Handy TAB key

[joto]

[QUOTE] [you are a genius! It appears to me that you digged deep into the code of XX and know it inside out by now. Maybe even better than the developers? ;-}

How DO you know all these things, I'm stunned.

Jolande

[RAMWolff44]

All these great tips guys and dolls!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

I found another one that I don't think very many folks know about. Or maybe I'm the only one that's not aware, who knows!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif

Select an object, left click and hold down and then right click and you have a duplicate made. Nice for quick, on the fly dups. To position the dup elsewhere besides on top of the original.... left click-grab the object and drag it to the new position and then right click and instead of the original being moved there the dup is placed there instead. NEATO! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

Serif's DrawPlus 7 has a really cool wizard called the Replication Wizard located under the Tools drop down menu. Select your object, invoke the wizard. First dialog asks you if you want the program to position the objects or for you to choose from a layout grid. If you choose the layout grid then the next dialog gives you Columns and Rows and then a result in objects (so 3 Columns and 3 Rows will result in 8 new objects). The next dialog is the spacing (X and Y). Then the last dialog asks you if you want the Wizard to remember the settings and then to hit the finish button gives you a perfectly spaced layout of the objects. Works great for creating grafts and what not.

Kinda sorta on my XaraX wishlist but it's not the end of the world if it's not implemented any time soon!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

Richard http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

http://www.ramwolffsworld.com//Publi..._Prowl_sig.gif

http://www.ramwolffsworld.com/RAMWolffsWorld

[This message was edited by RAMWolff on March 14, 2004 at 11:08.]

[Judi A]

Thanks Dmitry, I thought you had to find and select both the beginning points then hit enter. This is much quicker!!!

[Egg Bramhill]

Great tip dmitry, well worth 5 stars.
Egg

[OklaEd]

Very COOL thread people http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/cool.gif

Here's what I found:

TAB+arrow = moves selected object 1 pixel
ALT+arrow = moves selected object 2 pixels
CTL+arrow = moves selected object 5 pixels
SFT+arrow = moves selected object 10 pixels

-Ed.

[RAMWolff44]

Well don't I feel really stupid right now.

Here I was thinking that I had uncovered some wonderful tip and over in the Xara Xone: Tip of the Week 8 "Charles Moir's Top Ten Power Tips" it was the first thing on the list!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif ACK!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

Although the 3rd one down does not work all that well, at least for me.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Copy and Paste styles:
You can quickly copy the style of any shape (e.g. the color, line or brush style, fill, transparency etc) to any other shape. Simply select and copy the original shape (Ctrl-C) and then Paste Attributes, key short-cut Ctrl-Shift-A (remember A for Attributes).

This even works across documents, so you could have one document with a library of commonly used styles and then easily paste these onto any other shape.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Now what my experiences are is that most of the time it works but if you have too many styles applied then some of them transfer and others don't!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

An example. I just created 2 simple rectangles, 4 color fill, inner bevel, fractal cloud transparency and a drop shadow. I copied the box and then pasted attributes into the second box. All I got was the fractal transparency!! The rest was ignored! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/frown.gif I tried the keyboard short cut and same thing, no difference! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/frown.gif So this is either a bug or it's a bug!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

Richard http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

http://www.ramwolffsworld.com//Publi..._Prowl_sig.gif

http://www.ramwolffsworld.com/RAMWolffsWorld

[RAMWolff44]

Like I said the copy/paste attributes does not work as they should. So the shadow and bevel don't copy/paste but the others don't copy sometimes either. The function is not perfect and it's really no big deal as I have the registry set up to paste attribs automatically to new shapes anyway! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

Maybe in the new and improved XaraX this function will be improved to include ALL effects/attribs and fix the bug that sometimes prevents ALL the copyable attribs to be pasted as written.

Thanks for the info Ed!! http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

Richard http://www.talkgraphics.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

http://www.ramwolffsworld.com//Publi..._Prowl_sig.gif

http://www.ramwolffsworld.com/RAMWolffsWorld

[This message was edited by RAMWolff on March 14, 2004 at 22:35.]

[joroho]

Thanks, Dmitry!

I should clarify one thing that I found on my computer. To close a shape with the [Enter] key, I learned you have to use the alphabetic [Enter] key, not the [Enter] key on the numeric keypad.

Secondly, Thanks for the cropping idea, I was aware of cropping images this way, but did not know that hitting the tab key with multiple points selected would keep multiple point selected. Also, I find that using the Shift-Arrow keys moves the points further than the Alt-Arrow keys.

.joroho.

http://www.joroho.com/initials.gif

[accessD]

Handy TAB key

Many times I heard questions about how to make closed curve.
To close this question I suggest tip below. And also few TAB-key related tips.

I use TAB key which in ShapeEditor mode selects next point(s). Shift+TAB selects previous point(s).
ENTER with selected first or last point closes curve.

Closing shape.
Select shape, ungroup it if grouped. Select Shape Editor tool. Press TAB key then ENTER. You should get closed shape.
i.e. Ctrl+U, F4, TAB, ENTER

http://xaraxtv.at.tut.by/cs/mc0.png

Closing several shapes.
This approach works well also with several shapes.

http://xaraxtv.at.tut.by/cs/mc.png

Cropping image.
Also you can crop image with keyboard arrows. Convert image to editable shapes (Ctrl+Shoft+S), select first two points with mouse.
Then use arrows and Alt+Arrows to adjust first pair of points, press TAB to select second and third points, adjust and so on.

http://xaraxtv.at.tut.by/cs/mc2.png

Maybe it is obvious...

[carygee]

Tip of the Year Award for sure. Bravo!