Copyright: (c) 1992 Wolfram Research, Inc.


Mathematica Front End Help

Dialog boxes

Dialog box listing

Keyboard

Key combination listing

Command menus

File	Commands for opening, closing, saving, and printing files

Edit	Standard cut, copy, and paste commands; settings for graphics, evaluation, and animation

Cell	Commands for changing cell attributes; grouping cells; opening and closing groups; evaluation groups

Graph	Options affecting display of PostScript graphics; conversions between graphics types; alignment and animation of graphics cells

Action	Commands involving the kernel or preparing input for the kernel

Style	Format commands for cell contents, choosing font, face, color; options for text alignment and display

Options	Commands that call up dialog boxes for special settings

Window	Commands for arranging open windows and selecting a new window from open Notebooks


File Menu

New 	Creates a new Notebook

Open/Import	Opens an already existing Notebook

Close	Closes the currently active Notebook

Save	Saves changes to the current Notebook

Save As/Export	Saves the current Notebook, prompting for a new name

Print	Prints the current Notebook

Exit	Kills the kernel if it is running, closes all windows, and returns you to Program Manager


New

This command in the File menu creates a new Notebook.

The Notebook is initially empty.  When you start typing, Mathematica creates a cell to hold what you type.


Open
Open/Import

This command in the File menu opens a Notebook previously saved on a disk.

To open a Notebook:

  1.	Choose the Open/Import command.

  2.	In the list box that appears, look for the file you want to open.  Use the mouse to scroll through the list of files, or to open directories (by double-clicking them), or to select a different drive, until you see the file you want.

  3.	Click the name of the file, then click the Open button; or just double-click the name of the file.

If you just want to open Notebook files, this is all you need to know.  For information on importing files produced by other programs, see "Opening Files from Other Programs".  Also see the Open/Import dialog box.


Opening Files from Other Programs

Mathematica can open documents produced by a number of other programs, as well as its own Notebook documents.  When you use the Open/Import command to open a document from another program, it is placed in a Notebook window.  If the document is anything other than a text document, the Notebook will be untitled.  The following types of files can be opened in Mathematica:

     Text:  Files in plain text form are opened with all the text in a single active initialization cell.  (Note: Mathematica Notebooks are also text type files, but they include extra lines [control lines] that tell Mathematica how to break the file into cells.)  If the text appears all on one line, you may want to switch the cell's Style to Text, which is normally a word-wrapping style.

     Metafile:  Files saved in Metafile format from most graphics programs will open as a single cell containing the picture in the file.


Close

This command in the File menu closes the current Notebook.

When you close Notebook windows, Mathematica asks if you want to save any changes made since your previous save.


Save

This command in the File menu saves the current Notebook.

Use Save to record changes made to a Notebook already stored on disk.  If the current Notebook is still untitled (not yet saved on disk), Save will behave exactly like Save As/Export and ask you to name it.


Save As
Save As/Export

This command in the File menu saves new Notebooks or allows you to rename new versions of existing Notebooks.

To save or rename a Notebook:

  1.   Choose the Save As/Export command.

  2.   Type the Notebook name in the "Save this document as" box.

  3.   Choose the directory into which you want to put your Notebook.

  4.   Click the Save button.

If you just want to save and open Notebooks within Mathematica, this is all you need to know.

Mathematica automatically saves Notebooks in text format so they can be read by other text processors.  You can export Notebooks for use in other programs by saving them in the appropriate file type.

See also the Save As/Export dialog box.


Print

This command in the File menu prints the active Notebook.

The Print dialog box will vary with different printers.  Usually Print lets you specify page range, number of copies, reduction or enlargement factor, and horizontal or vertical orientation.  Note that these options are not controlled by Mathematica; they are determined by the particular printer being used.  For more information about printing, see your Windows User's Guide.

Page size and shape must first be specified using options in the Print dialog box, and various other options can be set using Printing Options in the Options menu.

Mathematica prints the Notebook in what-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) form.  For example, the contents of closed cells and closed group are not printed, since they are not visible on screen.  To print out the entire contents of a Notebook, first open all its cells (choose Select All Cells in the Edit menu, then Open All Subgroups in the Cell menu).


Exit

Use this command in the File menu to exit from Mathematica and return to Program Manager.

Mathematica will ask if you want to save any unsaved Notebooks before quitting, since changes would otherwise be lost.


Edit Menu

Undo	Reverses your last typing or editing action

Cut	Deletes selected text, graphics, or cells from your Notebook and puts them onto the Clipboard

Copy	Copies selected text, graphics, or cells onto the Clipboard without deleting them from your Notebook

Paste	Pastes a copy of the Clipboard contents at your insertion point

Clear	Deletes the selection without putting it onto the Clipboard

Paste and Discard	Pastes the Clipboard contents at your insertion point and then empties the Clipboard

Auto Paste	Automatically pastes selections from other Windows applications into a Notebook

Select All Cells	Selects all the cells in your Notebook


Undo

This command in the Edit menu reverses your last action.

You can undo the basic commands in the Edit menu or any amount of typing you have done since your last action.  When your last command can be undone, its name appears after the word Undo in the menu (for example, Undo Cut).  Otherwise Mathematica displays the message Can't Undo.  You can only undo your most recent command.

The only way to undo many actions at once is to go back to an earlier version of your file: close the file, click No when asked if you want to save the changes, then reopen it.  This will revert the Notebook to the last version saved.


Cut

This command in the Edit menu deletes selected text, graphics, or cells from your Notebook and transfers them to the Clipboard.

To cut selected material from the Notebook and place it onto the Clipboard:

  1.   Highlight the area to be cut by clicking or dragging.

  2.   Choose the Cut command.

You can then insert the deleted material elsewhere using Paste.


Copy

This command in the Edit menu copies selected text, graphics, or cells to the Clipboard, without deleting them from your Notebook.

To copy selected material from the Notebook and place it onto the Clipboard:

  1.   Highlight the area to be copied by clicking or dragging.

  2.  Choose the Copy command.

The copied text or cells can then be inserted in another Notebook or elsewhere in the same Notebook with the Paste command.


Paste

This command in the Edit menu inserts a copy of the Clipboard contents into your Notebook.

To insert the Clipboard contents inside an existing cell:

  1.   Position the insertion point (blinking vertical bar) by clicking the desired area.

  2.   Choose Paste.

To insert the Clipboard contents between two cells, or at the bottom or top of the Notebook:

  1.   Position the insertion point (horizontal line) in the desired area between two cells.

  2.   Choose Paste.

Mathematica pastes a copy of the Clipboard contents in a new cell at the insertion point.

To replace a selected area with the Clipboard contents:

  1.   Select a range of characters or cells by highlighting them.

  2.   Choose Paste.

Mathematica deletes the selected characters or cells and inserts the new material in their place.

