To assist in manipulation of AutoFetched data it is possible to set an action to run on the raw output of the data before it is set as the note's $Text. It can be thought of as if it were an 'OnAutoFetch' action. Such actions are set in an Action-type attribute $AutoFetchCommand, and thus use the same syntax as agent actions and rules.
If $AutoFetchCommand is empty (the default), $AutoFetch behaves as normal; the contents of the specified URL are stored in the note's text.
$AutoFetchCommand has code set, that code is run on this note (i.e. the same note holding this code) immediately after a network AutoFetch event has been performed (event triggers are described under AutoFetch).
Historically, these actions have been command line calls but as Tinderbox's range of text-manipulation operators in action code has expanded, pure action code may suffice. For instance, if pulling stock ticker information, it is possible to look for a line like "AAPL: 145.64 USD" and set the price to a Number-type attribute $StockPrice. This could be done like so:
$StockPrice = $Text.following("AAPL: ").replace(" USD","");
An AutoFetch command might invoke an outside program, perhaps fetching some information from the user's hard disk or network, using the runCommand() operator. For example:
$Text = runCommand("echo | ls ~"/Documents);
will replace the $Text of the note with a list of all the files currently in the user's Documents folder (the latter syntax is the recommended choice).
$Delivered = runCommand("myDatabaseQuery $TrackingID");
which will run the shell script 'myDatabaseQuery' in the user's OS home folder, passing it the value of the note's $TrackingID attribute as an argument.
When accessing the command line this way the current working directory is '/', i.e. the root of the current volume (more on the assumed working directory). Thus if calling scripts elsewhere (e.g. in a user account's 'Documents") remember to prefix an appropriate path to the script.
See also—notes linking to here: