Set Color of KM Action

Macro Library
1

###MACRO: Set Color of KM Action

####DOWNLOAD:
Set Color of KM Action.kmmacros (4.2 KB)

Based on @peternlewis post at How click gear of an action?:

####HOW TO USE:

  1. SELECT the Action (OR nothing selected)
  2. HOVER the Mouse over the Action (NOT over a text area)
  3. Trigger this Macro
  4. Manually TYPE the FIRST letter of the COLOR you want
  5. Press RETURN

####You might also like this macro:
MACRO: Set NAME of KM Action

###RESULTS:

2 Likes
2

Does anyone know what "Set Color>Search does? I would assume that I can pick a custom color from the standard options on Mac like the crayons, color picker, etc. It is always greyed out for me.

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I am not finding anything in the Wiki about it. I am trying to set an action to the color blue but I am guessing the solid blue is not there to not overlap too much with the search stripped blue.
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Set Color
The Set Color menu in the Actions menu sets the color of actions.
Note: A blue striped color is reserved to mark the action as a match for the current search.

https://wiki.keyboardmaestro.com/manual/Menus?s[]=evaluate%20condition%20results#Set_Color

3

My guess is it's only showing what the search color looks like, so you have some idea of how the other colors compare. It's just a guess, but since it seems to be always greyed out, I can't imagine what else it could be for.

4

Thanks Dan that sounds like a good logical guess, @peternlewis will have to add some pin stripes through the tiny dot too haha. Hopefully something can be added to the documentation on that.

5

You can't. There's only those limited colours, as you can see from the action's XML.

If you "Copy as XML" a coloured action and paste into a text editor you'll see an ActionColor key and a string colour value. You can set that value to Red, Green, Yellow, etc then Select All, Copy, and Paste back into the macro to get the newly-coloured action. But if you change it to Blue you'll get an uncoloured action, the ActionColor key now missing.

1 Like
6

The Search color is shown there in an endlessly failed attempt to ensure people understand what it means when the action is colored with the blue striped color.

Short of me visiting each user in person and explaining it, it seems this goal will remain forever unachievable.

4 Likes
7

You and Santa, the only two left going door to door! :slight_smile:

Serious suggestion: Maybe a (custom) tooltip that shows if someone hovers over a blue-striped action for more than N seconds, with a "don't show again" box?

-rob.

8

My experience with Tooltips is that they don't get updates well, the system seems to cache them, so they can't be dynamic like this.

9

I figured it was something like that ... durn.

-rob.

10

Oh sad, I think I would have understood if there was a Wikipage about it or if it said something blue strip is searched actions instead of just search. The whole bottom stripped below the line and "Searched" and italicized rather than the active word "Search" also would have made it a little more intuitive but between the combination of those two that might help. I am not sure I have ever seen a menu option that is never selectable before.

I remember when you reached out for input on what buttons active would like like if they were highlighted or not highlighed and in the end with the feedback and your input you came up with a great solution that was very clear and highlighed in blue modifiers and crossed out not used mofifiers. Some of the most clear visuals I have seen. Thanks for trying to make things more clear and for me it is noted for me it is not an option. When I forget in a few months I'll be back to ask again :wink:.

1 Like
11

Experience has shown that you can document things until you're blue in the face and it makes little difference.

Part of the problem is that people ask the same question in different ways, so it's difficult to make searchable documentation that works for everyone. But a bigger problem is 95% of people don't read documentation at all, and believe they should never have to...

3 Likes
12

I agree both are very true. I do really try to understand the documentation and this forum is amazing for really understanding things with examples and details. No doubt it is exhausting to forum members that have to state things in the documentation. I can say for sure that the shortcuts and right clicking on each action item straight to the documentation has been such a time saver and absolutely amazing! I certainly would not want to allude that if it is in the documentation no one would ask the question again.