There may be some items which are unselectable on the menus. This means that the command is either not possible at that moment or not implemented yet. Most of the commands and actions indicated in the next few pages can be invoked in several different ways. The most obvious way is a hit or do on the appropriate icon or menu but you can also choose your action directly from the computer keyboard. There is also a difference in precision between, say, moving an object in edit mode and moving an object using the Edit menu (F3). As you gain familiarity with the program the choice of which action is the most useful for any given situation will become clearer. In the following text a hit on the icon at the head of the text will produce the action described. The text that follows gives the key presses that will also give the same result.
The Edit Mode can also be entered by pressing <e> or <tab>.
This is probably the most important action in LINEdesign since, without it, many of the other commands are unavailable. Most of the commands on the Edit Menu require one or more objects to be selected by this means before they can be activated and it is the key to changing every aspect of the size and shape of these objects. In addition to that, an object that has already been drawn can only have its Attributes altered if it has been selected in this way. The bounding box mentioned in the following text is invisible except when selected by either Edit or Edit Node but is always a property of the object. For an object drawn using the circle, square, freehand or line or line commands the bounding box is fairly obvious and comprises of a square which surrounds the object as closely as possible. For a bezier curve, a slanted object, or an object whose nodes have been edited the box is expanded and may be a lot larger than you expect. To get an idea of how this box may vary try drawing a few items and then selecting them in the way described below. Once you have grasped the use of the basic commands described in this manual you should then try drawing some objects, editing them and then examining their bounding boxes. This is a worthwhile pursuit in that it will give an insight into the ways in which the box may change and explain why items are sometimes selected unintentionally.
All objects can be selected by a hit or do inside the bounding box. This bounding box will then be visible as eight red (or green, depending on configuration) blocks, one on each corner, and one at the centre of each side. If you hit at a spot which is inside multiple bounding boxes, then the topmost object will be selected first. Hitting again on the same place will select buried objects.
You can also cycle through all objects by pressing <tab> (top to bottom), or <shift+tab> (bottom to top).
If Keep is indicated during selecting, or if you simultaneously press <control> , then the selected object will be added to the group of selected objects. The last selected object can still be changed though.
If you have mistakenly selected multiple objects and wish to deselect them pressing <esc> or indicating Undo will reverse the action.
You can also select several objects at once by dragging. Dragging is moving the pointer during a (long) hit or do. If you do this, a rectangle will be displayed. Depending on your current settings either all the objects for which the bounding box falls completely inside, or intersects the rectangle will be selected.
To move the current object, hit one of the red squares which indicate the bounding box of the current object. You can then move this object. If you pause during this action, a preview of the result will be drawn in green. For objects with a lot of detail this replotting can take some seconds and no further movement of the pointer is possible until it is completed so it is advisable to make the first move as close to the desired position as possible. While moving, the relative distance to the original position is printed on the status line. hit or do to position the object. Pressing <esc> or indicating Undo will cancel the action. Hitting different parts of the bounding box will have diffent actions : The red boxes on the corners will allow the object to be positioned anywhere. The red boxes on the sides will only allow the obect to be moved along strict horizontal or vertical lines.
A do on one of the red squares which indicate the bounding box of the current object will allow you to scale the object. The shape of the bounding box changes as the pointer is moved and, if you pause during the process a preview of the result will be drawn in green. If you pause during this operation a preview of the scaled object is drawn in green. For objects with a lot of detail this replotting can take some seconds and no further movement of the pointer is possible until it is completed so it is advisable to make the first move as close to the desired size as possible. While scaling, the scale factor is printed on the status line. A hit or do will fix the object at the desired scale. Pressing <esc> or indicating Undo will cancel the operation.
If you start scaling by a do on a corner block, than the scale is ratio preserving, meaning that the objects original ratio is kept. If you start with a do on a side block then the object will be stretched vertically or horizontally.
When you scale an untransformed paragraph text, you only change the size of the frame, not the object as such. This means that after a scale, the paragraph object will have to be reformatted (which can take some time).
A do outside the red bounding box will give a rotating bounding box.
This bounding box is drawn with eight double sided arrows instead of red blocks.
A hit or do on any of the arrows on the corner will start rotating. During movement the
bounding box will be drawn rotated. If you pause during this operation a
preview of the rotated object is drawn in green. For objects with
a lot of detail this replotting can take some seconds and no further movement of the
pointer is possible until it is completed so it is advisable to make the first move
as close to the desired position as possible.
