Re: Asked before, now again with more questions attached

[RittervomNie web de]

Am Donnerstag, 9. September 2004 17:10 schrieb Jim Clark:
> I wonder if there is some way to specify the place or item on which the
> alignment tool works. What I mean is this; I have a box where I want it,
> and I want to align another box with the first one. If I choose Center (my
> usual choice) it aligns them against some intermediate, self-determined
> meridian. I do not see where/how/if I can specify (and cannot really
> imagine how such thing would be specified) to say Align Item B with Item A.

Just use "vertical"->"top" (select both objects before). "top" or "bottom" use 
the upper or lower border, center uses the center of each object. (or 
"horizontal", if you want them to be in a row. You see, makes sense :-) )

> If there's some other way to do this, I'd be happy to hear.

or to read...

> So, in a similar vein, is there a way to specify the distance when I do a
> spread out vertically? Is there a setting somewhere that tells it how far
> to space the boxes, or does it average the existing distances and make them
> that distance apart?

I found no context menu but I'd guess, if you select more than two objects and 
choose "horizontal"->"same distance" ("same distance" is also guessing, my 
menus are german :-) ) dia calculates the average distance and applies this 
to all selected objects.

The basic alignment concept behind dia allows scaling _after_ you got all 
elements together, it would make no sense to use numbers for layouting, user 
numbers later, for scaling (before printing on micro dots or plotting on 
sticky foil to attach it to trains :-) )

> Thanks-
>
> Jim Clark

Were this the answers to your questions?