Information contained on the Clipboard remains there until a new selection is copied or cut.  This lets you paste the same contents repeatedly.  Large Clipboards take up memory, however.  To empty the Clipboard automatically after pasting, use the Paste and Discard command.


Clear

This command in the Edit menu deletes the current selection from the Notebook.

Unlike Cut and Copy, this command does not place the selection onto the Clipboard.


Paste and Discard

This command in the Edit menu inserts the Clipboard contents once and then empties the Clipboard.

When the Clipboard is extremely large and memory is short, you can paste with this command to avoid duplicating the contents of the Clipboard.  Unlike the Paste command, Paste and Discard cannot be repeated, since it empties the Clipboard.

By using Cut in combination with Paste and Discard you can transfer large blocks of cells between Notebooks without taking up additional memory.


Auto Paste

This command in the Edit menu allows you to paste text and graphics items from other Windows applications directly into a Mathematica Notebook.

Choose Auto Paste and position the insertion point at the place in the Notebook where you want the pasted items to appear.  If you now enter another application, and leave Mathematica running, any items you copy or cut in that application will be automatically transferrred to the Mathematica Clipboard and pasted into the active Notebook at the place you selected.


Select All Cells

This command in the Edit menu selects all the cells in the active Notebook.


Cell Menu

Formatted	Toggles selected cells between formatted and unformatted form

Inactive	Toggles selected cells between active and inactive status

Locked	Toggles selected cells between locked and unlocked status

Initialization	Marks selected cells for automatic evaluation whenever the Notebook is opened

Page Breaks	Makes page breaks visible on screen and specifies where a page break should occur

Group Cells	Groups the selected range of cells

Ungroup Cells	Ungroups the selected range of cells

Open All Subgroups	Opens all levels of closed groups in the selected group

Close All Subgroups	Closes all subgroups in the selected group

Open/Close Group	Collapses the cells in the selected group so that only the first cell is visible

Evaluation Group	Marks all cells in the selected group to be evaluated together whenever any one of them is evaluated


Formatted

This command in the Cell menu toggles selected cells between formatted and unformatted form.

A check appears beside this command name when the selected cells are formatted.  Text and expressions that you have entered are usually unformatted.  Output from Mathematica is usually formatted.

Unformatted cells contain ordinary text that can be edited using basic Windows skills.  The contents of formatted cells cannot be edited.

The formatted attribute is useful for cells containing two kinds of data: (1) mathematical formulas, and (2) PostScript graphics.

Any cell can be formatted or unformatted.  If you unformat a cell containing output from Mathematica,  you will see the same output in an editable text form.  If you unformat a cell containing PostScript graphics, you will see the PostScript text (also editable).

If you format a cell in which you have entered text, Mathematica will format the text as a mathematical expression and show it in two-dimensional form (e.g., exponents will appear in superscript).  If the cell also has the PostScript attribute, Mathematica will interpret the text as PostScript commands and render them in the cell as a graphic.  If the text cannot be rendered, or if there is no kernel available to do the mathematical formatting, Mathematica will display an error message in place of the contents of the cell.


Inactive

This command in the Cell menu toggles the selected cells between the active and inactive states.

A check appears beside this command name when the selected cells are inactive.  Inactive cells are identified by a horizontal tick mark below the top of the cell bracket.

Inactive cells are not evaluated when any of the evaluation commands in the Action menu are used.  Inactive cells are typically used to hold Mathematica output and commentary text.


Locked

This command in the Cell menu locks or unlocks the selected cells.

A check appears beside this command name when the selected cells are locked.  Locked cells are identified by an "x" below the top of the cell bracket.

Locked cells cannot be edited or removed from the Notebook.  You should lock a cell to protect its contents from being accidentally changed.

If you do want to edit or delete a locked cell, first select it and choose this command to unlock it.


Initialization

This command in the Cell menu marks selected cells for automatic evaluation whenever the Notebook containing them is opened.

A check appears beside this command name when the selected cells are initialization cells.  You can assign or remove the initialization attribute from the selected cells by choosing this command.  Initialization cells are identified by an I-shaped tick mark below the top of the cell bracket.

The Evaluate Initialization command in the Action menu will evaluate all the initialization cells in the active Notebook.

When you use the kernel command <<filename, which reads in and evaluates a file, only cells marked as active initialization cells will be evaluated.

When a Notebook containing initialization cells is opened, Mathematica will ask you if you want to evaluate all the initialization cells.  By using the Action command in the Options menu,  you can configure Mathematica to load the initialization cells automatically without asking, or to ignore them.

Initialization cells are useful in Notebooks that contain both definitions of Mathematica functions and examples of their use.  The cells containing the definitions are marked as initialization cells, while the examples are not.  (Both the examples and the definitions are marked as active.)


Page Breaks

This command in the Cell menu calls up a cascading menu that allows you to specify where a page break should occur.  The Show Pagebreaks command makes the page breaks in the Notebook visible on screen so that you can see where they appear before printing the Notebook. To create or prevent a page break at a selected spot, select a cell and then choose either Force Page Break Above Cell or Prevent Page Break Above Cell . Choose the same command again to undo the creation or prevention of a page break.


Group Cells

This command in the Cell menu groups the selected range of cells together.

The range of the grouping is marked by an extra bracket outside the regular cell bracket.  Clicking the group bracket selects all cells in the group, just as clicking a cell bracket selects everything in the cell.

To open and close groups, double-click the grouping bracket.  To remove a grouping bracket, select it and choose Ungroup Cells.

When using Group Cells on a selection in which the beginning cells are already grouped, Mathematica incorporates the remaining ungrouped cells into the existing group.


Ungroup Cells

This command in the Cell menu ungroups grouped ranges of cells.

Ordinarily, you would use this command after selecting an entire group (for example, after clicking a grouping bracket).  The selected cells are ungrouped, leaving ungrouped cells.  If there are subsubgroups within the selection, they are left unchanged.

If the selection is a range of cells at the bottom of a grouping, but not the whole group, Ungroup Cells removes those cells from the group, but does not destroy the whole group.

For more information, see Group Cells.


Open All Subgroups

This command in the Cell menu opens all the selected groups and subgroups of cells.

See Group Cells for more information.


Close All Subgroups

This command in the Cell menu closes all the selected groups and subgroups of cells.

See Group Cells for more information.


Open/Close Group

This command in the Cell menu closes or opens the selected group of cells.  (Cells are grouped using the Group Cells command.)

Closing a group collapses all cells in the group so that only the head cell is visible.

You can toggle the selected groups between open and closed by choosing this command.

You can also close or open a group of cells by double-clicking the grouping bracket.  This is equivalent to choosing Open/Close Group.


Evaluzation Group
Evaluation Group

This command in the Cell menu sets all cells in the selected groups to be automatically evaluated whenever any cell in the group is evaluated.

