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topic: 1265Pegging group onto notch
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posted: 6 Oct 2010 19:51

from:

Paul Boyd
 
Loughborough - United Kingdom

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Hi Martin

One area of Templot I have a question about is pegging a group onto a notch.  What always seems to happen is that the peg is never in the right position on the template within the group.  What I'm doing is to delete that template to current, putting the peg in the right place, storing it to the background then doing the Group select => Toggle thing, noting the warning about the group being linked to the notch.  The whole group can then be correctly positioned.

This feels clunky, so the first question is:- am I doing this the right way or have I missed something? What would be nice is to be able to shift the peg around within the group as if the whole group was a current template, but I guess that would be a tricky thing to sort out...

...which is where you say "but that's exactly what you can do by..." :D

Cheers

posted: 6 Oct 2010 21:05

from:

Martin Wynne
 
West Of The Severn - United Kingdom

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Paul Boyd wrote:
...which is where you say "but that's exactly what you can do by..." :D
Hi Paul,

No I don't. You are quite right. It's clunky. :)

The way you are doing it is the way I do it, and every time I think to myself "this is no good, it needs something better". :(

Pegging an entire group isn't something you do very often, so it doesn't need to be ultra-slick. But I agree the present function is frustratingly cumbersome.

In 074b there was a function to swap the peg on a background template to the opposite end, but it seems to have got lost in 091c. Even then it was a nuisance to remember to do it first.

I will add a sub-menu to put the notch under any peg position on a background template, similar to the existing sub-menu on snap the control template onto background template.

Thanks Paul for giving me a prod. :)

regards,

Martin.

posted: 7 Oct 2010 19:39

from:

Paul Boyd
 
Loughborough - United Kingdom

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Hi Martin

I'm glad it's not just me!  You're right - it isn't something that's done often, which is why I have to remember how it works each time.  I'll actually be doing the "Shift group onto notch" function on track that's already laid - I'm moving the station "throat" a foot to the right to give a longer platform, but I decided to do this five years after building the track :?  That sub-menu you mentioned sounds just the job.

Edit - I meant just the job within Templot, not on already-built track :)

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Last edited on 7 Oct 2010 19:48 by Paul Boyd
posted: 8 Oct 2010 13:31

from:

JFS
 
United Kingdom

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Hello All,

Maybe this is not something that we do very often - but it is unbelievably powerful and very, very useful, especially in complex situations.

I wonder Martin, if you are thinking about making changes here, if it would be possible to create "permanent" groups which could then be selected and manipulated as a single entity and appear as such in the storage box until an "Ungroup" button was clicked (at which time of course the "regoup button would become active). They could then have a common set of peg positions which would then mean that when you had created some partial template masterpiece, it could be moved around like a simple template. I am hoping that such a thing would be only a *simple development* of the 'Remember Group As' action - the biggest issue with that being that it is not saved between sessions.(new set of Box File structures needed???)

Alright, I know that we are supposed to do all the juggling around BEFORE we fiddle with partial templates, but I find that (especially when in a tight corner) it is only when you do the detailing that you realise that you have created something which would be near impossible to build from "real" components. By that point, making changes is a start-again job.

Best Regards,

Howard.

posted: 8 Oct 2010 15:02

from:

Martin Wynne
 
West Of The Severn - United Kingdom

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JFS wrote:
I wonder Martin, if you are thinking about making changes here, if it would be possible to create "permanent" groups which could then be selected and manipulated as a single entity
Hi Howard,

I've looked at this several times. It always gets extremely complicated when you get into the details -- for almost every function in Templot you have to decide what to do if a combined template is selected instead of a single template. You also need a clear way of indicating on the pad which templates are part of such a combined template, and which are not. When you ungroup them to edit a single template you lose the group selections, and have to tediously reselect the group every time. Then there is the whole question of nesting one combined template inside another.

All things are possible in the code but it just gets too difficult to create a sensible user interface and write the Help notes. I get enough stick as it is from users saying it is all too complicated! :) Such combined items are possible on the sketchboard, and I'm dreading the task of writing the Help notes for it.

At present the preferred method is to group by marker colour -- which unlike the clunky "remembered groups" function (due for the chop) is saved in the file. Just select the group and set a unique marker colour for it. Then when you want to recreate the group, group > group select > select by marker colour... menu item. Marker colours apply only to the pad, they are not used for printing (for printing in different colours use mapping colours). The advantage of this method is that it is self-indicating on the pad, it doesn't need any other indication of which templates are in which group. You retain access to the individual templates, and you can move them into or out of the group just by changing their marker colour and then reselecting the group. In effect the colour becomes a visible "tag".

