# exclude Spotlight Search Overlay from Conditional Activation Group? **URL:** \ **Category:** Configuration Help & General Discussion\ **Tags:** spotlight\ **Created:** [July 9, 2021, 8:34am UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320 "2021-07-09T08:34:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![mallej](https://community.folivora.ai/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/8edcca/32.png) [@mallej](https://community.folivora.ai/u/mallej)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2021, 8:34am UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/1 "2021-07-09T08:34:56Z")
Hi, Is it possible for BTT to recognize when the Spotlight Search Overlay is active? I´m using Conditional Activation Group to trigger a Shortcut in a named Window in Firefox. Unfortunately, BTT does not recognize when the Spotlight search is active and also executes the shortcut in the Spotlight search, which is not desired. ---
**Author:** ![JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/user_avatar/community.folivora.ai/jazzhands/32/7317_2.png) [@JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/u/JazzHands)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2022, 7:21am UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/2 "2022-09-01T07:21:49Z")
Bump. Exactly the same problem here! If it can't be solved I would like to report this as a feature request. ---
**Author:** ![Andreas\_Hegenberg](https://community.folivora.ai/user_avatar/community.folivora.ai/andreas_hegenberg/32/39221_2.png) [@Andreas\_Hegenberg](https://community.folivora.ai/u/Andreas_Hegenberg)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2022, 10:51am UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/3 "2022-09-01T10:51:28Z")
You can not exclude it from a conditional activation group for various technical reasons. However the latest BTT alpha (3.840) adds a new way to exclude triggers from Spotlight. You can use the new "Advanced Trigger Conditions". Here is an example on how to set that up: ![image](https://community.folivora.ai/uploads/default/original/3X/5/9/590110bf952fdb7f13e13e32f649a6d4042d4fb4.jpeg) ![image](https://community.folivora.ai/uploads/default/original/3X/7/3/738060c0c7cd5764f346e95c54619d62ef578604.jpeg) ---
**Author:** ![JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/user_avatar/community.folivora.ai/jazzhands/32/7317_2.png) [@JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/u/JazzHands)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2022, 2:57pm UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/4 "2022-09-02T14:57:43Z")
Interesting stuff. Well it works, and that's a nice start for me. But in my case I use keyboard characters to launch shortcuts and when I fire up a Spotlight search I want those keyboard characters to use in my query. Now those characters are just negated. Is there a workaround maybe in the current alpha? so when I remap "k" -\> arrow down , how to output "k" in spotlight Thanks ---
**Author:** ![Andreas\_Hegenberg](https://community.folivora.ai/user_avatar/community.folivora.ai/andreas_hegenberg/32/39221_2.png) [@Andreas\_Hegenberg](https://community.folivora.ai/u/Andreas_Hegenberg)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2022, 3:28pm UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/5 "2022-09-02T15:28:44Z")
you can create one shortcut with a condition that is only active for spotlight, then make that shortcut send itself (make sure to enable „prevent recursive triggers“). I’ll post an example later. Similar to this [Use number of fingers touching the trackpad as modifier for keyboard shortcuts](https://community.folivora.ai/t/use-number-of-fingers-touching-the-trackpad-as-modifier-for-keyboard-shortcuts/28272) For the other shortcut it needs a condition to not be active for spotlight ---
**Author:** ![JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/user_avatar/community.folivora.ai/jazzhands/32/7317_2.png) [@JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/u/JazzHands)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2022, 3:48pm UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/6 "2022-09-02T15:48:26Z")
Ah! "Prevent recursive triggers". Nice, needed something like that a couple of times before. Didn't know that it existed. Unfortunately it doesn't work very smooth in this case. In the spotlight search window the output of "k" gets very fuzzy 🙂 Doesn't seem to work well ---
**Author:** ![Frank1](https://community.folivora.ai/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/f/a87d85/32.png) [@Frank1](https://community.folivora.ai/u/Frank1)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2022, 3:49pm UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/7 "2022-09-02T15:49:02Z")
> [@JazzHands](#): > > so when I remap "k" -\> arrow down , how to output "k" in spotlight As a quick workaround: try fn + k in spotlight ---
**Author:** ![JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/user_avatar/community.folivora.ai/jazzhands/32/7317_2.png) [@JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/u/JazzHands)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2022, 3:57pm UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/8 "2022-09-02T15:57:15Z")
Ha! Nice one. Cumbersome, but it works. Definitely the best second choice. ---
**Author:** ![Frank1](https://community.folivora.ai/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/f/a87d85/32.png) [@Frank1](https://community.folivora.ai/u/Frank1)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2022, 4:06pm UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/9 "2022-09-02T16:06:48Z")
> [@JazzHands](#): > > Cumbersome This is just the emergency solution, so you can now write "k" in spotlight until the proper solution is implemented. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Andreas\_Hegenberg](https://community.folivora.ai/user_avatar/community.folivora.ai/andreas_hegenberg/32/39221_2.png) [@Andreas\_Hegenberg](https://community.folivora.ai/u/Andreas_Hegenberg)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2022, 4:18pm UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/10 "2022-09-02T16:18:11Z")
These accessibility conditions can be a bit slow, I think if you switch to the "visible\_window\_list" and check for "contains **Spotlight - 23**" it will be much faster and should work fine: ![image](https://community.folivora.ai/uploads/default/original/3X/d/b/db11cd5af7b20056a6e8204bbf675c2727bb1934.jpeg) (I need to make that window resizable) ---
**Author:** ![JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/user_avatar/community.folivora.ai/jazzhands/32/7317_2.png) [@JazzHands](https://community.folivora.ai/u/JazzHands)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2022, 5:25pm UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/11 "2022-09-02T17:25:32Z")
Nice! Definitely works a lot better. Excellent BTW after bumping this thread I switched to Raycast as a Spotlight replacement because I was hoping that this would solve the issue. I came to love it and better for the time being. Do you have a similar workaround for Raycast. What did you use to identify "Spotlight - 23" in the window list? ---
**Author:** ![Andreas\_Hegenberg](https://community.folivora.ai/user_avatar/community.folivora.ai/andreas_hegenberg/32/39221_2.png) [@Andreas\_Hegenberg](https://community.folivora.ai/u/Andreas_Hegenberg)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2022, 5:31pm UTC](https://community.folivora.ai/t/exclude-spotlight-search-overlay-from-conditional-activation-group/23320/12 "2022-09-02T17:31:17Z")
the button on the top right of the conditions editor opens a list of all visible windows