ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer gives you flexibility in working with the documents: you can select and modify the global application settings (used by default and applied to every new document) and specify the custom settings for any particular document.
Application Preferences
Customizing the Toolbars
Customizing the Floating Dialogs
Working with Windows
Workspace Files
Global program configuration can be set in the Preferences dialog. This dialog lets you select the default template and specify such settings as scale and units of measure, initialization paths for main files and Internet browser, set the document page properties and check the parameters for document view.
To call the dialog, select Preferences from the Edit menu (from the Application menu on the Macintosh).
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The dialog contains several tabs which respond for various groups of parameters: Default, Paths, View, Save, Advanced.
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The Default tab contains settings applied to every new document. |
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On the Paths tab you can specify paths to various components of the application: documents, libraries, templates, help system. Besides, here you can choose a Web browser and search engine to be used for searching the Internet. |
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The View tab controls the appearance of the applications, allows to choose a background color for the document window, and set other parameters of the user interface. |
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On the Save tab you can configure the saving parameters: whether to save the document automatically, in which format to save documents (XML for ConceptDraw, ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer or ConceptDraw 1.x) and other. |
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The Advanced tab controls additional parameters, such as ConceptDraw Basic settings, the editor's font etc. |
For more information about the Preferences dialog see Dialogs - Modal Dialogs - Preferences.
ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer has several toolbar lines in which the tools are grouped by their functions. The application lets you manipulate the toolbars to facilitate your work.
The toolbars can be docked to the application menu bar in the upper part of the screen, or placed in floating state anywhere in the screen area.
To move a toolbar, grab it by its window title or by the space between the icons, and drag it to the needed location.
ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer lets you set which toolbars should be visible on the screen, and show/hide the needed toolbar at any moment. For example, you may want to hide some rarely used toolbars for economic use of the screen space.
To show/hide a toolbar, you can use the View
/ Toolbars menu, or just call the context menu on any of the
toolbars.
In the list of the toolbars, just check which toolbar should be displayed, or
uncheck the toolbar which you want to hide.
The tools and operations from the hidden toolbars can be called easily from
the main menu.
You can also use the shortcuts for switching between the tools or performing
certain operations.
A toolbar can be resized by dragging its right bottom corner. The buttons will re-arrange automatically to adopt the new size.
In ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer you can also remove or add buttons on toolbars.
Use the Customize dialog to configure toolbars (the menu View / Toolbars / Customize). Apart from toolbars, you can configure the menus, keyboard shortcuts and other parameters in this dialog.
For more information about the toolbars see the Toolbars section.
For more information about the Customize dialog see Dialogs - Modal Dialogs - Customize.
ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer introduces floating dialogs, which help to speed up working with shapes. When you change a parameter in a floating dialog, the results are displayed immediately in the drawing, not after you close the dialog.
You can display or hide floating dialogs from the View / Floating Dialogs menu. You can dock, reposition and resize the dialogs. Also, you can organize several dialogs in a tabbed palette. To do this, drag a dialog with the mouse and drop it onto another dialog. ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer has the following floating dialogs:
For more information about each of the dialogs see Dialogs - Floating Dialogs.
ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer opens each document in a separate window. It is also possible to
open several windows for working with the same document (e.g. if you
need to see several pages simultaneously, or view the pages at different zoom
levels).
To open a new window for the active document, select the New Window
command from the Window menu.
To close the active window, you can
a) click the respective button on the window headline;
b) apply the Close Window command from the Window
menu;
c) or use the keyboard:
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Note 1: To quickly close all the windows together,
select the Close All command from the Window menu.
Note 2: The Close
command from the File menu can be used to close the active
window together with all the other windows in which the same document is displayed.
To switch between the open windows, you can use the
Window menu. It holds the list of open windows and the documents
displayed in them. The tick marks the active window. To switch to another window,
just select it in the list.
If the number of open windows is more than 9, and the needed window is not displayed
in the Window menu list, click "More Windows". A
dialog will appear, which holds the complete list of all open windows (the active
one is shown selected). You can select the needed window in the list and click
OK to make it active.
ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer lets you switch between all the open windows quickly, activating
them one after another.
To cycle through open windows, use the following keys:
Ctrl + F6 |
Ctrl + Tab |
or apply the Next command from the window's menu (see the icon to the left of the File menu).
Note: You can also use the Window
menu commands to arrange the open
windows automatically:
Cascade - for arranging the windows so that they overlap partly,
and each window can be activated easily;
Tile Vertically and Tile Horizontally - for
arranging the windows vertically or horizontally as non-overlapping tiles.
On the Macintosh each window has a number (e.g. if
you open 5 windows, they will get numbers from 1 to 5). You can activate the
window by pressing its number key together with the Cmd key.
ConceptDraw NetDiagrammer lets you save the entire workspace if you need to work with the
same set of documents and libraries often.
A workspace file stores information about the sizes and arrangement
of all windows open in the application, and the list of open documents and libraries.
This allows you to customize your working environment only once and use it repeatedly.
Workspace files have the .cdw extension.
Saving a workspace is especially helpful in several cases:
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When you often work with the same set of documents and libraries. |
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When you work with documents displayed in a specific way (this may concern magnification, tables of shape parameters, the active pages of documents, etc.) Saving a workspace lets you easily reproduce the suitable arrangement of windows. |
To open a workspace file:
To save the current state of the application in a workspace file:
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All information about the currently opened documents and libraries and their look and on-screen arrangement will be saved in the workspace file.
When moving a workspace file from one computer to another, keep in mind that a workspace file only stores references to the documents and libraries. So, you ought to move all the necessary documents and library files along with the workspace. Make sure that the workspace file and the required components keep their relative positions with respect to one another. Alternatively, you can place the documents and library files in the same folder with the workspace file.