Re: Family Tree

[Michael Ross <michael e ross gmail com>]

Wayne,

You will find the polyline most useful for this as the ends and intermediate nodes are all amenable to object snapping.  To keep it all squared up you can turn on the grid snap.  

The function of snapped objects is trick - if you snap  polyline to a box and grab the line between end points the whole line moves, but if you grab the box the snapped to line follows it.  Play around with the Dia I sen you to see how the various properties work. 

The zigzag line is has its nice orthogonal property, but you can't snap to the grips in between corners, can't snap to the corners, only the end points.

You can edit the default properties of the basic functions such as text by double clicking on them in the tool box.  You might want to sdo this with the test tool and set the justification to Center, maybe change the back ground color and turn it on, and so on.

Once a properties box is open you do not have to close it to use it on other or multiple entities.  Just pick apply then double click on another entity to get it properties.  You can do text one time then double click a line and the box switches to line properties.

I think you will find these to hints useful.  Try out the Tree shape for sure.

You can also make up a group of items like a connection point a box and text once they are together as you like and they become immune to getting disarrayed among themselves.  Then you can ungroup them for editing.  After grouping you can still snap to their connection points.  This can be a time saver.

On Tue, Mar 11, 2014 at 8:38 AM, Wayne Babb <wayne babb gmail com> wrote:

I have the same problem as this post:-

"On Wed, Aug 22, 2012 at 8:39 AM, Julian Hagenauer <hagenauer uni-heidelberg de> wrote:

Hi,
i want to draw a tree.
The nodes should be text, and lines should connect the nodes.
With dia it seems not possible to connect text with lines"

In my case the top text would be the parents names, with a short vertical line down to join the horizontal "childrens" line. This would have the next short vertical lines down, 1 to 17 (in my tree) with the kids names underneath, suitably spaced and aligned.

If it is possible, please be kind enough to advise which tools etc I must use ( i am a newbie).

P.S. What is ""Get the Electric palette and bring out a "Connection point". ""

mentioned in the above post reply?

Thanking you in advance,

Wayne Babb

.

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