A check appears beside this command name when the selected group is an evaluation group.  You can toggle the selected groups between normal and evaluation group state by choosing this command.

Evaluation groups are identified by a small triangle at the top of the grouping bracket.

Note: You can only use this command when one or more grouped ranges of cells are selected.  Cells are grouped using the Group Cells command.

Evaluation groups are useful if you have several cells that must be evaluated together, never individually.  A prepared example, for instance, containing both text cells (inactive) and input cells (active), could be placed within a single evaluation group.  When users select any cell in the example,  they can choose Evaluate Selection in the Action menu to see the whole example worked out.


Style Menu

Cell Style	Displays the Cell Style cascading menu

Font	Displays a dialog box listing all fonts currently installed in your system

Format	Displays a dialog box listing the different format options available for text

Edit Notebook Styles	Opens a window that shows the active Notebook's "style sheet"

Edit Default Styles	Opens a special Notebook that sets the standard attributes for new cells


Cell Style
Cell Style menu

This cascading menu appears when you choose Cell Style in the Style menu.The commands in the Cell Style menu constitute a style sheet.  Each style is a set of fonts, sizes, faces, colors, and formats that can be applied to individual cells.

To assign a style to one or more cells, select the cells and then choose the desired style name from the Cell Style menu.  Styles are named to suggest the most appropriate use for each style, but you can apply any style to any cell.

To change the definition of a style, open the Edit Notebook Styles from the Style menu and apply formatting changes to the cell representing that style.  Changing a style's definition will change all the cells in the current Notebook that have been given that style.


Font

The Font dialog box appears when you choose Font in the Style menu.  It contains a list of all the fonts currently installed in your system.

You can choose any of these fonts for all of the text within the selected cell or cells, or for style definitions (see Edit Notebook Styles).

A check beside a font name means that all the selected characters or cells have that font.


Format

The Style Inspector dialog box appears when you choose Format in the Style menu.  It  contains commands for aligning cells, word wrapping, and scrolling.  It also lists commands for ornamenting cells with boxes and bullets.

All the options in the Format dialog box apply to whole cells at a time.  If the active window contains the Styles Notebook, any changes you make will change the selected style definition and thereby affect all cells of that style in the current Notebook.


Styles Window
Edit Notebook Styles

This command in the Style menu lets you view and modify the format description of individual styles.

When you choose Edit Notebook Styles , Mathematica opens a Notebook containing the definitions of each style.  Each cell in the Styles Notebook corresponds to one of the styles listed in the Cell Style cascading menu.

The Styles Notebook defines the styles of the Notebook directly behind it.  Its title will read "Styles for" followed by the name of the Notebook it belongs to.

To change the definition of a style:

  1.   Open the Styles Notebook by choosing this command.

  2.   Click the cell of the style or styles you want to redefine.

  3.   Alter the style settings using commands in the Style menu and its cascading menus.

The new definition automatically changes all cells in the Notebook.  Changing the style in one Notebook does not affect the styles in other Notebooks.

For example, to make the title style correspond to the Windows Times Roman font, simply select the cell that represents the title style, then choose "Tms Rmn" from the Font dialog box.

To apply styles to individual cells in a normal Notebook, pull down the Cell Style cascading menu under the Style menu, and then choose the desired style name.


Defaults Window
Edit Default Styles

This command in the Style menu opens a special Notebook for setting the standard properties of new cells.

Whenever you make a new cell, either by typing new text or by evaluating an input cell, Mathematica looks in the Defaults Notebook for a prototype cell to copy settings from.  The new cell inherits the style and attributes of the prototype cell.  The Defaults Notebook contains several different cells, each of which is used in a different circumstance.  Each cell contains some text identifying the circumstance for which it is used.

If you want new cells in a Notebook to be created with different default settings, change the settings for the appropriate cells in the Defaults Notebook.  To change the default style settings, open the Defaults Notebook, then open the Styles Notebook.  Any changes you make to the styles for the Defaults Notebook will be used in subsequently created Notebooks.

The Defaults settings are automatically saved when you exit Mathematica.


Window Menu

Cascade Windows	Cascades all the open windows in an overlapping pattern

Tile Windows	Distributes all the open windows evenly on the screen after resizing them

Arrange Icons	Arranges Notebook icons neatly in the application window

Other open windows	You can make a window the current one by choosing it from the menu


Cascade Windows

This command in the Window menu neatly arranges all windows by overlapping them.

When you choose this command Mathematica restacks the windows in the standard overlapping pattern.  This arrangement makes visible as many titles as possible while keeping all the windows large.


Tile Windows

This command in the Window menu cleans up all windows by resizing them and distributing them evenly on the screen.

When you choose this command, Mathematica shrinks the windows into side-by-side rectangles of similar size and rearranges them on the screen so that each window is completely visible.

Note: With large numbers of windows there will be some overlapping, since windows cannot be made smaller than a certain minimum size.


Arrange Icons

This command in the Window menu arranges Notebook icons neatly at the bottom of the application window.


Names of Other Open Windows

All the commands after the second dividing line in the Window menu are the titles of open Notebook windows.

Choosing one of these titles brings the corresponding window to the front.  This is useful for getting to windows that are hidden beneath larger ones, or for finding a particular window when numerous windows are open.  You can also cycle through the list of windows by pressing Ctrl F6.


Moving or resizing a graphic

To move or resize a graphic:

Click the body of the cell (not the cell bracket).  A bounding box with small handles appears.

To  adjust the size and shape of the graphic, drag the handles on the bounding box.

To move the whole graphic without resizing it, click anywhere inside the bounding box and drag the mouse.


Bitmap--an array of pixels that makes up a graphic image.


Bounding box--appears around a graphic when you click inside the cell containing the graphic.


Cell bracket--a cell's "handle", that appears in the right margin of a Notebook to mark the cell's position.


Closed group--a range of cells that has been collapsed, leaving only the first cell visible.


Evaluation group--a group of cells that are evaluated together when any one is evaluated.


Front end--the part of Mathematica that handles interaction with the user.


Initialization--an attribute of cells; an initialization cell can be evaluated automatically whenever a Notebook is opened.


Point--a unit of type size equal to approximately 1/72 inch.


Action Menu

Prepare Input	Calls up a cascading menu of commands for copying input lines or entering ViewPoint or RGBColor specifications into an input line

Evaluate Selection	Processes the Mathematica input in the selected cell or cells

Evaluate Next Input	Moves to the cell below the current one, then processes its contents

Evaluate Notebook	Processes all Mathematica input cells in the Notebook

Evaluate Initialization	Processes all initialization cells in the Notebook

Interrupt	Sends an interrupt signal to the kernel to halt the current calculation


Prepare Input
Prepare Input menu

This cascading menu appears when Prepare Input is chosen from the Action menu.  It contains several commands that can be used to construct input for evaluation:

Copy Input from Above

Copy Output from Above

Complete Selection

3D ViewPoint Selector

Color Selector


Copy Input from Above

This command copies the contents of the nearest Active cell above your insertion point, and then pastes them at the insertion point.

