Check Size of Clipboard ⇢ Data-Types on the Clipboard

Questions & Suggestions
#1

Sometimes by mistake I hit CMD+V to paste into Notes, when in fact I want to paste the text instead (CMD+OPTION+SHIFT+V), for example if I select a group of file/folders in Finder and I then want to paste the names only. So if those files/folders are large files, Notes freezes.

Is there a way for KM to check the size of the clipboard in MB?
According to this, it seems that the =>, =, etc, are related to the text length, not file size?

#2

Checking the size of the clipboard is not going to work for things like files and folders, because it simply holds references to those items.

However – you can test for data-types on the clipboard and proceed from there.

@ComplexPoint has a very comprehensive macro for this on the forum:

A simpler JXA script would be something like this:

(() => {
    'use strict';

    ObjC.import('AppKit');

    return ObjC.deepUnwrap(
        $.NSPasteboard.generalPasteboard
        .pasteboardItems.js[0].types
    ).join('\n');
})();

Result for several items copied from the Finder:

public.file-url
public.utf16-external-plain-text
public.utf8-plain-text

@ComplexPoint's script result for the same items:

{
  "public.file-url as propertyList": "file:///Users/myUserName/Downloads/Clipboard%20View%20(all%20textually%20representable%20data%20as%20JSON).kmmacros",
  "public.file-url as string": "file:///Users/myUserName/Downloads/Clipboard%20View%20(all%20textually%20representable%20data%20as%20JSON).kmmacros",
  "public.file-url as data": "file:///Users/myUserName/Downloads/Clipboard%20View%20(all%20textually%20representable%20data%20as%20JSON).kmmacros",
  "public.utf8-plain-text as string": "Clipboard View (all textually representable data as JSON).kmmacros\rDeltaWalker-2.6.4_x64.dmg\rMemoDate_c.zip\rmuCommander-1.2.0-2.dmg",
  "public.utf8-plain-text as data": "Clipboard View (all textually representable data as JSON).kmmacros\rDeltaWalker-2.6.4_x64.dmg\rMemoDate_c.zip\rmuCommander-1.2.0-2.dmg"
}
3 Likes
#3

If you always, or nearly always, want to paste as text, you could just give in to your habit and set Cmd-V to trigger "Paste and Match Style".

You could create a macro for this in a macro group that is only active for the Notes application (amongst other ways).