Act on what you're looking at

Select some text, or point at a file, a link or a Mail message, and press ⌃⌥Space. Actions for This opens over a card for what it found, with the macros that know what to do with it:

1. The macros that take that kind of thing, the ones you used most for it first.

2. Open, when the type knows where to go: a link, an email address, a tracking number's carrier page, a ticket's page.

3. The macros that take anything.

4. Copy, Search the web, and Make a macro for this kind of thing…

If what you selected is several things ("Call 555-1234 about ABC-12" is a phone number and a ticket), a row of chips under the card lets you switch between them: ⇥ steps through, ⌃1 to ⌃9 jump. Type to filter the actions.

You do not have to learn a second hotkey: hold the palette key (⌥Space) instead of tapping it and the same card opens, with ⌫ on the empty field to drop back to the plain palette. See Keyboard shortcuts ("Tap to search, hold to act"). Turn it off, or change the hold time, in Settings.

Where it looks #

In this order, and the first place with something wins:

1. The text selected in the front app. Switchboard asks Accessibility first. Only when the app doesn't say (Electron apps, some web views), it copies with ⌘C, reads, and puts every part of your clipboard back within a fraction of a second. Clipboard history and the clipboard trigger ignore that copy, and it never happens in a password field.

2. The Finder selection, when Finder is in front.

3. The front browser tab, when nothing is selected.

4. The selected Mail message, when Mail is in front.

5. The element under the pointer.

6. The clipboard, but only when you add ⇧ to the hotkey (⌃⌥⇧Space). It is never a silent fallback.

It gives up after about half a second and opens with what it has. With nothing found, it says "Nothing to act on. Select text, a file or a link first."

Write an action #

An action is a macro whose first input is a thing. Add an input of type Thing and pick what it takes: a link, an email address, a tracking number, anything, or a type of your own. The macro then appears in Actions for This, the clipboard panel's ⌘K, Paste as and the selection bar, unless you untick a place under Shows in.

Inside the macro:

• {{thing}} is the value, {{thing.type}} its type, {{thing.label}} a short name, {{thing.source}} where it was found, and {{thing.<field>}} the extra facts for the type: {{thing.host}} of a link, {{thing.carrier}} of a tracking number.

• A macro that ends with a Return step of the same kind of value is a transform: Actions for This puts the result on the clipboard and says so. Anything else is an action that just runs.

• A macro started some other way (a hotkey of its own) gets the same facts with the Get the current thing step, and the Current thing is condition checks the type.

Choose Make a macro for this kind of thing… to start Make with AI with the input already set.

Teach it a type #

Open Library ▸ Thing Types and add a type: a name, a type word such as jira, and a pattern.

In the link, $0 is the match, $1 the first group and ${name} a named group ((?<project>[A-Z]+)). Named groups also become {{thing.project}}. A type with a link gets an Open action with no macro. Try it shows what any text turns into as you type. Limit a type to some apps with their bundle ids.

Extensions can add types the same way with the recognizers point of their manifest.

On the iPhone #

Share text or a link to Switchboard from any app. It recognizes the same types (yours come over with the library) and lists your Mac's actions for it; tapping one asks your Mac to run it. Only macros that take a thing and show in Actions for This are listed.

See Thing types for every built-in type and the fields it carries.