This is most useful when you are making similar evaluations in a sequence.  After each evaluation choose Copy Input from Above to copy the last thing you evaluated into a new input cell.  You can then edit the text.  See also Copy Output from Above.


Copy Output from Above

This command copies the contents of the nearest output cell above your insertion point, and then pastes them at the insertion point.

This is most useful when you are making a chain of calculations.  Often you will want to use Copy Input from Above instead of this command.  The contents are pasted in their unformatted form so you can edit them.


Complete Selection

This command reads your current selection, which must be a single word, and looks up possible completions in the list of all currently defined functions and variables.

For example, if your selection was "Inte" the possible completions will include "Integrate" and "Integer".  Note: This command works only when you are running the Mathematica kernel.

If you choose this command after typing a partial word, Mathematica selects the first apparent word to the left of the insertion point (indicated by the blinking vertical bar), then looks for a suitable completion.

If there is only one possible completion, Mathematica automatically pastes it over your selection.  Otherwise, a pop-up menu lists the various possible completions.  To insert one of them, click the completion you want, or type another letter to reduce the list of possible completions.  The letters you have typed are shown in boldface on each possible completion.  If all the possible completions begin with a common sequence of letters longer than the one you typed, all the common letters will be bold.  Press Backspace to cancel.

When there are more than 10 possible completions in the list box, scroll the menu by moving the mouse up or down, or by using the arrow keys.


3D ViewPoint Selector...
3D ViewPoint Selector

This command in the Prepare Input cascading menu of the Action menu displays a dialog box for interactively selecting a viewpoint for three-dimensional graphics.

You can use this dialog box to generate a ViewPoint option text string, or to reset the default viewpoint for graphics commands.  For more information, choose this command and then click the Help button in the resulting dialog box.


Color Selector...
Color Selector

This command in the Action menu presents a dialog box for interactively selecting a color for Mathematica graphics.

If you have a color monitor, the Color box allows you to choose a color while seeing it on screen.  When you have chosen the color, click OK to paste the selected color at the current insertion point in the form of a Mathematica RGBColor[red, green, blue] function.  In this way you can specify the color of a graphical object without having to figure out the actual RGB values for the color yourself.


Evaluate Selection

This command in the Action menu evaluates all selected cells and places the output from each directly after the cell that produced it.

The Shift + Enter key combination is a shortcut for Evaluate Selection.  Pressing the Enter key by itself does not evaluate a selection--it produces a line break.  Pressing the "5" key in the numeric key pad, or the Insert key, also will evaluate a selection.

To determine what happens after an evaluation, and how inputs and outputs are grouped, choose Action in the Options menu.  To determine the characteristics of output and message cells, use the Edit Default Styles in the Style menu.

Note: The kernel must be running before you can evaluate any cells.


Evaluate Next Input

This command moves to and then evaluates the next input cell below the current selection.

If the current selection is a single input cell, it is evaluated; otherwise the next input cell after the current selection is selected.  The effect is that by repeatedly choosing this command, you can evaluate all the input cells in a Notebook, one at a time.  You need to choose this command twice for each cell, once to select it and once to evaluate it.  This allows you to see the next input before evaluating it, and is good for preprogrammed demonstrations.

A keyboard equivalent for Evaluate Next Input is Ctrl + Enter.

See also Help for Evaluate Notebook in the Action menu.


Evaluate Notebook

This command selects all the cells in the active Notebook and evaluates them.

This is most useful for spreadsheet-style Notebooks, where each cell depends on the ones above, and all need to be re-evaluated to get the final answer at the bottom.  See also Help for Evaluate Initialization.


Evaluate Initialization

This command selects and evaluates all the initialization cells in the Notebook.

See also Help for Evaluate Notebook.  See Help for Initialization in the Cell menu for information about initialization cells.


Interrupt

This command interrupts the current calculation.

When you choose this command, you will get a dialog box allowing you to abort, continue, or step through your current calculation.  Some calculations may not be immediately interruptible, in which case you will not get the dialog box until the calculation is able to stop.

For more information about the options available in the Interrupt dialog box, see The Mathematica Book.


Graph Menu

The Graph menu includes the following commands for handling Mathematica graphics:

PostScript graphics commands

Render PostScript	Redraws the selected PostScript graphic(s)

Play Sound	Plays a sound associated with one or more sound cells

Show Filled Areas	Toggles between filling in or not filling in shaded surfaces

Show Lines	Toggles between showing lines and not showing lines

Make Lines Thin	Toggles between normal thickness and a thickness of one pixel

Make Standard Size	Resizes graphics to the default size

General graphics commands

Image Conversions	Calls up a cascading menu of commands for converting graphics between formats

Animate Selected Graphics	Displays the selected graphics in sequence

Align Selected Graphics	Aligns graphics in selected cells


PostScript definiton
PostScript--a text-based graphic description language


aspect ratio
aspect ratio--the proportion between a graphic's height and width


Re-Render PostScript
Render PostScript

This command in the Graph menu tells Mathematica to render all the selected cells that contain PostScript graphics.

You might want to use this command if you have edited a PostScript description, or if some PostScript cells were previously rendered with different graphics settings.


 Play Sound

This command in the Graph menu plays the sounds associated with the selected cell or cells. You can also play the sounds of a cell by double-clicking the sound icon in the cell's bracket, or by pressing the Play Sound button in the Toolbar.


Show Filled Areas

This command in the Graph menu toggles the selected cells between showing and not showing surface shading (or coloring) in PostScript graphics.

A check beside this command name indicates that all the selected cells show shading if shading is present in their PostScript coding.  To make a PostScript cell show white surfaces instead of shaded ones, select the cell and then uncheck this menu command.  The command has no effect on cells that do not contain shaded surfaces, or that contain Windows Metafile graphics.


Show Lines

This command in the Graph menu toggles the selected cells between showing and not showing lines in PostScript graphics.

A check beside this command name indicates that all the selected cells show lines in their PostScript coding.  To remove all lines from a PostScript cell, select the cell and then uncheck this menu command.  The command has no effect on cells that do not contain lines, or that contain Windows Metafile or bitmap graphics.  Note that a graphic that contains only lines (such as a two-dimensional plot) will disappear completely if this command is unchecked.


Make Lines Thin

This command in the Graph menu toggles the selected PostScript cells between drawing lines at their normal thickness and drawing all lines one pixel wide.

