+x

 

Rob Robinson - 8/7/2017 1:08:16 PM

Thanks for the questions:

-‌ How do you duplicate a drawing?‌‌
It depends on your objective: because SD7.2 is project-based, where a project is comprised of products or, more accurately, Product Instances, you have to consider whether you want to create a duplicate drawing representing the same Product Instances, or a new drawing containing different Product Instances.  Because of this there is no 'Duplicate Drawing' command, instead you do the following.  Either;
a‌) Copy the current drawing, create a new drawing tab and Paste - this creates a new drawing representing the same Product Instances, or,
b‌) Copy and Paste into the current drawing - this creates new Product Instances - then Cut, create a new drawing, and Paste.  This moves the new Product Instances into the new drawing.

-‌ connector types on blocks‌.
T‌his is under consideration.  There is some debate over whether a connector type belongs on the symbol, or the Cable.  Presumably it's only important to show the connector type if the port is connected to a cable - would you agree?  Or should connector types be shown on the symbol whether the port is connected or not? Can you share a graphic example of how you would  expect connector types to be shown?

I‌f you want to represent connector types alphanumerically, e.g. "A", "B", "RJ45", "XLR3" etc, then you can simply use the Start and End labels on cables.‌  

‌‌To add graphical representations of connector types you can edit UDP symbols or just add 'connector' symbols as you need then, using the Symbol Browser. 

-‌ Is there an ability to rearrange the port order or hide ports from a block?
T‌here are several tools and techniques; again, the right approach depends on your objective.
a‌) If you want to make a permanent change to a symbol for periodic re-use, create a User Defined Product and use the Symbol Editor to adjust the symbol.  The Movie "Adding New Products" might be helpful, at https://www1.stardraw.com/stardraw/sd7/movies‌‌
b‌) If you just want to hide unused IO stubs, go to the View menu and choose Hide Stubs.
c‌) Objects in symbols can be edited, moved and deleted (but never added) using the Unlock Cursor.  This is a cursor mode that ignores the group hierarchy in symbols and other compound objects, 'drilling down' to the base object, like Line, Rectangle, Text etc, to allow ad-hoc changes to the symbol in the drawing.  So, with the Unlock Cursor you could, for example, delete stubs and labels and even adjust the symbol outline to optimize spacing for connected ports only.

I‌ hope this is helpful.‌