Single click - displays The Built In Color Samples
Shift click - to display all palette colors
Cursor on color sample swatch…
Double click - for color picker
Shift click - for more color information
In any mode...
Space key - starts full screen color sampling
Shift Space key - multiple color sampling
Note: Space key also Cancels sampling mode
• Help
This Help features HyperText. Underlined text is considered a HyperText phrase, or link, and clicking on it will present you with information pertaining to that HyperText phrase.
Important…
Shift Space Bar puts you into the multiple sampling mode (also Sample Multiple Colors in the Edit Menu). The ONLY way to get out of this mode is to hit the space bar!
Using This Help Window
Clicking on any part of the ColorKeeper window pictured on the left will display detailed help for that item. The cursor will turn into a hand if you are over a clickable item.
I recommend you read everything because this utility is so feature rich. You will be pleasantly surprised at what you can do with it.
You can select from a Topics list. In the General Preferences you can set Help so the Topics appear first instead of this section.
Help can be activated by clicking on the small Help icon in the ColorKeeper window, or, from selecting ColorKeeper Help… under the Apple menu.
• The Close Box
Clicking here will close the ColorKeeper window.
If you are working with a New unsaved window or if you have made any changes to the current file you will be asked if you want to Save the current file.
• The Title Bar
Clicking and holding the mouse button down will allow you to drag the window to any location on your screen.
When you Quit ColorKeeper the last location of the window is "Remembered" in the preferences file so the window will appear in the same place when it is restarted.
Note: The main window and the iconized window have independent positioning and their locations are each stored separately.
• The Iconize Box
Clicking on the Iconize box toggles the window from it's normal size to a smaller, yet still functional size... or back again.
The Iconized window is a much smaller footprint with only the Sample area and Tags Menu showing. This makes it easy to use the sampling and tags.
Note: You can sample any color on your screen by pressing the space bar, moving the Eyedropper over the color to sample, and clicking the mouse button.
The position of the Iconized window is kept independently of the main window.
If you close ColorKeeper in the Iconized mode it will reappear in the Iconized mode when you restart it.
To store any colors you will have to click on the Iconize box to the full window so a palette will be available.
• Sampling Colors
The eyedropper tool allows you to sample colors and there are three sampling modes in which the eyedropper tool becomes available.
Sampling a single color
You can sample a single color anywhere on your screen when you press the Space Bar. This will cause the cursor to turn into a small eyedropper. As you move the eyedropper onto any part of your screen you will see the color beneath it appear in the sample swatch of the ColorKeeper window. Clicking the mouse will store that color in the sample swatch. You can then drag the sample onto any cell in The Color Palettes.
Sampling multiple colors
You can sample multiple colors anywhere on your screen when you press the Shift Space Bar. As in single color sampling you can move the eyedropper cursor around on your screen and click the mouse to collect any colors you want. Colors are stored in the first available empty (white) cell of the frontmost color palette. No more colors can be collected when that palette becomes full.
Important - you cancel multiple color selection by hitting the space bar again. If you do not know this you will be "stuck" in the multiple collection mode!
Sampling colors from a palette
You can quickly sample a color from the frontmost color palette by holding down the appropriate modifier key (Command Key is the default - see Keys Preferences) while the cursor is over the palette. The eyedropper will appear and you can sample any of the cells.
Why would you want to do this when you already have that color on your palette? Simple, you may want to copy it to the sample area so you can change it with The Color Picker and create a new color.
• Storing Colors
Holding down the appropriate modifier key (Option Key is the default - see Keys Preferences) while the cursor is over a palette will turn the cursor into a small paint bucket. When you place this tool over any cell in the palette and click the mouse you will paste the sample color into that cell.
If you have the "Ignore Duplicate Colors" option selected in the Clipboard Preferences and you try to paste a color that already exists on the palette it will not paste.
If you have the "Warn if replacing a Named Color" option selected in the Clipboard Preferences and you try to paste a color onto a cell that has a Named Color it will warn you that you are about to change a Named Color. If you proceed with the paste then the color will be changed but the name will remain.
For more information see About Named Colors.
As soon as you release the modifier key or move the cursor outside the boundaries of the palette the cursor will revert to the standard arrow cursor.
Dragging the sample to a palette
You can also drag the sample color onto any cell of the palette without using the paint bucket. Simply click the mouse on the sample color, hold it, and drag it onto the palette. Once you are over the cell you want to paste the color into simply release the mouse.
All the same rules and warnings apply as if you were using the bucket tool to paste a color.
