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Copy & Paste


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Many topics on this board wind up by asking for yet another new tool - me, I would settle for some of the very elementary ones to work properly.

Take Copy & Paste - say you have a line drawn at a certain angle and you want to rotate another object, say a rectangle, to match. You select the line, and Copy the angle text from the OIP. Then you select the rectangle, go to Rotate and try to Paste in the text angle you copied - but you can't. Paste is greyed out, you have to physically type in the angle.

What about Find/Replace Text? Surely that would work? No it doesn't, you have to type in the text you want to change as well as the corrected version, you can't Paste into either box.

I hope someone can tell me I'm wrong and I'm doing something wrong!

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On my Windows PC I can paste text anywhere in VW that I can type text, including any OIP cell, the angle cell of the Rotate command's pop-up window, and the Find and Replace strings. That's always been the case, as far as I can remember. Sorry, I can't think of any reason why it's not working on your Mac.

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Katie

Thank you for your reply - I am impressed that you are working at 6:21pm on a Sunday evening!

However, I don't understand your reply - the 2 respondents above imply that they can copy and paste as I want to, so why can't I?

I don't use keyboard shortcuts, my memory is incapable of remembering the 1001 possible commands!

Why though isn't the paste menu active when I am in a dialog box (I assume you mean Rotate)? To me, that's the intuitive way to do it - select the text, copy it, select the object I want to rotate, paste the text into the Rotate box. This box is highlighted, so it is ready for text - why can't it accept text from the Copy memory?

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Ahh...well I never use copy or paste from the menu. Just tried that and couldn't do it. In all Mac programs the shortcut is the same so I've been using commandX,C or V long before I began using vWorks.

I guess you can't use another menu command if one is already running...the dialog box for rotate or find/replace for example.

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Yes, same with Windows version. Can't use the pull-down menus of the main window while in a sub window. In any program.

Sorry, it never occurred to me that you were trying to use a pull-down menu to Copy and Paste. I've never done that. For me those are always F3 and F2.

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I think ccroft is right, if one menu command has a window open, the other menus will be inactive.

cntrl/cmmd z,x,c,v (undo,cut,copy,paste) work in almost every application, on either mac or windows, and may be your only option here. HTH

For what it's worth, and I'm sure most of the users here would agree, learning some of the basic keyboard shortcuts can really increase your productivity. I draft with one hand on the mouse, and the other on the keyboard, and rarely need to touch the menu bar, as many of the basic commands are available with a single keypress.

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OK, I see how to use the shortcuts, only they're not shortcuts at all in terms of saving keystrokes, not this time anyway.

I have to select the angle and then hit command, C (3 keystrokes, my own way 2), there's no shortcut for rotate, so I have to go to a pull down menu anyway, then back to the keyboard for command, V to place the text - my preferred way (if the program would allow), pull down menu to rotate, pull down menu to paste and let go. Another keystroke saved and I wouldn't have to go from screen to keyboard and back to screen.

Why command, V? Because P is already used for Print. But why V, where is the logic in that? It all sounds a bit Windowsish.

For me, using menus instead of the keyboard is faster, more intuitive, and more Mac like. It would be nice to have the choice.

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I agree with Mr Ormsby. I focus on 20-30 basic commands and it really helps and is definitely faster. I printed a copy of the keyboard shortcuts out and kept it handy by my keyboard. Over time I learned the one's I use the most and menu the rest so far.

I am not certain exactly why you can't menu paste into a textbox but with regard to shortcut speed, one can select the text or object and while holding down the Command key hit D,L,C,V in succession and this will duplicate,rotate,copy and paste quite a bit faster than menu commanding each step.

You seem to be happy with menus and that is fine but I don't think you'll find it faster in the grand scheme of things once you learn the 20 or so you use the most. Seriously. I am glad I did. Fortunately I didn't already know enough about CAD to be concerned that things aren't always "intuitive". I think the word intuitive is inappropriately used with regard to computer processes. It all has to be learned sometime.

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On my machine, the "=" key activates interactive rotate, and typing it twice opens the requestor - many VW commands work this way, a single press activates the tool, and a double press opens the requestor. (The "A" key being one of my most used - turning "snap to grid" on and off, or the double tap opens the grid snap settings box).

I think the "v" is about placement - as I mentioned cmmnd+z,x,c,v are among the most common commands needed - undo,cut,copy,paste - and they all neatly adjacent to each other. More of a qwerty thing than windows - I seem to recall these commands working on the C64 and they may even predate ms-dos.

BTW, these 4 keys by themselves are very useful in VW

z = pan

x = select

c = zoom in (a double tap zooms in %50 on the cursor)

v = zoom out (a double tap zooms out %50 on the cursor)

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I think it's the operating system (both MacOS and Windows) that prevents using the pull-down menus of the main window while in a sub window. It's the same in all applications I have. So the only way VW could get around that would be to have pull-down menus built into each of the palettes.

But if you just want to use the mouse to copy and paste, you could get a two-button mouse (if that isn't too unMaclike), and use the other button to get pop-up copy and paste options anywhere.

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