Permanent clipboard?

hey folks, forgive me if i've overlooked something, ...

Looking for a way to have a permanent clipboard that never goes away, ACTUALLY, really what would be better if i could have it saved as a file.
That may work with text, but the specific item i am looking to produce on command, out of thin air, is Action cells in the Keyboard Maestro Editor.

For example, i hit a key and it immediately adds a "speak text" with a certain voice selected, and certain settings picked in the pop-up menus. This can be produced instantly if it's on a clipboard, but i imagine it would be much better to keep it saved to a file. Can't figure out how to actually VIEW the actual clipboard contents as data so I can figure out what the clipboard actually contains when it contains a kbm action cell.
I've done this just by keeping the clipboards hanging around, but the clipboards become unruly sometimes and can be a cause of slowdown, so i feel it's better to keep it saved to a file, if i want to produce KM action cells out of thin air. but yeah, can't figure out how to get that to a file. when i try to do it, it just reproduces the textual title of the action. whereas if i actually copy it from kbm editor, then paste it, then it's fine.

Was looking at the clipboards plist file in hopes to find a raw xml version of what is currently on the clipboards. .... I thought that would be the answer! but for some reason i'm not seeing newly created clipboards on that list.

hopefully this makes sense ....
Thanks!

Here are some ideas that may work for you:

  1. Mark a Clipboard in the Clipboard History Switcher as a Favorite, and it will never be removed
  2. Save the System Clipboard to a Named Clipboard.
  3. Save a KM Action, as you have customized it, as a KMFAM action, using this great macro:
    MACRO: [KMFAM] Favorite Actions and Macros by @DanThomas

In order to save a Clipboard to file, you will need a special utility to do that, since the System Clipboard actually contains multiple data types for the object that has been copied. For example, here is what the Clipboard Viewer shows after I have copied a KM Action:

See the Clipboard Viewer

If you are referring to the KM Clipboard History Switcher, you are correct. I have found that if I keep a significant number of large Clipboard in the KM CB Switcher, then viewing the Switcher can greatly slow down. I don't use KM Named Clipboards much, but I have never noticed any performance penalty from using them.

My favorite solution for storing customized KM Actions is the MACRO: [KMFAM] Favorite Actions and Macros I mentioned above.

HTH. If you still have questions, please feel free to post.

awesome, I have a few more questions:

Dan's KMFAM package is mindblowing. but does it allow these action inserts to be triggered by hotkeys or USB keys?

And with the 'clipboard viewer' solution, I've downloaded clipboard viewer, seen that when I have an action cell on the clipboard it appears to be XML, so I've saved that to a file, then I cleared the clipboard and tried to load the clipboard from a file (using KM "read a file" to system clipboard. And it didn't work .... at least it didn't reproduce it in a pastable form. Any idea how to get a customized action cell (like the inserts in Dan's KMFAM) to just pop up by hitting a key? have a full keyboard full of custom actions? besides saving them as named clipboards. .... because it is nice to be able to purge the clipboards, because they do bog things down as they accumulate. thanks so much

Dan's macros can be triggered by any trigger available to all Macros.

Just export the Action (File > Export Actions) and give it any name you like, but make sure the extension remains ".kmactions". Then whenever you want to insert this Action, just double-click on the file, or do a File > Import Actions.

The export will work with however many Actions you have selected, and export all of them as one file.

Of course, once you have exported these Actions, you can create a Macro that will allow you to select and import them.