• Getting Rid of Colors
Holding down the appropriate modifier key (Control Key is the default - see Keys Preferences) while the cursor is over a palette will turn the cursor into a small scissors. When you place this tool over any cell in the palette and click the mouse you will Cut the color from the palette. So long as you are holding down the modifier key you can snip away.
As soon as you release the modifier key or move the cursor outside the boundaries of the palette the cursor will revert to the standard arrow cursor.
Dragging colors to the trash
Another way to clear a color (return it to white), including the sample color, is to drag it into the small Trash Can in the custom menu bar of the ColorKeeper Window.
If you have the "Trash Warnings" option selected in the Clipboard Preferences you will be warned you are about to destroy a color.
If the "Trash Warnings" option is not selected the action is immediate and you cannot undo it.
Clearing all the colors at once
Another way to get rid of colors is to clear the whole palette using the Clear Palette… selection of the Palettes Menu. You will always be warned that you are about to clear all the colors and you may proceed or cancel.
In all cases
If you have the "Warn if replacing a Named Color" option selected in the Clipboard Preferences and you try to cut, drag to the trash, or clear all colors from a palette that has any Named Colors you will be warned that you are about to destroy Named Colors.
• The Color Sample
The Color Sample Square displays whatever color was under the eyedropper tool when you clicked the mouse.
You can double click the Color Sample Square to bring up the Macintosh Color Picker where you can adjust the color to your liking.
Once a color is in the sample square you can put your cursor over it, click, hold the mouse, and drag the sample onto a palette for pasting.
If you have the "Ignore Duplicate Colors" option selected in the Clipboard Preferences and you try to drag the sample onto a color that already exists on the palette it will not paste.
If you have the "Warn if replacing a Named Color" option selected in the Clipboard Preferences and you try to drag the sample onto a cell that has a Named Color it will warn you that you are about to change a Named Color. If you proceed with the paste then the color will be changed but the name will remain.
For more information see About Named Colors.
Note: Whenever you close ColorKeeper and save your file, whatever is in the Color Sample Square is saved as well and will reappear in the Color Sample Square when you open that file again.
Getting more information
The cursor will turn white if you hold down the Shift Key while it is over the sample square. Clicking the mouse will bring up more information about that color, including the RGB values.
Note: You can do the same thing with any color on the palette as well.
• The Hex Display
Just below the color sample square is the hex value of the color. This value is often used in HTML documents to specify link colors, a body background color, font color, or table element background color.
This information is automatically inserted into your Tags in the Tags Menu. You have the option of copying the simple hex value, one of eight tags with the color inserted, or a PICTure of the color sample itself into the clipboard.
The text can then be pasted into your HTML document, or, with the color square PICTure copied, you can paste it into any graphics program, like PhotoShop, to match and use within that application.
You can set your Clipboard Preferences to automatically copy your choice of results into the clipboard upon sampling or leave the clipboard untouched until you manually copy a selection from the The Edit Menu or the The Tags Menu.
• About Named Colors
You may have gone to a lot of trouble to create colors you use in special circumstances. For instance, you might create a unique shade of teal for some graphics on a particular web site. You can easily relocate that color by giving it a name by which you can later search.
You may have called the color "MartinTeam Teal" and using the Find Named Color… selection of the Edit Menu you can quickly locate it again.
These are called Named Colors.
To name a color simply double click on any color of a palette and you will be presented with a small dialog window in which to name your color. A sample of the color will also be displayed just to make sure you selected the right color.
Type in your name, limited to 31 characters, and click the OK button. Your color is now named.
There are other reasons to use Named Colors.
Named Colors are, to some degree, protected. If you have the "Warn if replacing a Named Color" option selected in the Clipboard Preferences then you will be warned any time you attempt to alter a Named Color.
If you decide to Clear All Colors from a palette and you are warned that it contains Named Colors you can select Remove Unnamed Colors from the Palette Menu. Then you can see which colors were named and decide what you want to do with them.
• The Color Palettes
There are four palettes which can be selected from the Palettes Menu. You can change the names of these palettes to your liking in the Palettes Preferences. Whatever names you choose are saved as defaults for any new documents. They are also saved with the document so you could have different palette names for different documents.
Any time you select a new palette the name of that palette is displayed just beneath the palette.
You can cycle through the palettes with the left and right arrow keys on your keyboard.
Each palette is an 8 x 7 grid of cells. These cells can hold any color you paste into them.
To view the entire contents of a palette, that is, all the colors listed with their hex values, simply hold down the Shift Key and click on the rainbow icon in the lower left corner of the ColorKeeper window.