Don't forget also that you can keep your groups each in its own file (save group menu item) and add them onto the pad only as needed. When adding them, there is an option on the storage box to create a new group from the templates added.

regards,

Martin.

posted: 8 Oct 2010 19:06

from:

Martin Wynne
 
West Of The Severn - United Kingdom

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Hi Paul, Howard,

When pegging a group, here's a trick you can try -- use F7 snapping as a quick way to get the notch on a free end of a background template; and then use the cycle notch function to move it back there after linking: :)



(Video may take a few seconds to load.)

regards,

Martin.

posted: 8 Oct 2010 20:31

from:

JFS
 
United Kingdom

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Hi Martin,

Many thanks for this - you will have detected that my tougue was firmly in my cheek when I talked about a *simple development!*

I have not made use of the Group by marker colours nor really the Save Group, but it now strikes me that these things might be useful. I have a memory of seeing you use the marker colour facility in a video somewhere.

I will have a play with these and see how I get on.
I suspect that there is a "Proper Procedure" to manage groups to deliver some of the functionality I am looking for but it is an example of one of those things you are unlikely to stumble across in Learn By Doing mode - I wonder if this might be a good case for a little demo video?


Best Regards,

Howard.

posted: 10 Oct 2010 16:25

from:

Paul Boyd
 
Loughborough - United Kingdom

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Hi Martin
When pegging a group, here's a trick you can try -- use F7 snapping as a quick way to get the notch on a free end of a background template; and then use the cycle notch function to move it back there after linking: :)
That looks worth a go - thanks.  I'll also try the marker colours thingy - although I do use the "remembered groups" I was disappointed that they weren't saved.  I didn't know (or had long forgotten) the "select group by marker colour" option.

Cheers

posted: 7 Jun 2012 10:52

from:

Martin Wynne
 
West Of The Severn - United Kingdom

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Martin Wynne wrote:
I will add a sub-menu to put the notch under any peg position on a background template, similar to the existing sub-menu on snap the control template onto background template.

Thanks Paul for giving me a prod. :)

But not a firm enough prod, because it's taken me 18 months: :)

2_070536_170000000.png2_070536_170000000.png

This will be in the next Templot2 update.

(If you simply want to move the peg on the background template without putting the notch under it, hold down the SHIFT key while clicking the sub-menu item.)

Notice that the current peg position (CTRL-5 TXP in this case) is greyed out in the sub-menu -- moving the peg to its existing position is meaningless.

I've listed as many peg positions as seems sensible in the sub-menu. If you want to move it to some other position it will be necessary to delete the template to the control, as previously. (Or set one of the other peg positions as the user-defined position.)

regards,

Martin.

posted: 7 Jun 2012 17:50

from:

Paul Boyd
 
Loughborough - United Kingdom

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Wow - thanks, Martin - that's brilliant!  That menu really will make life easier.  I promise not to make any more comments along the lines of "not doing any more coding" :D

Looking forward to the next release...

posted: 25 Jul 2012 03:09

from:

Martin Wynne
 
West Of The Severn - United Kingdom

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Martin Wynne wrote:
At present the preferred method is to group by marker colour -- which unlike the clunky "remembered groups" function (due for the chop) is saved in the file.

Just select the group and set a unique marker colour for it. Then when you want to recreate the group, group > group select > select by marker colour... menu item. Marker colours apply only to the pad, they are not used for printing (for printing in different colours use mapping colours).

The advantage of this method is that it is self-indicating on the pad, it doesn't need any other indication of which templates are in which group. You retain access to the individual templates, and you can move them into or out of the group just by changing their marker colour and then reselecting the group. In effect the colour becomes a visible "tag".

I've resurrected this topic to mention the new Templot2 sorting functions on the storage box. This is especially useful for a group of partial templates such as a slip or tandem.

When creating the templates, give them all a suitable prefix (or suffix) on the name, such as abc- or yard-tandem-, or whatever.

Then on the storage box the box > find and group... menu item puts them all in a group when you enter the prefix.

This does require some thought in advance when creating the templates and setting the names, because at present there is no function to modify the names of a group of templates all in one go. I will have a look at adding that. :)

See also: topic 1238

regards,

Martin.



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