Adding macros to library

[Wilfred Hildonen]

Like Lou Reed sang: I guess I'm dumb, coz I ain't smart.
I have tried to search for a simpistic explanation but didn't find any which made sense to me, so forgive me if this has been explained somewhere. 
I have made a simple macro which I need to run on at least two images which I have imported at the same time. I saved the recorded macro to the desktop as I didn't see any option to add it to the library when I used the Export-function. Now, when I want to use the macro, I need to import it for each of the images, which is a waste of time and ruins the idea of the macro in my opinion. Why can't it remain open as long as I have use for it? Or why can't there be a shortcut? Can I add a shortcut? How? 
Then I wanted to add it to the library by just importing it, but when I use that function, it doesn't recognise the .afmacro-file. It is inactive, greyed out. That doesn't make any sense to me. Not very intuitive. 
So, can anyone smarter than me explain what to do and how to do it? In layman terms? For dummies?

[Alfred]

5 minutes ago, Wilfred Hildonen said:

I saved the recorded macro to the desktop as I didn't see any option to add it to the library when I used the Export-function.

To add a macro the the library, click on the ‘Add to Library’ button near the top right-hand corner of the Macro panel.

8 minutes ago, Wilfred Hildonen said:

Then I wanted to add it to the library by just importing it, but when I use that function, it doesn't recognise the .afmacro-file. It is inactive, greyed out. That doesn't make any sense to me. Not very intuitive.

You can only import *.macros files into the Library. For single *.macro files (no ‘s’ at the end of the filename extension) you need to use the Macros panel. I agree that this is not very intuitive!

[Wilfred Hildonen]

3 minutes ago, Alfred said:

 

You can only import *.macros files into the Library. For single *.macro files (no ‘s’ at the end of the filename extension) you need to use the Macros panel. I agree that this is not very intuitive!

Thank you and besides that they are named *.afmacro, that means that one has to import the single file for each time I want to use it, so if I had a dozen images open which I want to use the same macro on, I need to import it a dozen times, is that so?
It is not only unintuitive, it is stupid in my opinion. It renders the whole idea close to useless. I hope I have misunderstood something.
And what are the *.afmacros-files, in plural?

[carl123]

12 minutes ago, Wilfred Hildonen said:

that means that one has to import the single file for each time I want to use it, so if I had a dozen images open which I want to use the same macro on, I need to import it a dozen times, is that so?

You only need to import it once. Once imported add it to your library as shown in the 2nd post in this thread

Now when you want to run it you open the Library panel and run it from there.

Once in the library it remains there forever so there is never any need to re-import it again

[Wilfred Hildonen]

12 minutes ago, carl123 said:

You only need to import it once. Once imported add it to your library as shown in the 2nd post in this thread

Now when you want to run it you open the Library panel and run it from there.

Once in the library it remains there forever so there is never any need to re-import it again

But as it was explained to me in that post, I can’t import .afmacro-files, only .afmacros-files. And I don’t have that. 

[Alfred]

24 minutes ago, Wilfred Hildonen said:

It is not only unintuitive, it is stupid in my opinion. It renders the whole idea close to useless. I hope I have misunderstood something.

I hope @carl123 has reassured you on that point.

25 minutes ago, Wilfred Hildonen said:

And what are the *.afmacros-files, in plural?

The plural form of the filename extension is used for a collection of macros, even if that ‘collection’ contains only one macro. (The iPad version of APh can’t import single macros, so this distinction is more important than it should be.)

[Trinity]

Have a look at this video by James Ritson

Macros (Affinity Photo) - YouTube

[Alfred]

3 minutes ago, Wilfred Hildonen said:

But as it was explained to me in that post, I can’t import .afmacro-files, only .afmacros-files. And I don’t have that. 

You can’t import *.afmacro files via the Library panel, you have to import them via the Macros panel. But you can copy them to the Library from there.

[R C-R]

6 hours ago, Alfred said:

You can’t import *.afmacro files via the Library panel, you have to import them via the Macros panel. But you can copy them to the Library from there.

Also note that to import a *.afmacro file into the Macros panel, you must have a document open. It doesn't have to be one you have saved or even have any layers, it just needs to be there, so File > New works fine for that.

[Wilfred Hildonen]

On 5/11/2021 at 8:41 PM, R C-R said:

Also note that to import a *.afmacro file into the Macros panel, you must have a document open. It doesn't have to be one you have saved or even have any layers, it just needs to be there, so File > New works fine for that.

Sorry for responding late, but it got busy around here, but I finally found out how to add it to the library. I overlooked that icon - and now I see that @Alfredhad even showed it - and looked for some option in a menu or something. Well, it is there now, but I think this tells of not being a very intiuitive process. The fool proof or the idiot's test 😛
Thank you all!