Rainmeter with Photoshop?

[rainman2012]

Hi everyone, I find Rainmeter to be intriguing... I'm not totally sure how the program works but I've researched it a little and would like to know if anyone has any info on whether or not it might work with Photoshop.

I'll try and keep this simple if possible, lol:


I use keyboard shortcuts in Photoshop.

What I want to do is display my keyboard shortcuts as buttons on my screen, which I can just click to activate the command.

For example:

I have a shortcut which is (SHIFT-F2).

So when I hold down SHIFT and press F2, my keyboard shortcut activates in Photoshop ('paste', for example.)

It would be a lot easier to have a button on my screen which says "PASTE", (and stays/floats always on top of Photoshop) instead of glancing down at the keyboard and simultaneously pressing the two keys.

Photoshop unfortunately is a little limited when it comes to customization like this, and doesn't have a customizable toolbar. Rainmeter might be the program that does it better. Or if not, is there another type of software out there that can achieve this?




Thanks for any and all help..

[UnforgivenRevival]

Hi everyone, I find Rainmeter to be intriguing... I'm not totally sure how the program works but I've researched it a little and would like to know if anyone has any info on whether or not it might work with Photoshop.

I'll try and keep this simple if possible, lol:


I use keyboard shortcuts in Photoshop.

What I want to do is display my keyboard shortcuts as buttons on my screen, which I can just click to activate the command.

For example:

I have a shortcut which is (SHIFT-F2).

So when I hold down SHIFT and press F2, my keyboard shortcut activates in Photoshop ('paste', for example.)

It would be a lot easier to have a button on my screen which says "PASTE", (and stays/floats always on top of Photoshop) instead of glancing down at the keyboard and simultaneously pressing the two keys.

Photoshop unfortunately is a little limited when it comes to customization like this, and doesn't have a customizable toolbar. Rainmeter might be the program that does it better. Or if not, is there another type of software out there that can achieve this?




Thanks for any and all help..

You may want to look into AutoIt and AutoHotKey. You can write basic scripts which are turned into .exe files and can be activated through a Rainmeter button, Sending keystroke commands(Everything but the function key found on laptops) to any program(Running or not).

This is only a dent in their full potential, As AutoIt can simulate mouse movements and clicks also. These are VERY handy programs. I Highly recommend looking at them.

Note: You might also have to include bringing photoshop to the foreground in the script, Or it might not work properly. Clicking the Rainmeter "Button" Will give Rainmeter focus, And in turn try to send the command to Rainmeter instead. Overall, It is fairly easy to set up, Just have to do some minor research on these 2, decide which is best for you(Most likely AutoIt), And read up on their basic script language.

[rainman2012]

thanks for the suggestions

my only problem is that I have zero knowledge of programming, scripts, etc, lol.

I was looking for something with a graphic interface and have come so, so close to finding what I'm looking for but as usual am coming up short.

I have a wacom tablet and the drivers allow for you to right-click the mouse/pen and it brings up a pop-up menu on the screen containing all your keyboard shortcuts which are used in conjunction with photoshop. The menu appears wherever you clicked the mouse button (just like right-clicking on the windows desktop).

The problem with it is that it's not very customizable, it's very limited and a bit tedious to select your shortcuts. (You need to click-click-search-click-click-click etc. to find the shortcut you want. It doesn't bring up a simple, customized menu with your shortcuts ready to access. You have to go into sub-menus and find them, etc.)

I found a few programs that when you right click the mouse, it brings up a small pop up menu with your shortcust ready to use "R, E, SHIFT-F2, etc. Or it allows for little icons instead of text - really cool.) But as usual they aren't quite working perfectly with Photoshop.

I would definitely go for Autoit or Autohotkey but I looked at them and am completely lost lol. Like I said I can't program worth anything.

Thanks for the help though- I'll keep looking.

[eclectic-tech]

You might want to try NIRCMD, it is a small utility that can do many things, but one very nice command is SENDKEYPRESS which can be used to imitate any keyboard key combinations.

If you copy nircmd.exe to your path (preferably the Windows folder), you can use the command below to simulate "Alt+F2" key press.

LeftMouseUpAction=["NirCmd.exe" sendkeypress alt+F2]

The included help file explains the proper key codes. I found this much easier to use and understand versus AutoIt (which is great for scripts and more involved operations)...

[moshi]

for what you have in mind, the WindowMessage plugin would be ideal: http://docs.rainmeter.net/manual-beta/plugins/windowmessage

it is very unlikely anybody here knows the messages you have to pass to Photoshop. if you want to do that, it is up to you to do the research. there is a tool called Winspector that might help you to find the messages.

[rainman2012]

thanks alot guys.

I think I've pretty well found something that's exactly what I need. Apologies if this is becoming a Photoshop discussion instead... but for those interested in creating os-screen visual buttons for every single photoshop keyboard shortcut there is, then a program called 'PowerPro' seems to do the trick. Huge, huge learning curve ...but huge, huge customability. (is that even a word lol.) Not even for Photoshop alone, but pretty well any program that uses keyboard shortcuts.

Rainmeter is still intriguing and I've been playing with it for days... seems like there's some nice gadgets to be used here.