Color Line

[Tabvla]

Question

Is there a way to display Named Colors on the Color Line that are NOT used in the current document?

Problem

I want to use my own pre-defined swatches of Named Colors that have been saved in a .xar document (myswatches.xar) but cannot find a way to display these colors on the Color Line of the current document (newdoc.xar).

My current solution is to load the swatches document (myswatches.xar) into Xara together with the current document (newdoc.xar). The pre-defined swatches are then available through the Color Editor. However, it is painfully tedious and time-consuming to have to constantly go to the Color Editor to select a color. It would be much more convenient if the colors of the pre-defined swatches (myswatches.xar) could be displayed in the Color Line even if they are not being used in the current document (newdoc.xar).

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

T.

[Soquili]

Hi Tabvla,

If you can post a copy of your myswatches.xar file (or email it to me if you would rather not post) bjt49 [at] hotmail.com, I will create a palette with your named colours that can be added to the color line.

It will not be done overnight, most likely my next day off from work which will be next Tuesday.

[angelize]

There a two different ways that I know of.

1. copy and paste your swatches into a new document, and under the utilities menu click options, now click the view tab and at the bottom clear the checkmark from delete unused colours when saving and loading. click ok. Now you can save this document as a template and if you want you can set it as default and it will be opened when you click new document.

2. It is possible to add your custom colours to the colour gallery but it does require another program that is capable of generating .pal files. There is a good one that is available for free from the Xara Xone. It is called Xpal. You need to create a bitmap containing your colours and import that into Xpal. Using Xpal you can save a .pal file containing all your colours. Once you have saved your .pal file you need to copy it into Xara's palettes folder. The path to that folder will be like this C:/program files/Xara/your version of Xtreme/ palettes.

[Tabvla]

Thank you Soquili for your very kind offer to create a palette with the Named Colors.

Thank you also Angelize for your detailed explanation how to create a palette.

As I would like to learn how to do this I will in the first instance follow the instructions provided by Angelize. If, for some reason, I do not succeed in creating the palette then, Soquili, I will take up your kind offer.

I will post back my progress to this Forum.

T.

[Su Lawrence]

Unless I've completely misunderstood (which is possible), can you not just import your myswatches.xar file into your newdoc.xar. If you import one xar into another it should then add all the appropriate named colours to the current colour line whether they are used or not. (It does of course also add objects to the current document - if there are any in the imported xar).

I don't have the latest version of XX so am not sure if this still works this way.

Regards

Su

[angelize]

That's exactly what my first method does, I just went one step further and made a template out of it.

My second method doesn't actually add the colours to the colour line, but makes them available via the colour gallery no matter what template you are using.

[Tabvla]

Thank you Su and Angelize for your suggestions.

Another way to explain this task is that I would like to be able to create my Color Line (or Lines) and to be able to load that Color Line.

Typically the Color Line will contain many colors, some which have been created by the user and some which are default. If the user-created colors are to be used in a number of documents (for example a Project which has numerous drawings but follows a common theme) then it would be convenient to be able to customise the Color Line and save it as a file (e.g. colorline_1.col)

It is easy enough to get colors into the Color Gallery, all that one has to do is simply load the .xar file with the user-defined colors. But using the Color Gallery to select colors is time consuming and inconvenient - the Color Line is much better for color selection.

Importing the .xar file, that contains the the user-defined colors, into the current document is practical but only if the colors remain static. For example, if when working with the current document, the user creates a new color then the user must remember to open the myswatches.xar file and add the new color to that file for future use. The same applies if existing user-defined colors are modified. Each of those edits has to be copied back into the myswatches.xar file.

Neither the Color Gallery, nor the Template, nor the Imported myswatches.xar solutions are really satisfactory. The most effective solution would be if the user was able to create user-defined Color Line(s) and select whichever line they wanted when they opened a document. In that way additions, deletions and edits would be automatically saved to the user-defined Color Line for use in future documents.

Is there a way for users to create their own Color Line? I am sure that the Xara software developers know of a way.... ???

T.

[Soquili]

Tabvla what graphics software to you have?

Several programs can create palette files which can be used by Xtreme. A palette file can be added to the color line.

The attached .zip file contains a .pal file that I created a few years ago. It has some named colours typically used in web pages and print.

The .pal file was created using Corel Draw version 4 (very old now ).

I don't know which version of Xtreme you have, but you can try the file to see how to add a palette to your installed version and to then have it show in the color line.

Close your version of Xtreme.

Download the .zip file. Unzip the Color_Names.pal file to:
C:\Program Files\Xara\your-version\Palettes folder.

Open your version of Xtreme then open the Color Gallery. You should see Color Library Color_Names in the list of available palettes. To add the palette to the color line Right Click the Name of the Palette and click Show in Color Line. It will display every time you open Xtreme regardless of which template you decide to use. To remove the palette from the Color Line, simply open the Color Gallery, right click the palette name click Show in Color Line to remove the check mark.

[Tabvla]

Soquili, thanks for the file. That was the key to understanding how to do this

Taking a look at the file I noted that it was simply a text file - something that could easily be created using nothing more complex than Notepad!! The format of the file seems to be very forgiving in that precise spacing and delimeters are not needed.

To create the Palette file using Notepad you will need to do the following:-

1. Create a name for your color (e.g. My Color One)
2. Note the CMYK values (e.g. 20 30 10 70)
3. Enter this data into the Notepad file in this format

"My Color One" 20 30 10 70
"My Color Two" 40 10 0 20
"My Color Three" 80 40 20 70
"End of File" 0 0 0 0

Because Notepad does not embed an eof (end-of-file) marker at the end of the file you will not be able to read the last record therefore you will need to create the dummy record "End of File" 0 0 0 0. Xtreme will then see the record before this as the last record.

The file then needs to be saved as a PAL file. In Notepad you do this by calling the file a name and then adding .pal - for example : mypalette_1.pal Notepad will then save this ASCII file in the correct format which will be readable by Xtreme.

The names of the colors must be enclosed within quotes e.g. "My Color 1". There must be at least 1 space between the name and between the CMYK values. There can however be more than 1 space. Each color must have 4 values, so even if the value is 0 it must still be included, for example "My Color Blue" 72 24 0 18

Palette colors cannot be created, deleted or edited directly using Xtreme, you will need to do this by opening the Palette file in Notepad and then creating, deleting or editing as required.

Even for an absolute computer novice creating a PAL file this way is a very simple task.

Thanks once again to everyone for their suggestions -

T.