A check beside this command indicates that all the selected cells show lines at a width of one pixel.  This is particularly useful for plots that have been dragged out very large, and whose lines have grown quite thick as a result.  Note that you can also use options to the Mathematica kernel plotting commands (described in The Mathematica Book) to change the line width.  Also note that this command does not affect cells that contain Windows Metafile or bitmap graphics.


Make Standard Size

This command in the Graph menu makes all the selected cells assume their default size.

The graphics cell in the Defaults Notebook determines the default size for PostScript graphics.  When you choose this command, all the selected graphics cells are reset to this default size.  Metafile and bitmap cells are reset to their original size.


Image Conversions
Image Conversions menu

This cascading menu appears when Image Conversions is chosen from the Graph menu.  It lists commands for converting graphics from one format to another.

The options given in the Image Conversions menu are Convert to Input Form and Convert to Bitmap.


Convert to Input Form

This command in the Image Conversions menu converts a Mathematica graphic into a form that can be read as Mathematica input.  A graphic in bitmap format, for example, will be converted into arrays of RGB values.  The input form of even a small graphic requires many times more memory than the graphic itself.  Using Convert to Input Form indiscriminately could quickly exhaust your memory.


Convert to Bitmap

This command in the Image Conversions menu converts all the selected PostScript graphics cells into bitmap cells, which are Paintbrush-like pictures.  This type of picture typically occupies less memory than PostScript or Metafile format, but cannot be printed or resized as well.

The main use for bitmap cells is as a very compact form for complex 3D graphics.  For relatively simple graphics, a bitmap image may actually be larger than the PostScript form.

You can also use Convert to Bitmap to convert Metafile pictures into Paintbrush-like form.  Note that you can't go back to Metafile format once you have converted a graphic into a bitmap.


Animate Selected Graphics

This command in the Graph menu animates the selected graphics cells.

To use this command, you need to have two or more cells that contain graphics (either PostScript, Metafile, or bitmap cells).  Select the cells, and scroll so that the first graphics cell is visible.  (It is often useful to put all the graphics cells for a particular animation in a group, so you can select them all with a single click.)  When you choose this command, Mathematica will cycle through all the images in the selected range in sequence, showing each image in the first selected graphics cell.  To stop the animation, click the mouse anywhere in the Notebook.

This command is most effective if all the selected graphics are about the same size, and if they are related to each other in some way.  Use Align Selected Graphics to align sets of graphics cells for animation.

You can animate PostScript, Metafile, or bitmap cells, and you can mix all three in a single animation.  For examples of animation, see the sample Notebooks that came with Mathematica for Windows.

The speed and direction of the animation can be set using the Animation Settings dialog box (from the Animation command in the Options menu), or controlled with the animation palette.


Animation palette

The animation palette is a window that appears on the screen when an animation is started by using Animate Selected Graphics.  The buttons in the animation palette allow you to change the direction of the animation to forwards, cyclical, or backwards.   You can also slow down or speed up an animation, or you can have it pause, or move backward or forward one frame at a time.  Click anywhere outside the animation palette to stop the animation.

You can transfer animation sequences between Mathematica and other animation programs.


Align Selected Graphics

This command in the Graph menu aligns all the selected graphics cells with the first one in the selection.  This command is useful for aligning graphics cells before using Animate Selected Graphics.

To use this command, you need to have selected two or more cells that contain graphics (either PostScript, Metafile, or bitmap cells).  When you choose this command from the menu, you will get a dialog box asking which edges (left, right, top, or bottom) of the graphics you want to have aligned.  All the selected graphics cells are adjusted so that the chosen edges are aligned with those of the first selected graphics cell.

If you choose to have both the left and right edges aligned, all the graphics will be set to the same width as the first one.  If you choose to have both the top and bottom edges aligned, all the graphics will be made the same height as the first one.   If you choose to have all four edges aligned, all the graphics will end up the same size.


Dialog Box Help
Dialog Boxes

Action SettingsAlign Selected Graphics

Animation Settings

Clipboard Settings

Color Selector

Evaluate Initialization Cells

Find File

Font

Format

Graphics Settings

Input

Interrupt

Kernel Settings

Now Printing

Open/ImportPrint

Printing Options

Quit Kernel

Save As/Export

Save Warning

Style Inspector

3D ViewPoint Selector

Why the Beep?


Why the Beep dialog box
Why the Beep? dialog box

This dialog box is used to display simple error messages.  Mathematica beeps when you try to do something it can't do, or when it doesn't recognize what you've typed as a command.  When you choose Why the Beep? in the Help menu Mathematica shows this dialog box with a message describing the cause of the beep.  For particularly serious problems, Mathematica shows this dialog box automatically, without your having to choose Why the Beep?.

If the last beep occurred some time ago, a status line at the bottom will report the time since the last beep.

Note that Mathematica is not aware of beeps that occur while you are working in dialog boxes or in other application windows.  When you get such a beep and then choose Why the Beep?, the message you get refers to the last beep that Mathematica was able to explain.


Save As dialog box
Save As/Export dialog box

Use this dialog box to save a Notebook on a disk.  It appears when you choose Save/As Export under the File menu.  You can also save a Notebook in a different file type for export to other programs.  For more information about how to select a disk, directory, and filename for your Notebook, please refer to your Windows User Guide.


Open dialog box
Open/Import dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose Open in the File menu.  It allows you to select one of the Notebooks on your disk to open.  You may also import files of other types into Mathematica by opening them.


Find File dialog box

This dialog box appears when Mathematica needs you to find a particular file in order to continue.  At the bottom of the dialog box is a description of the required file.  You should use the standard Windows techniques to look though your disk to find the requested file.  When you've found it, double-click it, and Mathematica will continue.  If you can't find the requested file, click Cancel.  In this case, Mathematica may not be able to do what you want it to.


Font dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose the Font command in the Style menu. It allows you to set the font, font style, size, and special effects (such as underlining) for selected text.


Format dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose the Format command in the Style menu. It lets you determine the alignment and various display attributes for selected cells.


Style Inspector dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose the Format command in the Style menu. It lets you determine the alignment and various display attributes for selected cells.


Kernel Settings dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose Kernel in the Options menu. It lets you determine whether the kernel should be loaded on startup, how much memory should be allocated to the kernel, and how the kernel should be run.


Save Warning dialog box

This dialog box appears when you begin to close a Notebook in which you have made changes.  If you close the Notebook without saving it on a disk, those changes will be lost.

When you click Yes, Mathematica saves the changes made since the previous save.  When you click No, Mathematica closes the Notebook without saving.  The No button reverts the Notebook to the last version saved, or destroys it entirely if it has never been saved before.  When you click Cancel, the Notebook remains open.

Mathematica keeps track of two classes of changes: (1) changes to the contents of the Notebook, which produce the above dialog box, and (2) changes to the state of opened and closed groups in the Notebook.  If the only thing you have done to a Notebook since opening it is to open or close grouped sets of cells, the dialog box will read "Save closed group changes to..." instead of "Save changes to...".  Choosing No will often be the right thing to do in this case.


