Colour Swatches...how to see where they are used?

[PAWU]

I have a document with some colour swatches that I know to be and stay unused (Changed to spot->output PDF, in the PDF, there is no plate with that spot colour). But when selecting the unused swatches, they do not get selected. I was able to detect the culprit for 2 colours (unused character style). But now, I have no unused character or paragraph styles anymore and still colours that indicate usage.

Isn't there a find command to find those elements?

[vinny38]

There are many places where those unused swatches can hide...

Here's probably the most common one:

1. Paragraph style B is based on paragraph style A
2. Paragraph style A uses swatch X (the one you wan't to get rid of)
3. Paragraph style B uses swatch Y
4. Paragraph style A is not in use in your document. But... it is said to be in use (because of 1.) and so will be swatch X

About a method (script?) helping to clean this up, or at least to point those swatches, I'm not aware of any.

I'd be glad to hear about one...

[vladan saveljic]

try to save your file in idml.

then reopen it and select unused swatches

[winterm]

You may still find interesting this old thread, and the script in the last post.

It didn’t find simple colored text for me.

However: it found a line with 0 pt weight and ’filled’ with some test color. You’re right - such an object is simply invisible. However, script found it for me.

So: not a Swiss knife, but can be useful sometimes. Especially if you’re not going to get rid of a color, just want to find out where it is used.

[computer J45]

A new update that is extremely useful is that you can now search for colours. You can just press CTRL + F and click Color. 

You can also right click on the swatch in the swatches panel and select "find this colour".