Gobe Productive User's Guide - Working in the Graphics Environment

- Working in the graphics environment
- Drawing tools
- Pre-defined Shapes
- Pen Attributes
- Fill Color
- Text Color
- Customizing inks
- Customizing ink sets
- Transparency
- Moving items
- Resizing & Rotating items
- Aligning Items
- Reshaping, reorienting & smoothing shapes
- Arranging, grouping & locking items
- Creating Outlines
- Views & Layers
- Styles

# Working in the Graphics Environment

Selecting and Activating | Selection Tool | Grids

The graphics environment is a layout-based environment. The behavior of the environment is devoted to placing, moving, and developing graphic items and frames. It is important to understand a few basic features of the graphics environment before you get started.

## Selecting and Activating

Selecting has a very specific meaning in the Gobe Productive suite. When you are working in a word processing document, selecting text is easy. Click the mouse button and highlight some text.

However, when you are working with frames and graphic items in the graphics environment, selection is a little different. When you select a frame or graphic item, small "handles" appear on the edges of the item. Since all frames behave like graphic items, when a frame is selected, it can be resized, rotated, etc.

If you want to work on the content inside a frame, though, it must be activated. To activate a frame, double click anywhere on the frame. The Gobe Productive interface then changes to display the tools and menus applicable for the activated frame. For example, while working in a word processing document, if you insert a spreadsheet frame, the interface changes to display tools and menus applicable for the spreadsheet environment.

In this example, a word processing frame and a graphic item (the red box) are placed within a spreadsheet document. When the text frame is selected, small handles appear on the edge of the frame. Notice that the PartBar is in "graphics mode". The frame is behaving like any other graphic item.

In this example, the text frame is active. Notice that the PartBar has changed to display the word processing tools. This is because when a frame is active, you are "inside" the frame's environment.

### Instructions for Selecting and Activating

> To select a frame: Click the frame once. You can now manipulate the frame like a graphic object.

> To activate a frame: Click twice on the frame. You can now work on the contents of the frame. (If the frame was already selected, you only need to click once).

> To "unselect' or "inactivate" a frame: Click anywhere else in the workspace or select/activate a different frame.

## Selection Tool

When working with items in the graphics environment, it is important to use the correct selection tool. By default, the cursor is in Normal mode. However, you can change this mode at any time using the selection tool on the ToolBar.

| Normal | Use the normal selection pointer to select, move, and activate items in the workspace.
| Rotate | When positioned at the corners of a selected frame or graphic item, the rotation pointer allows you to freely rotate an item or frame. This pointer works like a normal pointer when not positioned at the corner of a frame or item.
| Reshape | When positioned over the handle of a graphic item, this point allows you to freely reshape an item. This is especially useful for graphic items with many handles, such as a curve or bezigon (Beizer Curve). This pointer works like a normal pointer when not positioned at the handles on a curve.

## Grids

The Gobe Productive graphics environment has two modes: freehand and AutoGrid. In freehand mode, you can place items anywhere in the workspace without anything guiding the placement of those items. In AutoGrid mode, the workspace is governed by non-printing vertical and horizontal guides. With AutoGrid mode on, items align to the grid guides and are easier to align using the mouse. In freehand mode, items have no guides and therefore are a little harder to align, but you can control their placement at a much finer level. Try both modes and see which mode you are most comfortable using.

### To Toggle AutoGrid Mode On and Off

- To turn AutoGrid mode on, check the AutoGrid menu item in the Arrange menu. If the menu item is already checked, then AutoGrid mode is already on.
- To turn AutoGrid mode off, uncheck the AutoGrid menu item in the Arrange menu.

### To Display Grid Lines

The workspace can display major coordinate lines for the grid. These lines are not all the grid lines, but merely non-printing hash marks placed at regular intervals to help guide the layout of items in the workspace.

- To display the grid: check the Draw Grid menu item in the Arrange menu.
- To hide the grid lines: uncheck the Draw Grid menu item in the Arrange menu.

Copyright © 1999, Gobe Software, Inc