Selecting Objects

When you select an object, you distinguish it from other, unselected objects, so that when you choose a command or apply a color, Canvas X Draw knows to apply it to the selected object. In most cases, you select objects first, then apply a command or attribute. If you can’t apply an attribute, or a command is not available, check to be sure you have correctly selected an object first.

Canvas X Draw provides several tools and commands for you to select objects. Use the most convenient method for each situation. The Selection tools are the primary object-selection tools. You can also use the Select All and Find commands from the Edit menu to select objects.

In some cases, you can select parts of objects; e.g., you can select an anchor point within a vector object, a word within a text object, and an image area within a paint object. Selection techniques for various types of objects are described in the drawing, text editing, and image editing sections of the manual.

Selecting Objects with Selection Tools

	Selection tool: Select this tool when you need to Select a single object. To select multiple objects, you can Shift-click.
	Direct Edit Selection tool: This tool allows you to select all curve- edit points of an object in one step. Click this tool and then click on a vector object to place that object into Edit mode.
	Direct Group Selection tool: Using this tool, you may select individual or multiple objects within a group without the need to ungroup the object.
	Lasso Selection tool: Select this tool and then encircle or draw a line around an object or series of objects. Doing this will select all of the objects that are touching the selection. You can also use this tool to select objects by simply drawing a line through them.
	Direct Edit Lasso tool: You can quickly edit any path point of an object by enclosing it with this tool. This feature places the object or objects into Edit mode and highlights the edit points that fall inside the selection area drawn by the Direct Edit Lasso Tool. Likewise, you may also draw a line through an object to allow editing of a path point.
	Ink/Stroke Selection tool: You can select one object with specific attributes and every object sharing those attributes will also be selected. From the Properties bar, choose whether to select objects with shared Pen Inks, Fill Inks, or Strokes. Select None from the Group Level drop-down menu to ignore grouped objects in your selection.

To Select One Object:

Click a selection tool in the Toolbox.
Click an object.

To Select Multiple Objects:

Do one of the following:

Hold down Shift, and click each object you want to select.
With the Selection tool, drag a selection box around objects to select them. Canvas X Draw selects all objects inside the selection box.

To Select All Objects on a Single Layer:

Choose Edit | Select All to select every object in a single-layer document.

To select all objects on all visible layers in a multi-layer document, change the default selection setting in the Configuration Center. (See Setting Preferences.)

To Hide a Selected Object:

Choose Object | Hide Selected Objects.

Locked objects cannot be hidden. If a locked object is selected, this menu option is disabled.

To Show All Hidden Objects:

Choose Object | Show All Hidden Objects.

Selection Methods

The following table gives you a quick description of all the methods for selecting objects.

To select	Do this
A single object	Click the object with a Selection tool.
Multiple objects	Shift-click each object with a Selection tool.
Objects using a selection box	Drag a box around the objects with a Selection tool.
All objects touched by a selection box	With a selection tool, press Ctrl and drag out a box that touches the objects.
One object within a group object	Click the object with the Direct Group Selection tool (hollow arrow).
Multiple objects within a group	Click the Direct Group Selection tool and drag your cursor over the objects' boundaries. If an object's boundaries are not completely contained within the area being dragged over, the object will not be selected.
No objects (deselect all objects)	Click a Selection tool in a blank area, or press Esc.
All objects	Choose Edit \| Select All.
The inverse of the current selection	Choose Edit \| Invert Selection.
An object behind another object	Tab-click the object’s location until it is selected.
Unfilled object	Click the object’s border, or press Tab and click inside the object.
An object on a layer other than the current layer, or an object on a master page	Tab-click the object with a Selection tool.
All objects created by a particular tool	Select the tool, then choose Edit \| Select All.
Objects based on their attributes	Choose Edit \| Find.

Selection Indicators

Canvas X Draw indicates that an object is selected by displaying the object’s bounding box, a rectangle with solid blue squares, called handles, at each corner and side midpoint.

A bounding box with handles surrounds a selected object

The first object selected is called the key object. The key object is indicated with solid blue squares in the bounding box. If several objects are selected, the other selected objects have solid white squares in their respective bounding boxes. The key object may affect alignment and distribution of the other objects. (See Aligning and Distributing Objects.)

If 1000 or more objects are selected, bounding boxes around each individual object will not be displayed. Instead, one large selection boundary will be drawn.

When an object is selected, its bounding box is visible even if it has attributes (the same color as the background, for example) that make the object itself invisible. Also, a selected object’s bounding box is visible even if it’s covered by other objects.

When selected, Canvas X Draw displays the object type at the right end of the Status bar. When more than one object is selected, the Status bar shows the number of selected objects.

To Change the Key Object:

The key object in a selection can be changed via the context menu.

To Switch the Key Object with Multiple Objects Selected:

Select the objects and then right-click the object that you want to be the key object. Select Make Key Object in the context menu. Note that this change is only temporary.

To Add the Key Object to a Selection:

Select one object, (by default it’s the key object). Press Shift and right-click the object that you want to add to the selection but also designate as key object. Select Make Key Object in the context menu. The object becomes part of the selection as well as the key object.

Selecting Objects

Selecting Objects

Selecting Objects