# General background

Every macro command has:

- keyboard shortcut used to execute the recorded sequence;
- additional parameter set affecting the way and specifying the conditions under which the execution will take place.

ATTENTION!

- Please, keep in mind that macro commands are divided by areas of execution, i.e. context of the FAR application from which the macro command is going to be executed.

Macros can contain the special commands, providing some service functions and operators including conditional and iterative sequence execution etc.

### Please note:

- FAR ignores macros that have error in the macro name or sequence parameter "Sequence".
- Macro commands are not case sensitive.
- During startup FAR Manager loads all macro commands defined in the macro command storage in the registry. Any macro sequence recorded is going to be put into the registry immediately (if macro command autosave option is on).
- Macro command is considered to be inactive if its name begins with '~' character.
- FAR Manager translates mouse wheel events into the pseudo keystrokes:
  - scroll the wheel up - "MsWheelUp"
  - scroll thw wheel down - "MsWheelDown"
  You can use these pseudo keys with Ctrl, Shift and Alt modifier keys.
- If you trying to enter a character using Alt-number combination FAR saves the combination, not the resulting character.
  For instance, Alt-151 will be saved by FAR as "Alt00151".
- Special keys that have a virtual code other than 0xFF, but names of which are not known to FAR, will be stored as "OemXXXXX" (here XXXXX is the decimal virtual key code with leading zeroes).
- Special keys that have a virtual code of 0xFF, will be stored as "SpecXXXXX" (here XXXXX is the decimal scan code of the key with leading zeroes).
- We recommend using special plugin "Macro Browser" by Konstantin Melnikov to edit and organize macro commands. This FAR module provides the functionality for viewing, editing, copying and moving macro commands between areas of execution, copying and moving macros between different FAR Manager settings, exporting, creating and removing existing FAR Manager macro commands.
- The value of the "NoSendKeysToPlugins" macro command parameter depends on the way the macro command recording had started.
- CtrlBreak breaks macro execution. Macro assigned to CtrlBreak does not trigger in this case..

For more convenient and comfortable management of the macro commands you can use the special plugin MacroView Manager.

See also:
Using macros, Macro-language, Technical details, Examples