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install .jsx script in Photoshop 2022 (23.3.2)

Forum|Forum|3 years ago
May 15, 2022
5 replies
27362 views

What is the correct way to install scripts in Photoshop 2022? I have a couple of .jsx scripts that I'd like use from File > Scripts > ... without having to Browse... for them.

In earlier versions on a Mac, you evidently installed them by copying them here (this path is for 2022, obviously):

/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop 2022/Presets

However, in 2022, the Presets folder contains only empty directories. Even Actions is empty, even though I installed a number of them using Load Actions... in the Actions panel in Ps. In 2022, there is no Presets/Scripts/ directory, and even if I make one and put the scripts there, Ps doesn't find them.

The directory /Applications/Adobe Photoshop 2022/Presets/Scripts exists. If I copy the scripts there and restart Ps, it finds them. However, that directory is write-protected. I have to override the protections to install them there, not something I would expect Adobe would want me to make me do.

What is the right way to install them?

Thanks,

Rob

Correct answer willcampbell7

My favorite way is to make an Action. No need to touch any local folders because I keep all my scripts on a server to share among users, even share between macOS and Windows. Watch this tutorial video. Method #3 is using an Action.

https://youtu.be/b_kCiXFTNGk

Or read about how it works here:

https://www.marspremedia.com/software/how-to-adobe-cc

C

CMSutton

Participant

Copy the jsx to your desktop and open it with text edit. Make your changes to the and when you save the file, uncheck the box that says "if no extension is provided, use ".txt".", make sure it is named exactly the same as the original jsx you duplicated (text edit often adds the word "copy" so remove that), and make sure the plain text encoding is set to Unicode (UTF-8) - with those two things correct, delete the .txt from the filename and replace with .jsx. Save it. Now navigate to the Photoshop Scripts folder and drag your new jsx into the folder. An overwrite warning will pop up and choose to replace the existing file with the new one you created. You'll have to enter your password to do so. Once done, open photoshop and test it out.

It is a smart idea to save an original copy of the source script somewhere else on your computer just in case. If you have to replace your new one with the original, drag and drop into the folder to replace your edited version. I've never had any issues though and just edited the export layers to files.jsx to get rid of the annoying sequence prefix. Worked perfectly. You might have to update the jsx you modified when new versions are installed. Hope this helps.

willcampbell7Correct answer

Legend

My favorite way is to make an Action. No need to touch any local folders because I keep all my scripts on a server to share among users, even share between macOS and Windows. Watch this tutorial video. Method #3 is using an Action.

https://youtu.be/b_kCiXFTNGk

Or read about how it works here:

https://www.marspremedia.com/software/how-to-adobe-cc

William Campbell

Kukurykus

Legend

The problem with 3rd method is you must create one action per script, while an alias you use for folder with all scripts (located outside of Presets/Scripts location), unless user will change his mind shortly 🙂

RobM_LosAltosAuthor

Participating Frequently

Thanks for the ideas, folks!

Re using an action as a wrapper to run a script, it’s a plus for me that
the particular script I want will appear in the actions panel, instead of
in the File menu. The script acts on loaded layers (from files in
Lightroom loaded as Ps layers), so it feels like other actions.

The minus, having to write an action for each script, isn’t important to me
unless I get interested in a lot of scripts. But dropping new scripts into
a symlinked folder certainly makes installing and uninstalling easy! You
don’t have to remember to delete the wrapper action to uninstall.

R

RobM_LosAltosAuthor

Participating Frequently

Kukurykus --

I like the idea of using a symbolic link to an unprotected place. In Mac
OS, it doesn't look like an alias and a symlink are the same thing, but I
can experiment to see what works. A symlink is pretty much a sure thing,
unless the code goes to the trouble to figure out it isn't actually a
directory. For now, I gave up and installed the scripts directly
in /Applications/Adobe Photoshop 2022/Presets/Scripts, as I described in my
original post.

Steven --

I had a typo in the path that used to work for old enough Photoshop:

~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop 2022/Presets

a.k.a.

/Users//Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop
2022/Presets

That's where I found the empty Presets folders, apparently created by the
Ps 2022 installer, but that don't work, at least for scripts.

Rob

Kukurykus

Legend

Alternatively you may create shortcut to non protected folder: How can I change the photoshop plugin path ?

Stephen Marsh

Community Expert

Scripts are installed in the /Presets/Scripts folder

Mac OS Example:

/Applications⁩/Adobe Photoshop CC 2019⁩/Presets⁩/Scripts
/Applications/Adobe Photoshop 2021/Presets/Scripts

(If this path does not match your version, it should be a simple enough process to find the correct folder using this guide)

Win OS Example:

C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CC 2018\Presets\Scripts
C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop 2021\Presets\Scripts

(If this path does not match your version, it should be a simple enough process to find the correct folder using this guide)

More here:

https://prepression.blogspot.com/2017/11/downloading-and-installing-adobe-scripts.html

RobM_LosAltosAuthor

Participating Frequently

Hi, Steven --

Yes, as I mentioned, that works. What I found unlikely is that Adobe wants
me to override the read-only protection on that directory to install
scripts. I expected to find some way to import the script that didn't
require superuser permissions.

You're saying that no such method exists for 2022, right?

Tx,

Rob

RobM_LosAltosAuthor

Participating Frequently

There is no "fatal flaw." The permissions on /Applications require Administrator access. Its how things work.

Lumigraphics --

I never said "fatal flaw". However, with admin privileges, you can mess up most anything on your computer if you make a mistake, so it suprised me that Lr no longer supports the user-specific Presets folder that it used to.

Geek warning: stop here if you're just interested in easy script installation.

Yes, /Applications itself requires admin permissions:

% ls -ld /Applications/
drwxrwxr-x 59 root admin 1888 May 19 13:30 /Applications/

However, there's nothing to say that a subdirectory under it has to have admin permissions. For example, when TI installed some MCU software, they chose to install it so that I owned it:

% ls -ld /Applications/ti
drwxr-xr-x 5 rob admin 160 Feb 24 15:43 /Applications/ti

So while I can't write in /Applications without admin permissions, I can write in /Applications/ti with only my user permissions.

That said, do I think TI made a great choice? No. It's best if only developers modifiy their own packages in /Applications, for maximal flexibility. Installing scripts outside of /Applications is better, and Lr used to support it.

End geek warning

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