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A
Anonymous
March 30, 2016
Question

behavior of conditional actions when action sets with the same name

  • March 30, 2016
  • 1 reply
  • 394 views

My question is all about behavior of conditional actions,
when action sets with the same name exist in the action panel.

Let me explain the picture above.
There are 7 action sets at present.
Only 6th and 7th action sets are important in my question. (Their names are the same)

JustForFun (6th) has only one action, Action 2.
Action 2 selects the entire pixels of the document, and fills the selection with Red.

JustForFun (7th) has three actions, Action 1,Action 2,Action 3.
Action 1 is a conditional action. If there is a selection in the document then GOTO action 2, else GOTO action 3.
Action 2 fills the selection with White.
Action 3 selects the entire pixels of the document, and fill the selection with Black.

Quiz : What if I select a region, and execute Action 1 of JustForFun (7th) ?

Answer : entire pixels of the document is filled with Red.
That is, Action 2 of JustForFun (6th) is executed. (not Action 2 of JustForFun (7th))

The principle of conditional action is :
"Photoshop always directs to the topmost action set of action panel,
if there are action sets with same name."

There 4 imaginable solutions. But none of them I can do at present.

1) A script that does not allow to search action name outside of its action set
(The best, but looks difficult)

2) assign unique identifiers to action sets with same name
(looks hopeful)

3) rename all other action sets and turn back to original name
   (looks easy, but dangerous and unnatural)
  
4) duplicate the action sets with unique name + blahblah
  (looks hopeful)

Can you help me? Thank you.

This topic has been closed for replies.

1 reply

JJMack
Community Expert
JJMackCommunity Expert
Community Expert
March 30, 2016

I see only one problem

There 4 imaginable solutions. But none of them I can do at present.

If you can author ,create, write, Photoshop scripts you do not need to search action set(s) or use any actions you can do what you need to do in the script. Scripts do not have to make an if statement into multiple; script. all the conditions can be handled in the current script.  The way Adobe implemented conditional action step forces you to record more the one action in the same action set.  You can have actions sets with the duplicate set names but you should not. You can cut off you hand but you should not.  There are things you can do but should not do.

JJMack
A
Anonymous
March 30, 2016

Of course, user with common sense will never give pre-existing action set name to an action set.

But suppose that a person is testing hundreds of action sets, downloaded from internet.

Some of them had the same set name, but he did not notice it. Then this is now big problem.

He should check whether there are duplicate action set name. (By his own eyes)

The best story is, from the beginning, photoshop was made to lead any conditional actions to itself(=action set containing the conditional action).

But it isn't. So this is an important problem.

JJMack
Community Expert
JJMackCommunity Expert
Community Expert
March 30, 2016

When you record a conditional action step you play other actions in the same action set the action your are recording is in your not given a choice of action sets names the other actions is in..  There are also things you need to do. You need to copy the other action into the current action set. If something works one way that the way you must do it. There should be no action set that has conditional action steps that all the actions involved in conditional step are not in that action set. Your scenario seems to be to be trumped up  not real the tester would need to delete an action to create your case.   One of the thing I dislike about action the play other actions is you can not rename sets the played action is in without knowing all the action in other sets that play the action for you need to edit the play action step to the renamed action set in all the other actions and cuurrent action set.  You also can not have duplicate set names laoded with different actions in them or actions with sane name that work differently when Action in sets play actions in other sets which one would be played .  But this is life.

JJMack
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