While rotating, the angle over which is rotated is printed on the status line.
A hit or do will fix the object in its current position. Pressing <esc> or indicating
Undo will cancel the operation.
When the object is in a rotating bounding box it can also be slanted.
hit or do any of the arrows on the side to start slanting. During movement the bounding box will be drawn slanted. If you pause during this operation a preview of the rotated object is drawn in green. For objects with a lot of detail this replotting can take some seconds and no further movement of the pointer is possible until it is completed so it is advisable to make the first move as close to the desired angle as possible. While slanting, the angle over which is slanted is printed on the status line. A hit or do will fix the object at the current angle. Presssing <esc> or indicating Undo will cancel the operation. The side whose arrow you have hit is the one that moves and the side opposite will remain fixed. The other two sides will move in relation to the first to provide horizontal or vertical slanting.
You can only edit the nodes of one object at a time. To enter the Edit Nodes mode you can select the object you want to edit from Edit mode and then either press <e> or indicate the Edit Nodes icon. If you have just finished drawing an object you can enter the Edit Nodes mode by Hitting or Doing the Edit Nodes icon or by pressing <e>. These two action both allow the nodes of the last drawn object to be edited.
The meaning of these nodes is different for each kind of object, so we handle them separately.
With a path you can do anything, even completely redraw it. The control you have over the object is enormous. As usual, we will use the term path for both a path or a combined path.
Each node is a startpoint or endpoint of a path segment. The startpoint of a subpath is drawn in black, all the other nodes are green.
When you select a node, the type of node is printed on the status line. Depending on the key used to select the node different actions are taken.
A hit on a node will move it. If the node has no controlpoints, you can move it immediately. This is the case for a line node followed by a line, or the startpoint followed by a line. Otherwise the controlpoints are drawn as green circles, connected to the selected node with a line ( = tangents to the curve). All the other nodes are removed, to make it a bit clearer. hit the node or controlpoint you want to move. During movement, the object will change along. hit or do to confirm the movement. Press <esc> or indicate Undo to leave it as before.
do a node to get the commands possible on that node.
The advantage of using third degree Bezier curves, and composing them to form a larger curve, becomes clear here. Any change to a node only has a local effect. The flow of the curve is only affected at this node, and it doesn't affect the whole curve. This is very useful, because it makes the effects of these changes predictable, so when you know what you want to change and where, you will know how ! It is only because the change remains local that we can show it immediately.
Editing the nodes of a path could be slow in Preview Mode.
Two nodes are drawn, one indicating the startdegree of the arc, one indicating the enddegree. If both are equal (the circle is closed), the two nodes will coincide, and only one will be visible.
hit or do the node to move it. During movement the angle is shown, and whether you selected the end or startdegree on the status line. As you move the nodes the arc will be drawn accordingly.A hit or a do will fix the arc. Pressing <esc> or indicating Undo will cancel the action and leave the object unchanged.
You can round the corners of a rectangle or square. There is a difference between a rectangle and a transformed square (one that has been scaled to be a rectangle). In normal geometry all four sided objects are regarded as rectangles and a square is merely a rectangle with four equal sides. For LINEdesign, however, an object is drawn as a square by selecting the rectangle icon and starting with a do on the first corner. A rectangle follows the same procedure but starts with a hit. When the corners of a rectangle are rounded to their highest radius the manner below it shows as 2 half circles connected by 2 lines. For a square this would be a circle. If you transform a square into a rectangle by scaling on of the sides the result, when the rounding process is taken to its furthest radius, is an elipse. For the description we will only refer to squares as the procedure is the same for rectangles.
If the square has not yet been rounded only one node is shown on a corner (normally the upper left, but this is not necessarily the case when the square is transformed). hit or do the node to round the corners. If you move towards the centre of the square, the corners will be rounded more; towards the outside of the square, less rounded.
Headline text can be manually kerned, or to be more precise : you can put each character where you like it.
For each character a node is shown. hit the node to move the character. During movement the character will move along, allowing you to see how it will look. A hit or do will fix the character in place. Pressing <esc> or indicating Undo will cancel the action.
Do the node and you will get a menu offering the following choices :
You cannot edit the nodes of a paragraph !
You cannot edit the nodes of a bitmap !
