The only thing the Ai Team has completed with this User Voice request is to completely avoid actually executing a feature or functionality that matches the actual User Voice request posted. All you did is rip-off an existing custom script and built it into your app as if it was a unique and innovative feature?

Lazy development and yet another half-baked feature. You had the opportunity to truly do something unique, that no other vector app had, but instead you took the easy way out.

So short sighted. And thanks for ghosting me on the last meeting. That was a cherry on top of the disappointment in what you ended up pushing out.

Von

This feature still feels very incomplete, you posted today as "Completed"

Pantones are still saving as CMYK values, still very impossible to change the font size of the text without damaging the layout of the swatches ( I had to create my own action to save my sanity )

and how come if you only have 1 swatch selected you can create the " swatch info " the only way to make it work is having at 2 colours selected, what if the art only has 1 colour in it.

I updated my illustrator this morning with high hopes and to my surprise the menu still looks the exact same as it did yesterday ( Updated to 29.3.1 )

I really hope more its being done for this feature as it is very useful for my day to day job as a pre-press designer and there is a lot of colour that have to be listed on production proofs and this have been a time saver.

I think sharing this information is great, but I need to print them as well. I'm constantly finding myself having to create swatch chips for the colors I'm using. Being able to automatically label the HEX#, RGB values, CMYK values, LaB values or Spoi Color Name would be the ideal as well.

The feature doesn't work correctly with tints for global colors.

Unfortunately the 'Create Swatch Info' isn't what this UserVoice request was for? The 'Create Swatch Info' functionality is also not unique or innovative, it's derivative of scripts like 'Render Swatch Legend' which has been out for years. And frankly it doesn't look very good.

I want drag-and-drop actual swatches I can tile and compare tonal values, or select an object and click them to fill a color without going to the swatches palette. But I guess that is too hard for your team of engineers to pull off?

BTW 'Create Swatch Info' Is another half-baked feature. It's all vector so why can't we make it what ever size we want? Why is it hidden in an option menu? Why can't we make a keyboard shortcut to it? I digress.

Sad you could have been truly innovative and all you did was replicate what already existed.

This is a great start! I don't know why the size of the rectangle/square is limited. I can't make them smaller than 100 pt, or 1.388 inches? This means I have to zoom out to resize them. I agree with Egor a separate layer may not be necessary, unless this is for a future feature that's being added. Would be great to have control over columns, rows, names, type. If I could have a preset so every time I generate, they fit my specs, that would be super helpful. Thank you!

This is almost good!
Several things to complete:
1. Lab values for spot colors — planned
2. Names for named colors — planned
3. 'Generate Color Info' says more about the legend, but not about having chips on canvas
4. 'Create Swatch Palette' is somewhat better, but since many still call panels as palettes (specifically Swatches) this can be confusing
5. Something in between would be better: Place Swatches Palette (not 'create', since it can refer to the panel)
6. I don’t like the fixed margin for text. I think it should be relative to the font’s size, or the leading. When it’s 12pt for text, it’s OK, but I don’t use points as units, and as in many other places, this default value in point would mean nothing for my layout (as with rearranging artboards, default effects’ settings, etc.). Please don’t ignore Metric world, it’s larger than Imperial.
7. Why not drag-n-drop also, with the last settings used?
8. Hotkey
9. Don’t see a way to create several columns or rows. I see it wraps at ten though — what if I need 5 or 7?
10. Don’t see a way to position captions to the right of the chips for the column view
11. In column view the bottom margin of the text is too little, and text seems to relate the chip below, not above. No, it' should not be solved by manual spacing, the minimal value should not allow this mistake.
12. No gradient and patterns is odd.
13. No hints for options
14. Don’t force the layer. Give a way to use the current one (Same goes for dimensions. Users should have a choice on their document structure. Don't undercut our decisions)
15. Where is Preview? Can we see these generated before we click OK?
Other than these — VERY close! Already usable! It remains just a tiny push for it to be complete! Pleased with it.

Thank you!

Awesome! Look forward to trying it out.

I would like to have something like this (see attachment). I already did it as a script.

It does the following
- getting all "global" swatches used in a selection
- getting all tints used
- calculating the values in different colour systems
- printing each colour swatch including the used tints and colour values, grouped by their parent folder with

@gwintrup, I added you as a voter to the dedicated request about guides 'being more like in InDesign' — http://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/333657/suggestions/37211029

Cool. Did you try my script? That's basically what we need, but in a drag-and-drop fashion.

@Von Glitschka — I also wish they had left the guides alone and not made them show up in the layers panel as an object. It sucks when you copy/paste to a new file and the guides come with the artwork—it totally fouls things up when aligning objects until you remember that it's because the stupid guides are the issue.

It can help to have the swatches on the artboard so you can layer them or pair them up to test contrast. I often leave my swatches in the artboard for future reference as I may return to a client file years later and they act as reminders of how the colors were utilized. A grid in a pallet does not offer the same functionality. It's not simply about selecting colors, but the ability to move and manipulate them. Cutting out the "create shape and apply swatch" step would help streamline that for the people that want it and would have zero impact on people that don't.
Maybe there could be a simple setting in the Swatch pallet for default size and shape when dragging swatches to the artboard. That would allow designers that work on large or small artboards to size them appropriately.

If we need to visualise the swatches in a more legible and organised manner, can't we just create a swatch group and increase the size of the swatch thumbnails?

The team is trying to ascertain the actual need here, drag and drop swatches is just one solution but there can be better solutions.

I don't know what I can say that's not already been said more eloquently, but I'll throw another simple metaphor in the ring.

Say you're a painter. Do you want to open a can of paint each time you need a new color, dip your brush, close it, set it down, get to painting, rinse and repeat? Or would you prefer to have a readily available and highly visible palette?

Not only does it speed up the workflow, but seeing the colors there in a more visible manner can ease the ideation process because you see what tools you have available.

Swatches may appear small and insignificant within the overall Illustrator interface, yet they play a crucial role during project work. It takes me a few seconds to locate the right color or gradient, navigate my mouse to select it, and then return to the artboard. Instead, I create and color a few squares directly on my artboard, each occupying approximately 1/20 of the screen size, and use them as my color pool.

This would be great if I could grab and pull swatches to the artboard at the beginning of the project.

The need: To be able to drag and drop swatches onto the art board in Ai so we can compare hues and judge color values next to one another.

The problem to solve: Swatches are currently stagnant. I more flexible work flow allowing us to use color swatches the way we prefer and make exploration and tonal value comparisons easier would benefit both designers and illustrators.

I don't expect anyone on the Ai team to full comprehend this since you don't have anyone on the team that builds brand identity on a daily basis or works out colors for illustration everyday either etc.

In all reality you own this type of technology already since you bought Macromedia Freehand which allowed users to do this. So in that respect this isn't a new feature.

It's far more useful on a daily basis having this functionality then it is other features you've invested time in: Intertwine which just mocks up a look, but ultimately you still have to manually build it so it's not as useful as it seems. Text-to-Vector is another hot mess that produces unprofessional clip-art quality poorly constructed vector images.

I would suggest have a setting to enable this feature. By default it could be set to off so no noobs won't get confused, but allow pros to go in and check the box to enable it.

I'd want this for laying out palettes for presentations. One way to drag swatches (maybe one or as a group) to the artbaord and have the option to display the color code profile (between hex, cmyk rgb, pantone, or all).