What exactly are hotstrings for?

[zanthor]

As I understand it, keymaps allow you to convert one key stroke to another across running WoW instances. I haven't been able to figure out what hotstrings are for....

And let me say in advance, yes I searched for "hotstrings" and purused dozens of posts. Still no clue what exactly they accomplish.

Can someone please describe them and give me an example of why I would want to use them?



Thanks,

Matt

If you understand keymaps, then you understand hotstrings.

Keeping in mind that a keymap lets you press G on client A and receive H on client B...

On client A's keymap file you have the hotstring
G -> PressHOnClientB

On Client B's keymap you have the hotstring
H -> PressHOnClientB

When you press H on client A the G gets converted to "PressHOnClientB" and sent to the other client which translates it back to an H.... now if you press G on client B nothing happens, but if you press H on client B, it converts to a hotstring "PressHOnClientB" which is received by client A and translated to a G...