Managing your colors
If you have collected colors without the "Ignore Duplicate Colors" option selected in the Clipboard Preferences you may have duplicate colors on the palette. You can get rid of all duplicate colors on the frontmost palette by selecting Remove Duplicates in the Palettes Menu.
You can compact a palette so there are no empty cells between colors by selecting Compact Palette… from the Palettes Menu. You will be asked if you want to compact the palette and you may proceed or cancel.
Dragging things around
You can click, hold the mouse button, and drag color cells around on the palette. If you drag a color cell to the trash can you can delete it. If you drag a color onto a cell that is occupied with another color you will exchange their positions. If you drag a color onto an empty cell you will move it.
In all cases of dragging colors around on a palette the names of any Named Colors are also moved.
You can also drag a color cell onto the sample square. This will not move the cell but only make a copy of the color in the sample square.
Getting more information
The cursor will turn white if you hold down the Shift Key while it is over any color cell. Clicking the mouse will bring up more information about that color, including the RGB values.
• The Apple Menu
About ColorKeeper - gives you the ColorKeeper splash screen with options for Help and Credits
ColorKeeper Help - get access to Help
How To Register - brings up a dialog on the ways to register when you are ready. Registering removes this from the menu.
• The File Menu
New - Create new empty ColorKeeper Documents
Open - Open any existing ColorKeeper File
Save - Save the current file (enabled only if changes were made)
Save As - Save current file under a different name
Revert - Revert the current file to the last saved version
Preferences - Allows you change your preferences
Register - only exists if you have not registered so you can easily access the registration dialog.
Quit - Quit ColorKeeper. You will be asked to save the current file if any changes have been made to it.
• The Edit Menu
Undo - is not available but for technical reasons it appears in the menu.
Copy Picture - This will copy into the clipboard the color Sample rectangle so you can paste it into a graphics program (such as Photoshop) for sampling.
Copy Color Text - This will simply copy the TEXT, or Hex (FFFFFF) representation of the color Sample into the clipboard for pasting into the document you are working on (HTML).
Paste - is not available but for technical reasons and for uniformity it appears in the menu. see Storing Colors for more details about pasting.
Find Named Colors - allows you to search for any Named Color.
Sample Color - sets the cursor to an eyedropper and allows you to select any color on your screen which is placed into the sample square.
Note: Hitting the Space Bar once is also the same as selecting Sample Color from the menu but once you are in the sampling mode you can cancel it by hitting the space bar again.
Sample Multiple Colors - puts you in the continuous sampling mode and as you click the mouse the selected colors are automatically put into the frontmost palette until it is full.
IMPORTANT - once in the multiple sampling mode the ONLY way to get out of it is to hit the Space Bar.
Color Picker - selects the standard Macintosh color picker so you can create any color you like. Selecting the Color Picker always starts you with whatever color is in the sample window.
• The Tags Menu
This is one of the features that is at the heart of ColorKeeper. The Tags Menu allows you to select any one of the following and move it into the clipboard...
Copy the TEXT value (hexadecimal) of the current color sample.
Copy the TEXT of one of eight user definable HTML tags with the color value imbedded in the tag.
Copy the PICTure of The Color Sample Square.
You can then go to the editor you use to create your HTML documents and paste the TEXT, or, go to your graphics program and paste the color sample.
The eight tags can be defined by you in the Tags Preferences.
The Tags Menu also allows you to select Edit Tags... which will take you directly the Tags Preferences where you can edit your tags.
• The Palette Menu
The first four items in the Palette Menu allow you to select a color palette by names you can define. See Palette Names below for more details.
Clear Palette - Will remove ALL colors from the current folder. This cannot be undone! If you do not do a Save you have the option to Revert your file.
Compact Palette - This allows you to compress the palette so all the colors are in contiguous rows starting at the topleft of the palette.
Remove Duplicates - This will remove any duplicate colors from your palette. If any of the duplicates are Named Colors then the remaining color, the original, will contain the name of the last Named example of the color that was removed.
Remove Unnamed Colors - This will remove all colors from the frontmost palette that do not have names. All that will remain are Named Colors if any existed.
Edit Palette Names - Takes you directly to the Palettes Preferences where you can change the names of palettes to suit your needs.
Note: The left and right arrow keys allow you to cycle through the palettes.
• Palette Names
There is more than a passing reason to customize the names of your palettes... you may want to name your palettes with meaningful names that pertain to a particular file.
Suppose, for example, you are working on a website project. One palette may contain colors you used in graphics for that site. Another may be used for backgrounds and another for font colors. The last one may be a set of standard colors you like to use on many of your projects.
So, your menu might look like this...