Print dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose the Print command in the File menu.  It allows you to set options for the printing of Notebooks.  You can set further options by clicking the Setup button to call up the Print Setup dialog box.


 Print Setup dialog box

This dialog box gives further options for setting up printing parameters.

More options are available by clicking the Options button.  This calls up the Print Setup Options dialog box.


Print Setup Options dialog box

This dialog box is used to set options for printing Notebooks.

Advanced options are available by clicking the Advanced button:


Printing Options dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose Printing Options in the Options menu.  It is used to set options for printing a Notebook.  Mathematica saves your new settings with the Notebook, so it will be printed the same way in the future.

If the "Print cell brackets" option is checked, the cell grouping brackets will be printed; otherwise they will not be.

If the "Don't break groups between pages" option is checked, Mathematica will try to keep grouped ranges of cells together on one page, if possible.  This is useful for keeping input and output cells together.

If the "Print multiple pages for wide cells" option is checked, Mathematica will print as many pages as needed to show wide cells (for example, very wide graphics cells) fully.  You can use this option to print out large posters or huge matrices, for example.

If the "Print registration marks" option is checked, Mathematica will print small guide marks bounding the printed area of the page.  This is usually only useful in connection with the "Print multiple pages for wide cells" option.  The registration marks can be used to line up separate pages to make a large poster.

Usually the initial settings of the PostScript, Metafile, and bitmap choices will be the best for your printer.

The four Margins items are used to set the margins from the edges of the printed page (in inches).  The From Window button sets the right margin according to the current size of the window.  If the window is very wide, this setting may be negative.  The Set Window button makes the width of the Notebook's window match the current paper size and margins settings.  This lets you see exactly how the Notebook will look when printed.

The "Starting page number" box allows you to set the page number of the first page of the Notebook.  This is useful if you are going to combine several separate Notebooks into a single printed document with page numbers continuing from one Notebook to the next.  The "Title page" check box determines whether page headers and footers are printed on the first page of the Notebook.  If it is checked, they are not printed.

In the Header and Footer fields you can enter any text you want printed at the top and bottom of each page.  If you include one or more of the following special codes in your text, the appropriate information will be automatically inserted in your header or footer.

_\p    page number

_\f    filename

_\d    date (short form)

_\D    date (long form)

_\a    date (abbreviated form)

_\t    time (hours and minutes)

_\T    time (including seconds)

_\k    keywords of all cells on that page

The font used for headers and footers is determined by the Header and Footer style entries.  For more information about styles see Styles Window in the Window menu.


Graphics printing types

Since Mathematica generates all its graphics output in PostScript form,  you can get much higher quality graphics output from a PostScript-driven printer by sending the PostScript code used to generate the graphics directly to the printer.  If you are using a printer that does not run on PostScript, Mathematica will interpret the PostScript itself, and translate it into a form your printer can accept.  You will lose some quality, but the graphics will print correctly.

Non-PostScript printers can print graphics in two different formats: bitmap and Metafile.  Bitmap is fastest, but gives lower quality than Metafile format.  Choosing Metafile format sends to the printer all the individual commands used to draw the graph.  This gives the best possible graph on a non-PostScript printer, but may take a long time to print, and for some graphics may even cause you to run out of disk space.


Now Printing dialog box

This dialog box appears while Mathematica is printing a Notebook.  It lets you know the page number currently being printed, and lets you interrupt the printing procedure.  If you want to cancel a printing job, click the Cancel button.

Note: It is normal for Mathematica to take a few seconds to respond, and for the printer to keep printing temporarily.

If you just want to pause the printing for a while (for example, to adjust or unjam your printer), click the Pause button.  Again, it may take a few seconds for the printing to stop.  You can resume printing again by clicking the Resume button.

Note: Certain printers will "forget" your print job if you pause too long; when you try to resume printing, the printer will not respond.  If this happens, cancel the print job and try again.  The maximum pause time varies, but it is usually about a minute.  Many printers can pause indefinitely.

Sometimes other dialog boxes will appear on top of this one.  For example, if your printer is not connected properly, you will get a dialog box from the printer software telling you this.  Before you can cancel or pause the print job you need to get rid of such dialog boxes by clicking their OK buttons, or by doing whatever is appropriate for the particular dialog box.


Graphics Settings dialog box

This dialog box is called up when you choose Graphics in the Options menu.  It lets you control the way graphics are drawn, printed, and stored in memory.

The "Cache bitmaps for Metafile cells also" option determines whether bitmap images are cached for Metafile cells, as well as for PostScript graphics cells.  This is usually desirable because it speeds up scrolling and animation, but it does require more memory.  You can do considerably larger Metafile animations (at slower speed) by turning this option off.

Color

If you are very short of memory, you can also select "Draw PostScript graphics in monochrome" under the "Color" heading.  On black-and-white computer systems this option has no effect.

Printer screen density

You will probably not need to change the "Printer halftone screen density" settings very often.  The normal setting is to let the printer choose its own screen.  Each printer that supports a user-settable screen has built-in default values that are known to work well, although they may not be optimal for all situations.


Clipboard Settings dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose Clipboard in the Options menu. It presents options for how PostScript cells in the Mathematica Clipboard should be copied into the Windows Clipboard.  They may be copied as bitmap, metafile, or device-independent bitmap cells.


Quit Kernel dialog box

This dialog box is a warning that you are about to lose all the information contained in your local kernel.  If you don't want this to happen, click Cancel, and you will not leave Mathematica.


Evaluate Initialization Cells dialog box

This dialog box appears when you open a Notebook containing any cells marked as initialization cells.  These cells probably contain definitions that are needed to use the Notebook correctly.  If you want these definitions automatically evaluated (that is, loaded into the kernel), choose Yes.

If you don't want anything to be evaluated, choose No.  You can have these initialization cells evaluated later, by using the Evaluate Initialization command in the Action menu.

If you don't have enough memory to run the kernel,  No.

If you want initialization cells automatically evaluated in the future without this dialog box coming up, you can change the options in the Action Settings dialog box, which is displayed when you choose Action in the Options menu.


Interrupt dialog box

This dialog box appears when you type Alt + . or choose Interrupt from the Action menu during an evaluation.  You can use this dialog box to abort an evaluation, or to examine its progress.  If you click Continue, your evaluation will be completed normally.

If you click Inspect, you will see a scrolling list of the kernel's activity.  You may find the messages somewhat obscure, but they usually give you some idea of what is going on.

If you click Abort, your calculation will be stopped.  The result entered in the Notebook will be a symbol, $Interrupted, representing an interrupted evaluation.  (Under certain conditions you may find the word "Interrupted" showing up in strange places.  For example, if you interrupt a 3D plot at the right point, all the tick mark labels will come out as "Interrupted".)


