Selecting Objects

Before you can alter an object, you must first select it. Because this is so fundamental to Design Intuition, a wide variety of methods are available. A good rule of thumb to remember: you can always select anything in your design, no matter how complex or unusual.

How many ways are there to select?

You can select an object by doing any of the following:

  1. click on an object in the 2D view
  2. click on a row in the Details view
  3. click on a row in the Materials view
  4. select an item from one of the popups at the top of the Inspector window

You can select a dimension by doing any of the following:

  1. click on a dimension in the 2D view
  2. click on a dimensional row (their background color is green) in the Object inspector or Details view

Did you know that you can select a face of an object?

  1. hold the Shift and Control keys down and click on an object
  2. click on a positional row (their background color is yellow) in the Object inspector or Details view

The object hierarchy

Every object in your design belongs to its containing group. The outermost group contains all the objects and groups contained in your design. When you group objects, this new group is then contained by the outermost group. You can think of it like you think of a family tree: grandparent, parent, children.

There is no limit to the number of levels in a hierarchy (except those imposed by how much memory you have). You can easily have groups contained within groups that are registrants of larger groups ... well, you get the picture.

This arrangement of objects within groups within groups, all contained within the outermost group, is called the object hierarchy. It is useful to keep it in mind when working with Design Intuition.

The entire object hierarchy is presented in the Details view. If you find that something in the 2D view isn't selectable, for a variety of reasons (see below), you can always find it and select it in the Details view.

I can't select something. Why?

  • The object is unselectable (to make it selectable again, see below)
  • The object is contained in a selectable group (to select it, see below, or use the drill-down key)
  • The object is behind another or enclosed inside a larger object (try clicking a second time)

In the latter case, where one object is being obscured by another (and both are otherwise not contained inside an unselectable group), the selection algorithm will switch back and forth between them on consecutive clicks of the mouse.

Controlling object selectability

Any object can be made unselectable. The outermost group begins its life as unselectable. Thus, when you click on an object, the object is selected, rather than the outermost group.

You may find it useful to make a group unselectable, in order to do a lot of editing of the objects within it. To do this, select the group and, in the Object inspector, uncheck the checkbox labeled Selectable, near the top of the inspector. I recommend using this feature sparingly, because of the reason you originally grouped them, whatever it happened to be.

You may find it useful to make an unselectable object selectable. How do you select an object that isn't selectable. If it's a group, the easiest way is to select an object that you know is contained by this unselectable group. Then, near the top of the Inspector window, select the top item in the popup labeled Out. This selects the containing group. Now check the checkbox labeled Selectable, near the top of the Object inspector.

Ack! I made an object unselectable. Now, how do I select it?

Everything (every object, group and attribute) is available and selectable in the Details view. Simply find the object in the object hierarchy and click on it's name. This will select the row that object's name is in. When you switch to the 2D or 3D view, it will remain selected.

The "drill down" key

If you'd like to select an object within a selectable group, you can hold down the Shift and Control keys and click the mouse. This will cause the selection mechanism to ignore the group.

If an object is already selected, the selection mechanism will select something inside it. This process continues until you reach the face of an object.

Try this:

  1. Create an object.
  2. Create another object.
  3. Select and group them.
  4. Create another object containing the group you just created.
  5. Select and group them.
  6. Now, click any object in the group. Notice that the entire group is selected.
  7. This time, hold down the Shift and Control keys and click an object. You'll see that it's selected, not the group. Continue to hold down the Shift and Control keys and click the object again. You'll see that its face is now selected.

Now you can work with individual objects within a group without having to ungroup them!

 

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