Graphics
Backgrounds
Fonts
Standards
Other situations may dictate different names. For instance, you may keep all the colors you used for a particular project in a single palette and your palette names might look like this...
The Standing Company
The Cat's Meow
Martin's Shoes
Standards
• The Trash Can
The Trash Can is the small trash can icon in the custom menu bar on the ColorKeeper window just to the left of the Help icon.
You can drag the sample or any color from a palette to the trash can for disposal. In the Clipboard Preferences you can set the option to have Trash Warnings or not. If it is selected you will be warned any time you try to use the trash can to eliminate a color. You will have the option to proceed or Cancel.
If you attempt to drag a Named Color into the trash can and you have the "Warn if replacing a Named color" option checked in the Clipboard Preferences you will be warned that you are about to destroy a Named Color with the option to proceed or Cancel.
• The Built In Color Samples
Clicking on this small icon and holding the mouse button down will turn the cursor into an Eyedropper and display a palette of colors. You can run the Eyedropper Tool over this palette to capture any of it's colors into The Color Sample.
This palette is intended to provide you some basic colors that you can sample and then alter with the Macintosh Color Wheel to suit your needs.
See The Color Sample Palette
As you move the Eyedropper Tool you will observe the sample color change to reflect the position of the Eyedropper Tool. Clicking the mouse will store the selected sample onto The Color Sample square.
• General Preferences
Always Open checkbox when selected will always open the ColorKeeper document selected in the file selection button right below it.
Begin Help Window With Topics - will start the help screen display with the topics instead of the Help topic, which simply explains how to use Help.
Display Splash Screen - will display the very colorful splash screen whenever ColorKeeper starts up. The splash screen will show how many days are remaining in the demo mode.
Expert Mode - when faced with a dialog window to do something potentially destructive, like clearing all colors off a palette, the normal default button should be "Cancel" so if you click the mouse button or hit the Return key by mistake nothing bad will happen. this is the default mode for ColorKeeper.
Selecting the Expert Mode reverses these buttons so the immediate default is the action button instead of the Cancel button.
• Tags Preferences
The tags preferences simply allows you to edit the tags to suit your own tastes.
You are certainly not restricted to the types of tags I have included. Sometimes I know I want a whole font tag with a color specification. It is easier to grab the entire tag than to paste in the color portion.
When you create tags remember this important detail…
Put an asterisk (*) where you want the color to be inserted. If the sample color is a dark blue and it's hex value is "0000FF" then if I have a tag that looks like this:
color = *
it will appear in my tags menu as:
color = 0000FF
…and that is how it will be copied into the clipboard and pasted into my HTML document.
• Clipboard Preferences
Ignore Duplicate Colors - will not allow you to sample any color that already exists in the frontmost palette.
Warn if replacing a Named color - will warn you if you try to copy over, delete, trash, or otherwise change any Named Color. See About Named Colors for more information.
Automatically Copy to Clipboard - will put the text or picture contents of the sampled color into the clipboard any time a new color sample is collected. Leaving this unchecked requires that you manually copy the selection to the clipboard with the Edit Menu.
Note: It may be advisable to leave this unchecked since it will give you more control and you are less likely to overwrite something of value you may have in the clipboard.
Trash Warnings - simply warn you if you try to drag a color to the little trash can in the ColorKeeper window menu bar. You probably want this turned off.
• Palettes Preferences
Palette Preferences allow you to change the names of the palettes as they appear in the Palettes Menu. These names become the default names for any future documents.
The names can be changed between documents because they are saved with the document as well as in preferences.
• Keys Preferences
Keys Preferences allow you to set which modifier keys (control, option, and command) you want to for the color editing tools while the cursor is over a palette.
• ColorKeeper Documents
ColorKeeper allows you to save small swatches of color in four different color palettes.
Each folder holds 56 colors for a total of 224 colors. When you Save your ColorKeeper Document you save all those colors, the Sample color, your custom tags, and your folder names.
When you open a ColorKeeper Document everything in that document is restored to the ColorKeeper window.
• Making ColorKeeper
ColorKeeper is the first in a series of shareware products collectively called WebFlock. I was going to name this series something like WebSuite but the name "Suite" seemed to be all over the place, so... I looked up synonyms for "suite" and found "Flock", as in a "Flock" of birds.
Flying toasters came to mind!
I wanted to produce a group of sophisticated, well designed utilities to assist in the creation of HTML documents (World Wide Web pages). More importantly, I wanted them to be affordable for everyone so I am only charging $15 for each of them. There are several utilities On The Drawing Board.
