp "/path/to/file" "$S/"
osascript -e 'tell application "Messages" to send (POSIX file "'"$S/file"'" as alias) to participant "${TEXT_ME_TO:?set TEXT_ME_TO to your iMessage number}"'
rm -rf "$S"

This is exactly what the UI does - working attachments in chat.db all live under ~/Library/Messages/Attachments/.

Entitled paths

codesign -d --entitlements - /System/Applications/Messages.app

~/Downloads being entitled and still failing is the trap. Do not assume an entitlement in the list is enough - stage in ~/Library/Messages/.

Text vs attachments

Plain text needs no staging and works directly:

osascript -e 'tell application "Messages" to send "hello" to participant "${TEXT_ME_TO:?set TEXT_ME_TO to your iMessage number}"'

Only attachments hit the sandbox problem.

Verify - always

osascript exits 0 on a send that silently fails. Never report success off the exit code. Read chat.db instead:

sqlite3 ~/Library/Messages/chat.db "select m.is_sent, m.error, a.transfer_state,
  round(a.total_bytes/1048576.0,1)||'MB', substr(a.filename,-30)
  from message m
  join message_attachment_join j on j.message_id=m.ROWID
  join attachment a on a.ROWID=j.attachment_id
  where a.is_outgoing=1 order by m.date desc limit 3;"

Large files take time. 188MB took roughly 45s to flip is_sent to 1, so poll rather than checking once.

Finding the self-chat

your own handle is ${TEXT_ME_TO:?set TEXT_ME_TO to your iMessage number}, self-chat is chat.ROWID=1, guid any;-;${TEXT_ME_TO:?set TEXT_ME_TO to your iMessage number}. If that ever changes, the account handle is in the DB:

sqlite3 ~/Library/Messages/chat.db "select distinct destination_caller_id from message where is_from_me=1;"

A self-chat splits almost exactly 50/50 sent/received, because each message is recorded twice - once outgoing, once as the receipt copy. Do not mistake that for a two-way thread.

Gotchas

• Size is not the limit people assume. A 188MB wav went through fine.
• Filenames with : and | arrive from yt-dlp as fullwidth ： and ｜. Quote every path; copy the real name from ls rather than retyping.
• Failed bubbles cannot be deleted by script. They sit in the thread as "Not Delivered" until the user removes them by hand - so verify before spamming retries.
• Clean up the staging dir after sending. Leaving 188MB copies inside ~/Library/Messages/Attachments/ bloats the Messages store.
• The Messages AppleScript dictionary is half-broken on current macOS. name of every account errors -1728; id of every account works. Do not read an account error as a send failure.
• Reading the unified log (log show) needs admin. your account is not in admin, so that diagnostic route is closed - use chat.db instead.

Scope

Self-chat only. Per the user's Slack rule, never message another person unless he explicitly names the recipient in that request.