OK, I hope I can ask this correctly. Its an idea but im not sure if its doable.
So I am creating an operator assignment page for one my departments. I could have each machine then have a name beside it and call it done, but I would like to see if I have whatever machine that operator is assigned to-to be colored. The only issue I think Ill have it that 1 shift has like 50 operators. Would that mean that each person on shift would need their own color? Below is a pic of what the layout looks like:
You can see that 1.A-D and 2.A has the same operator. 2.B,C and D have different operators. I would like to have the A-D letters be the color changing pieces.
You could create a color map somewhere (dataset global tag with a column for colorID and column for the color) and add as many rows to it as there will be operators per shift (if a shift will only ever have 12 operators put in 12 rows, maybe some extra if someone came in for overtime).
Somewhere else, do an on demand assignment of colors from that color dataset to the active operators (on the screen). (Update it every time an operator is assigned?) Put that assignment into a dataset (operatorID and color for the columns names) and put it on the root container of the view. Then, have an expression binding on the background color for each letter that uses lookup on the dataset attached to the root container using the assigned OperatorID as the search item.
If you're going to have 50 colours on the screen, that's a lot of colours to distinguish between! You will have a lot of the "same" hues just with different brightness. Consider there are essentially only ~12 hues on the colour wheel that we can readily distinguish if put side-by-side, with maybe 3 variations of these in terms of brightness level. That's only 36 individual colours + black, grey, and white, 39, you've got to work with. That's a lot of colour to have on a SCADA screen, and it still doesn't get you to 50 without using colours that will be difficult to distinguish between. If you've got any colour blind operators, then they will have no hope 
What if you used icons/avatars/symbols instead? You could generate QR codes for each person and use that 
Regardless, I would either use a dataset as Ryan suggested, or use simple maths to generate the colours 30 Hue° apart, and differing Lightness values as you go around. Just assign each operator in the shift a colour on the fly. What you don't want though is for operators' colours to change while on the same shift if operators come and go.
Yeah, this is exactly what I was looking for: a good discussion on what the flaws would be for this. I already have done something very similar to this but with names being displayed. I am trying make cleanier display for supervision to direct operators during clocking in.
Instead of color-coding each station, could you set this up on a touch screen where the operator inputs their information, and submitting this information highlights their machines with a background color for 10 seconds, or until the next operator enters their information?
That's a really good idea!