You cannot change the nodes of a group !
hit the PolyLine icon or press <l> to enter the Draw Lines mode. The pointer will change to a cross when in the drawing area.
hit or do in the drawing area to start drawing. As you move the pointer a line is drawn in green as a preview of how the drawn line will look. The length and angle of the line are shown on the status line. These are especially useful for Again. The angle is measured to either the previous line, or the horizontal (if it is the first line).
A hit or do will provide the endpoint of the line. Press <esc> or indicate Undo if you want to cancel the line. A different action is taken if you indicate the endpoint with a hit or a do.
do will end the object, calculate the bounding box, and prepare to start with anything else.
hit will start a new line where the previous ended; this allows you to draw polygons easily. If you have used a hit, you can also indicate Again or press <F9>. This will repeat the line you have just drawn with the same dimensions as the previous one and its angle to the first line will also be replicated. This function allows you to easily draw regular polygons. You have only to get the first angle right (for a triangle, say, 60 degrees).
You can also enter the Draw Lines mode from any other drawing mode. If you have indicated the centre of a circle, or the upper left corner of a square, this point will become the first point of the line. If you were drawing a curve, and you already have hit for the first contrlpoint and then press <l> this control point will be kept as the start point of the line and the point where you pressed <l> will be the endpoint. You will already have drawn one line ! In all the other cases, only the first point of the curve will be kept as startpoint of the new line.
If you were previously drawing curves, the lines will be added to the same path object !
hit the PolyCurve icon or press <b> to enter the Draw Curves mode. The pointer will change to a cross when in the drawing area.
We use third degree Bezier curves. These curves are defined by the start and endpoint and the two tangents in those points. The start and endpoints are commonly called nodes, because the curve runs through them. The other two are called control points, because they control the flow of the curve. The curve always lies inside the polygon formed by those points.
hit or do in the drawing area to start drawing, and indicate the startpoint of the curve. Move and see how the tangent moves along. Indicate the place where the first controlpoint has to be. Now we come to the difficult part. You have to indicate the second controlpoint, which will define the tangent to the endpoint and thus produce the curve, but we don't know where it will lie. So you need an idea of how the Bezier polygon looks to be able to draw the curve. Then move the pointer to choose where you will position the endpoint, at this stage you can see how the curve will look. Indicate the endpoint. The key that you used to indicate the endpoint defines the action that is taken. At any stage before this you can press <esc> or indicate the Undo item, to interrupt the drawing.
hit to indicate the endpoint if you want to add another curve to this one. The program automatically calculates the first controlpoint of the next curve, assuming you want to draw smooth looking curve. This appearance can always be changed later on with Edit Nodes. Then you only have to indicate the second controlpoint and the endpoint of the following curve.
Indicate the endpoint with a do to end the curve. You can then draw another one.
You can also enter Draw Curves mode if you already were drawing something else. Then the last indicated point will be taken as the startpoint of your first curve. E.g. you indicated the centre of a circle, the upper left corner of a rectangle, the endpoint of a line (with hit), etc. If you were drawing lines, the curves will be added to the same path object !
Freehand drawing is much easier than the previous methods. It also needs more processing power. Unfortunately, this means that it is very slow.
Indicate the Pencil icon or press
to get in Freehand mode. The pointer will change to a cross when in the drawing area.
hit or do to start drawing. Move the pointer, and you will draw. hit or do to end the drawing. The number of input nodes will be shown on the report line. This heavily influences the time needed to calculate the curve going through these nodes. This method is not optimal though, it needs a lot of processing power, it still keeps too many nodes, but it is a great start; use Edit Nodes to finish the object.
All curve nodes defined this way are cusp, because this offers more modelling capabilities (although the curve will often appear smooth, depending on what you draw).
hit or do the Square icon or press <s> to enter the Draw Square mode. The pointer will change to a cross when in the drawing area.
Indicate one corner and start drawing. Start with a hit to draw a rectangle or with a do to draw a square. A square is the constrained or special form of a rectangle in which the sides are always of equal length. Whilst you are moving the pointer the shape is drawn in green. In addition to this the length of the side(s) are displayed on the status line. hit or do on the opposite corner to end the drawing. Press <esc> or indicate Undo to abandon the process.
