Rotating & Scaling a Line.-
It has been already
explained how to move a line (more specifically, how to translate
a line) and how to modify it by changing one of its defining points.
The good news is that the process explained is exactly the same for
all the geometrical objects available in Metagraf. In this paragraph
it will be explained how to rotate and how to scale
objects.
There are two ways of performing this actions: the quick
one and the precise one.
For using the quick
rotation/scaling of an object it should be activated the control
ON state for transformations. This is done by clicking the
bottom-right button of Metagraf's screen, near the small gray window
with the "Ctrl OFF" label.
Clicking this button will change this small window to the one that can be seen below:
If an object was already selected or a new one is selected in this state, in the center of the object one vertical and one horizontal blue lines will be apparent, being the object of red color as corresponding to its selected state. See next figure:
The circles
at the extreme of this lines correspond to points that can be
selected with the mouse cursor. The vertical line serves for scaling
the object and the horizontal for rotating it.
Pressing the mouse
left button with the cursor over one of this points, if the button is
not released, dragging the mouse will move the point and the
scale or angle will be accordingly modified. If the button is
released, the control will be transferred to the arrow-keys of the
keyboard in the same way as explained before.
In this situation,
the points will not change its aspect but if anyone is selected the
color of the object will change from red to purple.
The angle
rotated will be the angle that the rotation line will have with the
horizontal, and the real value of the rotation will be visible in the
big bottom "Text" window, as shown in the next figure:
In the next
paragraph it will be explained how to made this kind of
transformations in a less intuitive but more precise way.
It
should be mentioned that the "Ctrl ON" state can be
deactivated by clicking once more the button used to activate it or,
more simply, just by clicking the right-mouse button. Also, for those
using a mouse with three buttons, clicking the center button
activates this state.
It is recommended to deactivate this state
once it has been used.
Madrid, January 2006 |
|