Suggestion: Paste center versus paste in place

I’d love an option key that pastes to the centre of the screen as opposed to the default paste in place. I notice I’m zooming in and out a lot between collecting copied paths to place in another part of another glyph

1 Like

I like that idea.

So do I. +++

bump - this would still be handy :o)

This is a recurring thought when I’m copying and pasting shapes for comparison or repurposing.

I’ve gotta zoom out, select, drag over, zoom in… time of which could be saved pasting in place of current view. The time wasted stacks up from when I initially posted this two years ago. Happy to learn of any reasonable explanation for the lack of it.

Why not write a script, Move Selection to View Center?

Because it’s an extra step? Computers are supposed to save us time, not add to it.

You’re right, I could - and generally I should probably be more proactive on that front.

That said it feels like a core issue, much like the layer collapse button I recently posted about. The adobe paradigm of paste centre view vs. paste in place is so widely understood (and fundamentally useful) I don’t understand the pushback. It’s literally getting in the way of drawing paths.

All for simplicity / avoiding bloated functionality but I find this a basic and easily solvable problem.

Still happy to hear why not as opposed to a work around.

How would you expect trigger the center-paste command?

Adobe Illustrator for example is CMD+V to paste center viewport, CMD+F to paste in place.

I would suggest flipping that and keeping paste in place as default.

Not au fait with every shortcut but CMD+ALT+V would also make sense.

Extra step? You could use that to move any selection to the center, not just what you just pasted.

But you can script anything. Clipboard handling is a little difficult in PyObjC though. I will be happy to help.

Cmd-Opt-V is already taken.

Incidentally when I say easily solvable problem I’m not suggesting that doesn’t mean work for you guys!

CMD-OPT V is benign in the drawing window… there’s no reference to it in the dropdowns either… seemingly no action taken

OK, I added a script to the mekkablue scripts, find it in App > Paste in View Center. Set a shortcut for Paste in View Center in System Preferences > Keyboard > Shortcuts > App Shortcuts > Glyphs. Unless you never ever use the shortcut for Paste Special, it will have to be a shortcut that is not taken anywhere in the app, I am afraid, try Cmd-Shift-V, Cmd-Ctrl-V, or Cmd-Opt-Shift-V.

2 Likes

Thanks Rainer.

Thanks Rainer — not to drag this on but what’s wrong with using CMD-OPT-V for paste centre in the drawing window focus and the same for paste special in the glyph map view focus? You could argue they’re both a kind of exceptional paste. Not that I’m an expert in software UX…

Thanks again… schöne sontag!

Setting the script shortcut with system preferences will overwrite the shortcut app-wide.

There is probably a solution. You can detect the context from inside the script, and trigger Paste Special when you are in font view. But that is not the job of my script, because it needs to be shortcut agnostic. So, you can do that :slight_smile: for your own spinoff.

1 Like