Script that sorts items in selection

Question

I'm trying to write a script that sorts/arranges the items in the selection (no strokes and all using spot colors) by "lightest to darkest". It's part of a larger goal to hopefully automate making separations for screenprinting but I'm stuck on this aspect. I've tried to accomplish this in several ways but the one I think has the most promise is converting each item's fill to grayscale, storing the original fill colors and the new gray values of each item in an array as objects, sorting the array based on gray values, and then making the items then match the new order of the array and returning the items to their original fill color. But I can't seem to make that work. Is there an easier way to accomplish this that I'm just not thinking of? also, is it possible to just assign a number to a zorder of an item rather than lengthy looping SENDBACKWARDS/SENDFORWARDS for the function? Thanks in advance.

m1b · Accepted Answer

Hi @Isaac265865188lnf, I have some functions I have previously written on hand, so I have put together this script quickly to do what I think you want. At the least it will show you a different approach and I think that will be useful.

- Mark

/**
 * Sort the selected items by their darkness value
 * (we use convert to grayscale, but you may want
 * to try other methods, too) and re-order so that
 * the darker items are in front of lighter items.
 * @author m1b
 * @discussion https://community.adobe.com/t5/illustrator-discussions/script-that-sorts-items-in-selection/m-p/14413597
 */
(function () {

    var doc = app.activeDocument,
        items = doc.selection,
        ordered = Array(items.length);

    // calculate the darkness and add to a sortable array
    for (var i = 0; i < items.length; i++) {

        if (undefined != items[i].fillColor)

            ordered[i] = {
                uuid: items[i].uuid,
                value: getGrayScaleValueFor(items[i].fillColor),
            };

    }

    // sort by darkness, descending
    ordered.sort(function (a, b) { return b.value - a.value });

    // make an item to act as a layer reference
    var reference = doc.groupItems.add();
    reference.move(items[0], ElementPlacement.PLACEBEFORE);

    try {

        // move each item to above the reference, in new order
        for (var i = 0, item; i < ordered.length; i++) {
            item = doc.getPageItemFromUuid(ordered[i].uuid);
            item.move(reference, ElementPlacement.PLACEBEFORE);
        }

    }

    catch (error) {
        alert(error);
    }

    finally {
        // clean up
        reference.remove();
    }

})();


/**
 * Returns a grayscale value, given a color breakdown.
 * @author m1b
 * @version 2022-05-23
 * @param {Array<Number>|Color} breakdown - array of color values, eg. [c, m, y, k] or [r, g, b], or a Color, eg. CMYKColor.
 * @returns {Number}
 */
function getGrayScaleValueFor(breakdown) {

    if ('Array' !== breakdown.constructor.name)
        breakdown = getColorBreakdown(breakdown);

    var gray;

    if (breakdown.length === 4)
        gray = app.convertSampleColor(ImageColorSpace.CMYK, breakdown, ImageColorSpace.GrayScale, ColorConvertPurpose.defaultpurpose);

    else if (breakdown.length === 3)
        gray = app.convertSampleColor(ImageColorSpace.RGB, breakdown, ImageColorSpace.GrayScale, ColorConvertPurpose.defaultpurpose);

    return gray;

};


/**
 * Returns an array of color channel values.
 * @author m1b
 * @version 2022-05-23
 * @param {Swatch|Color} col - an Illustrator Swatch or Color.
 * @param {Number} [tintFactor] - a number in range 0..1 (default: 1).
 * @returns {Array<Number>}
 */
function getColorBreakdown(col, tintFactor) {

    tintFactor = tintFactor || 1;

    if (col.hasOwnProperty('color'))
        col = col.color;

    if (col.constructor.name == 'SpotColor')
        col = col.spot.color;

    if (col.constructor.name === 'CMYKColor')
        return [col.cyan * tintFactor, col.magenta * tintFactor, col.yellow * tintFactor, col.black * tintFactor];

    else if (col.constructor.name === 'RGBColor')
        return [col.red * tintFactor, col.green * tintFactor, col.blue * tintFactor];

    else if (col.constructor.name === 'GrayColor')
        return [col.gray * tintFactor];

};

femkeblanco · Answer

Here's a simple snippet that sorts paths horizontally based on the black value of the fill.

var doc  = app.activeDocument;
var paths = doc.pathItems;

var array1 = [];
for (var i = 0; i < paths.length; i++) {
    array1.push(paths[i]);
}

array1.sort(function(a, b) {
    return b.fillColor.spot.color.black - a.fillColor.spot.color.black;
})

bubbleSort(array1);

function bubbleSort(a){
    for (var i = a.length-1; i > 0; i--){
        for (var j = 0; j < i; j++){
            if (a[j].top > a[j+1].top){
                var temp = a[j].top;
                a[j].top = a[j+1].top;
                a[j+1].top = temp;
            }
        }
    }
}

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