This https://docs.kde.org/trunk5/en/kde-workspace/klipper/actions-page.html is more updated than this https://docs.kde.org/trunk5/en/kde-workspace/klipper/klipper.pdf This is what I was looking for: Note that %s in the command line is replaced with the clipboard contents, e.g. if your command definition is kwrite %s and your clipboard contents are /home/phil/textfile, the command kwrite /home/phil/textfile will be run. To include %s in the command line, escape it with a backslash, as so: \%s.