Input dialog box

This dialog box comes from the kernel "Input" function.  An expression you have asked Mathematica to evaluate requires some information from you before the evaluation can continue.  There should be a message at the top of the dialog box telling you what sort of information to enter.

If you need to enter a string, be sure to put it in quotes, unless the message in the box tells you otherwise.  If you make a syntax error in your response, Mathematica will return you to the dialog box with the insertion point at the place of the problem.


Animation Settings dialog box

This dialog box is called up when you choose Animation in the Options Menu.  It determines the speed and direction of the graphics animations carried out when you choose Animate Selected  Graphics in the Graph menu.

You can choose the speed of graphics animation in frames per second by using the first field in this dialog box.  The maximum speed is determined by how fast Mathematica can show the frames.  If you enter a number larger than about 50, Mathematica will just do the animation as fast as it can.  You can also choose the direction of the animation.  Forward means the graphics in the animated group are shown in order from top to bottom.  Backward means from bottom to top.  Cyclic means from the top, down to the bottom, then backward up to the top again, and repeat.  You can change all of these parameters while an animation is running by using the animation palette or keyboard equivalents, as described under Animate Selected Graphics.

The last two fields allow you to make Mathematica pause for a specified number of seconds at the first and last frames of the animation.  This is useful if these frames show significant beginning and ending points in a transformation.  These options can be changed only in this dialog box.


Align Selected Graphics dialog box

This dialog box is displayed when you choose Align Selected Graphics in the Graph menu.  It asks which edges (left, right, top, or bottom) of the selected graphics cells you want to have aligned.  All the selected graphics cells are adjusted so that the chosen set of edges are aligned with the first selected graphics cell.

If you choose to have both the left and right edges aligned, all the graphics will be set to the same width as the first one.  If you choose to have both the top and bottom edges aligned, all the graphics will be made the same height as the first one.  If you choose to have all four edges aligned, all the graphics will end up the same size.

This command is most useful for aligning graphics cells to be used in an animation (see Animate Selected Graphics in the Graph menu).


Convert to PostScript/InputForm dialog box

This dialog box allows you to choose how the selected Windows Metafile cells will be converted into PostScript commands or Mathematica input form text.

This is a very complex process.  To use it successfully you will need to understand a bit about how Windows and Mathematica deal with pictures and graphics.

Converting to PostScript

Mathematica generates all its graphics in PostScript.  PostScript is a page description language, which means it is a language for describing graphic images on a page.  (This is the language used to transmit text and graphics to many laser printers.)  Because PostScript is a human-readable, textual language, Mathematica allows you to see and edit the textual form of all the graphics that it generates (simply select a PostScript graphics cell and choose Formattedfrom the Cell menu).  The PostScript text of a graphic contains the coordinates of objects in the graphic, together with commands describing those objects.  To learn about the PostScript language, see the PostScript Language Reference Manual and the PostScript Language Tutorial, both published by Addison-Wesley.

Windows has a different way of storing pictures, known as the Metafile standard.  This is a nontextual, binary representation of graphics.  One of the most important features of the Windows system is that pictures in Metafile form can easily be transferred to and from almost any Windows program that deals with pictures, including Mathematica.

Mathematica allows you to import Metafile pictures from other Windows graphics programs.  A picture of this type can be pasted into a Notebook, where it becomes a separate cell, much like a PostScript graphics cell.  Since there is no textual form of a Metafile picture, you cannot unformat or edit Metafile cells.  Metafile pictures come in two main forms, object-oriented and bitmap.  Object-oriented pictures consist of a list of separate objects, such as lines, rectangles, circles, or polygons.  When such a picture is drawn, the individual objects are drawn in sequence to build up the whole picture.   Bitmap pictures consist of a single array of pixel values, which defines the whole picture.  When such a picture is drawn, the whole image is produced at once from this single array.

The individual objects in the picture are translated into the corresponding PostScript drawing commands.  Text in the picture is converted into the special text-drawing commands used by Mathematica (currently all font information is lost in this operation).  Bitmap images are converted into PostScript image or color image commands, depending on how they are stored in Metafile (see below for more information about bitmap conversions).  Special objects known as "regions", which do not have a direct representation in PostScript, are ignored.

When Mathematica converts a picture containing objects drawn or filled with a certain pattern, or in a certain color, it tries to approximate the pattern or color as a solid PostScript color or gray level.  For example, if an object is filled with a black-and-white pattern with every other pixel black, the object will be translated into a 50% gray in PostScript.  When the PostScript form of the picture is rendered on a high-resolution printer, or on a color screen, the filled area can be drawn with a much smoother shading than what existed in the original picture.  (Of course, if the pattern was not just an approximation to a gray level or color, some information will be lost.  Typically, however, fill patterns are merely used as gray or color "dither" patterns.)

You can choose one of three options for how coordinates are converted.  Usually you can just use the default, which is to scale all coordinates so they lie between 0 and 1 in the x direction, and between 0 and the aspect ratio of the picture in the y direction.  (This is the same scaling that Mathematica uses for all its graphics.)  Alternately, you can choose to have the PostScript coordinates be the same as the Windows screen coordinates in the original picture; these are integers, in points.  You also have the option of manually specifying the coordinates.  (The "Automatic Top" option makes the y scale factor the same as the x scale factor, and adjusts the maximum y value accordingly.)

No matter what scaling you choose, the image will come out looking the same on screen, since Mathematica automatically re-scales the graphic to fit into the bounding box, which by default is the same size as the original picture.

The dialog box also contains options allowing you to determine how bitmaps are converted.  PostScript represents bitmaps as arrays of binary numbers, with either 1, 2, 4, or 8 bits per pixel in gray level images, or 1, 2, 4, or 8 bits per gun in RGB color images.  You can choose how many bits to use with the four options near the bottom of the dialog box.  Note that if the original picture contains fewer bits per pixel than what you choose, the smaller number will be used.  The "Convert color bitmaps to gray levels" check box allows you to convert color images into gray level ones.


3D ViewPoint Selector dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose the 3D ViewPoint command in the Prepare Input cascading menu of the Action menu.  It lets you interactively select a viewpoint in three dimensions by rotating a cube.

The currently selected viewpoint is shown by a schematic cube with the x, y, and z axes labeled.  There are three ways of controlling the viewpoint:

  1.  You can change the viewpoint coordinates in the editable text fields in the lower right of the dialog box.

  2.   You can adjust the three scroll bars surrounding the cube.

  3.   You can drag the cube to change the orientation of the viewpoint without changing its distance from the cube.

The text fields and scroll bars can be set to control either the cartesian coordinates x, y, and z, or the spherical coordinates r, theta, and phi, by selecting the corresponding options.