You can also enter the Draw Square from another drawing mode by pressing <s> (this will always draw a square and not a rectangle). The last entered point of the previous object will then be used as the upper left or lower right corner. The previous object will be stored separately from the rectangle or square.
hit or do the Circle icon or press <c> for circle to enter the Draw Circle mode. The pointer will change to a cross when in the drawing area.
hit or do for the centre of the circle and as you move away from this point the circle will appear. The radius of the circle is printed on the status line. When you reach the desired radius a further hit or do will complete the process. Pressing <esc> or indicating the Undo command before this will cancel the circle.
Draw Circle mode can also be entered from another drawing mode by pressing <c>. The last entered point of the previous object will then be used as the centre of the circle. The previous object will be stored separate from this circle.
To enter Text mode, indicate the Text icon or press <t>. If there are no fonts loaded, an error message will be given, and nothing will change. Otherwise the pointer will change to a cross when in the drawing area.
You can now put one of two types of text on the page : headline or paragraph text. Headline text is just one line of text, that can be kerned and edited manually. Paragraph text is a multi line formatted block of text, that has to be loaded from a file or imported from the scrap. Paragraph text can't be written or edited from within LINEdesign, although it can be replaced by different text (from scrap or file).
The different properties of these two types of text are described below.
To put a headline on the page hit the place at which you want the text to start. This point will then be the baseline and the place of the first letter. A window will then appear in which you can enter or edit the text.
You can enter special symbols by stating their name between backslashes. E.g to print ½, you will have to use the PostScript-name between backslashes. The name of a character can be found on the pages containing all the characters of each font. Beneath each character its name is printed. So, when you type a line like
\onehalf\ x \onehalf\ = \onequarter\will print on the screen as
½ x ½ = ¼
The text will appear in the current font and current font size.
Headline text is by default not kerned.
To place a paragraph on the page you must first do a point to be used to start drawing the frame in which the paragraph will be placed. As you move the pointer away from that point a green square or rectangle will appear. A hit or a do will complete the frame but it will remain drawn in green as it will not appear in the completed paragraph. All text will fall within this frame unless the text is too large to fit. In that case the text will be truncated and you must either increase the size of the frame or decrease the font size (see below). Then a window will appear with the following options :
As with headline-text, you can select special characters by writing their PostScript-names between backslashes. The text that is in inserted is automatically split into paragraphs. One (or more) empty line(s) (2 or more subsequent newlines) indicate the start of a new paragraph. A little example will make it a bit clearer. The following silly lines (who are certainly NOT ment to be educational)
When we look at the following equation \onehalf\ x \onehalf\ = \onequarter\ we can conclude that, in the case he found it himself, our author can calculate.will come out like this :
When we look at the following equation
½ x ½ = ¼
We can conclude that, in the case he found it himself,
our author can calculate.
considering the margins, and that there are no altered leading, paragraph spacing or indentation.
Normally the whole text is used to fill the frame. If there isn't enough, then the frame will not be filled completely. If there is too much, then only the text needed to fill the frame is processed, but the rest is retained. The whole text is kept in memory, because when the fontsize or the frame size is changed, the text is reformatted and more text could appear.
Press <o> or indicate the Zoom Out icon, the pointer will then change to a magnifying glass with a minus in it. hit anywhere to zoom out, so more page will become visible. The position where you have hit will become the centre of the new screen. If you do you will return to the previous mode. You can also press <esc> or indicate the Undo item to return to whatever you were doing before.
You can only zoom out a limited number of times consecutively. If you have reached the limit, you will return to the previous mode automatically.
Press <i> or indicate the Zoom In icon, the pointer will then change to a magnifying glass with a plus in it. hit anywhere to zoom in, and you will be able to see the position where you have hit in more detail. If you do you return to the previous mode. You can also press <esc> or indicate the Undo item to return to whatever you were doing before.
You can only zoom in a limited number of times consecutively. If you have reached the limit, you will return to the previous mode automatically.
There are vertical and horizontal scroll bars. The block inside the scroll bar is an approximate guide to the position of the centre of the screen within the whole editable area, this being much larger than the page.
You can scroll half a page by pressing <alt + cursorkey> or by a hit on the arrows at the ends of the scroll bar. If you do the arrows, you will scroll a whole page.
You can also hit the scroll bar itself, then you will scroll towards the spot you indicated, but over a smaller distance. This allows more accurate positioning. hit the scroll bar to move one sixteenth of a screen, do the scroll bar to scroll one eigth.