I started with ColorKeeper because I found myself loading Photoshop to store colors on the Photoshop "swatches" palette. I was using ColorFinder, by Wayne Walrath to sample colors and determine their hex codes for my HTML documents. The whole thing was driving me crazy.
I really wanted a simple way to translate a color to an HTML tag. Furthermore, I wanted to be able to take a sample of color into Photoshop so I could use it in my graphics (Photoshop will not allow you to sample a color outside it's own windows).
ColorKeeper solves all those problems and will allow me to save my color "sets" by project.
ColorKeeper took a lot of concentrated work to produce. All the graphics were designed in PhotoShop and the code was written in Metrowerks CodeWarrior Pascal.
• On The Drawing Board
WebFlock consists of a group of utilities designed to make life easier for the website designer.
ColorKeeper represents the first of these utilities. The next project is TableMaker.
TableMaker will be as elegant and sophisticated as ColorKeeper. It is a WYSIWYG table layout tool that will allow you to easily construct tables by dragging table data elements <TD>s onto a window, positioning them, sizing them, and even specifying colors and contents. Nested tables are included. It will then generate all the HTML code for that table.
TagMaker will allow you to create and organize any HTML tags you want on a convenient drag and drop palette. You can specify case, font, size, color, and style for each tag. It will imbed colors from ColorKeeper. Using most common text editors, you will be able to insert tags into your HTML document by drag & drop, menu, or mouseclick. You will also be able to replace selected text.
WebCheck will help you optimize your website for commercial success. It is a record keeping log for registering with Search Engines on the internet and it includes optimization information for each of the major search engines. It also includes the top search engine secrets being marketed by some for as much as $100. The database will be updated monthly and you can download it from our site:
www.address4success.com
ImageMaker will integrate ColorKeeper and TagMaker and produce custom image tags for graphics allowing you a great deal of flexibility to define them. ImageMaker will provide image management and "click to insert" library capabilities.
MapMaker will correctly create clientside and server side image maps with a pleasant and easy to use interface.
• Shareware
Shareware, for those of you who are new to this, is software laboriously slaved over by independent programmers and developers.
The idea is simple… you try it… you like it… you pay for it.
You Make It Work!
For good shareware the advantages to you are many…
- It is affordable
- You get immediate access to it
- Your suggestions are valued
- Bug fixes are more immediate
- You are supported by notification
- Competition & demand improve the product
There are advantages for the author as well…
- It is easy to distribute
- The author is immediately paid
- There are no middle men to pay
All this can mean you will have access to high quality products that, in all likelihood, would never reach the marketplace. The best part is low pricing.
Support shareware as much as you can and it will support you.
• Registration
ColorKeeper is feature rich and affordable at $15, but make no mistake… Your $15 counts very much. If you like ColorKeeper please register. There are four easy ways to register…
Online with most major credit cards:
www.address4success.com/colorkeeper
Email - colorkeeper@address4success.com with your name, credit card type, date of expiration, and name of card holder.
Fill out the order form that came in the ColorKeeper shareware folder and FAX or snail mail it with your payment. Make checks payable to:
Gilbert & Gray Associates
Call us (toll free) at 1-888-686-4040
Our Address is:
Gilbert & Gray Associates
2892 A West Long Circle
Littleton, CO 80120
Colorado residents please add 72 cents for state sales tax.
All Orders Are processed within 24 hours
• About The Author
Hi, I'm Stan.
I keep getting asked about my background so here are some basics…
In the mid 80's I worked for Apple Computer as a Senior Software Engineer. I left in 1986 to form Shared Intelligence, a successful consulting firm in the San Francisco Bay Area. I've worked with many international clients where I was responsible for the specification and development of a variety of Macintosh related projects.
Among my products was ToolKit™ for HyperCard which won awards and high reviews (4 1/2 mice in MacUser). It was also used to create experiments on the Space Shuttle.
I now live in Colorado. I enjoy flying, SCUBA diving, travel, meditating, hot tubs, nature, hiking, and yes, dare I say it… technology.
I'd enjoy hearing from you.
stan@address4success.com
• Wayne Walrath
By the way
I really want to publicly thank Wayne (the author of ColorFinder) for sharing his source code with me. Philosophically, I do not believe there are profits in secrets and I always appreciate it when programmers share their source code. It is how we learn.
If you are a Registered User then you are welcome to visit the WebFlock Website and download the source code for ColorKeeper.
• WebFlock Website
Please explore the WebFlock Website at:
www.address4success/webflock
to keep informed on updates and releases. There are even ColorKeeper files for downloading.
If you are a registered user of ColorKeeper then you can also download the source code. Be sure to read the download agreement first!