Once you have chosen a viewpoint, you can paste text describing it with the Paste button.  The viewpoint text will be pasted at the current insertion point in the uppermost (most recently active) open Notebook.

The text at the bottom of the dialog box is a template giving the form in which the coordinates will be pasted.  The coordinates are represented in the template by the following special symbols:

     \x   x coordinate

     \y   y coordinate

     \z   z coordinate

     \r   radius

     \t   theta

     \p   phi


Color Selector dialog box

In this dialog box, you can select a color specification to be pasted at the current insertion point.  This dialog box appears when you choose either Bracket Color in the Options menu or Color Selector in the Prepare Input cascading menu of the Action menu. If you have chosen Short Menus the Color Selector command will appear in the Action menu.

If you have a color monitor, the color box allows you to choose a color while seeing it on screen.  When you have chosen the color, click OK to paste the selected color at the current insertion point in the form of a Mathematica RGBColor[red, green, blue] function.

You can choose a color by clicking in the color box, or by specifying HSB (hue-saturation-brightness) or RGB values.  To use the color box, click in the area that has the shade you want.  A marker will appear at the selected point, and the chosen shade will appear in the upper half of the color box to the left of the box.  If you drag the pointer through the box, the color in the box will change as you go.  You can use the scroll bar to the right of the box to increase or decrease its brightness.

Whenever you reposition the marker in the color box, the HSB and RGB values in the boxes below will automatically be set to correspond to the color you have chosen.  You can also change these values by placing the insertion point in the boxes and typing; the marker will reposition itself in the color box accordingly.

The lower half of the color box will retain the color that you selected the last time you used this dialog box.  If you want to reselect this color after looking at a different shade, click on the lower half of the color box.


Action Settings dialog box

This dialog box appears when you choose Action in the Options menu.  It is used to control the way output is displayed. Options are also given for locking input cells, loading initialization cells, and timing evaluations.


Options Menu

Clipboard	Settings for how to change the form of a PostScript cell in the Mathematica Clipboard.  The cell can be copied to the Windows Clipboard in Encapsulated PostScript, metafile, bitmap, or device-independent bitmap formats.

Graphics	Settings for how and when graphics are rendered.  Calls up the Graphics Settings dialog box.

Animation	Settings for the speed and direction of animated graphic sequences.  Calls up the Animation Settings dialog box.

Printing	Lets you choose special options for printing Notebooks

Action	Settings for when and how input cells are evaluated.  Calls up Action Settings dialog box.

Kernel	Settings for the use of the Mathematica kernel.

Bracket Color	Lets you set the color of cell brackets.

Short/Long Menus	Toggles between full and abbreviated displays of menu contents

Ruler Bars	Toggles the display of the ruler and Toolbar at the top of the Notebook window


Clipboard Settings
Clipboard...

This command in the Options menu calls up the Clipboard Settings dialog box, which presents choices for how PostScript cells in the Mathematica Clipboard are to be copied onto the Windows Clipboard.  PostScript cells can be copied in bitmap, Metafile, or device-independent bitmap formats.


Graphics Settings
Graphics...

This command in the Options menu lets you determine how graphics are drawn, printed, and stored in memory.  These choices are presented in the Graphics Settings dialog box.  Any changes you make will be saved in your preferences file and retained in your next session with Mathematica.


Animation Settings
Animation...

This command in the Options menu lets you determine the speed and direction of the graphics animations carried out when you choose Animate Selected Graphics in the Graph menu.  Your options are presented in the Animation Settings dialog box.  Any changes you make will be saved in your preferences file and retained in your next session with Mathematica.


Printing Options
Printing...

This command in the Options menu calls up the Printing Options dialog box, in which you can choose special options for the format of printed Notebooks.

Mathematica prints in what-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) form.  For example, the contents of closed cells and closed groups are not printed, since they are not visible on the screen.


Action Settings
Action...

This command in the Options menu lets you control the way evaluations are made.  The available choices are presented in the Action Settings dialog box.  Any changes you make will be saved in your preferences file and retained in your next Mathematica session.

Evaluation commands are listed in the Action menu.


Kernel Settings
  Kernel...

This command in the Options menu lets you determine which Mathematica kernel should be run, and whether it should be loaded on startup or disabled.


 Bracket Color

This command in the Options menu calls up the Color Selector dialog box and lets you determine the color of cell brackets.


Short/Long Menus

This command in the Options menu toggles between a full listing of commands for each menu and an abbreviated listing.  If Mathematica is currently using the full-length menus, Short Menus will appear in the Options menu, and choosing this command will cause Mathematica to use the abbreviated lists.  While short menus are being used, this command will read Long Menus, and choosing it will return the menus to their full length.


Ruler Bars

This command in the Options menu toggles the display of the ruler and Toolbar at the top of the Notebook window.  When a check appears beside the command name, the ruler and Toolbar are displayed. The ruler lets you control the left and right margins of cells as well as the location of cell names.  The Toolbar displays buttons that correspond to frequently used menu commands.


Key Combination Listing

The following topics give a summary of key combinations and key sequences that can be used with Mathematica for Windows.

File menu commands

Edit menu commands

Cell menu commands

Graph and Action menu commands

Style and Window menu commands


File menu commands

New	Ctrl + N

Open	Ctrl + O

Close	Ctrl + F4

Save	Ctrl + S

Print	Ctrl + P

Exit	Alt + F4


Edit menu commands

Undo	Ctrl + Z

Cut	Ctrl + X

Copy	Ctrl + C

Paste	Ctrl + V

Clear	Ctrl + Del

Select All Cells	Shift-Ctrl + A


Cell menu commands

Formatted	Ctrl + T

Group Cells	Ctrl + G

Ungroup Cells	Ctrl + U

Open/Close Group	Alt + '


Graph and Action menu commands

Play Sound	Shift-Ctrl + P

Animate Selected Graphics	Ctrl + Y

Copy Input from Above	Ctrl + L

Copy Output from Above	Shift-Ctrl + L

Complete Selection	Ctrl + K

3D ViewPoint Selector	Shift-Ctrl + V

Color Selector	Shift-Ctrl + R

Evaluate Selection	Shift + Enter

Evaluate Next Input	Ctrl + Enter

Interrupt	Alt + .


Style and Window menu commands

Cell Style, Title	Alt + 1

Cell Style, Subtitle	Alt + 2

Cell Style, Subsubtitle	Alt + 3

Cell Style, Section	Alt +4

Cell Style, Subsection	Alt + 5

Cell Style, Subsubsection	Alt + 6

Cell Style, Text	Alt + 7

Cell Style, Small text	Alt + 8

Cell Style, Input	Alt + 9

Cascade Windows	Shift +  F5

Tile Windows	Shift + F4

Cycle through open windows	Ctrl + F6