NewDeal Hot Tip 1203

[Hot Tips for...] NewDraw

NewDraw Tips, Line Ends, Spirals and More

Line Ends

Lines created with the single straight line tool have squared-off ends. Polylines have curved ends. You can draw a single curved-end line with the polyline tool, but you can't draw a multi-section polyline with squared ends.

Spiral Technique

You can draw a pretty accurate spiral this way:

First set up a Grid and Snap To Grid of .25 inch. Using the straight Polyline Tool , click on three sides of a square. The next click goes to the next outer square and three sides around. Keep clicking around in ever-widening squares.

When it is as big as you want, select all points except the starting and ending points (hold CTRL key). Then, go to Transform, Polyline, Make Curve Point(s) and click. Eliminate the grid and enlarge or reduce the spiral line as you wish. Then select the ending outer straight point by itself and adjusted it out a little with Snap turned off for more accuracy.

Find the Horizontal Center

Here's a quick and easy way to find the horizontal center of any NewDraw object:
  1. Create a text box starting from the left edge of the object and ending at the right edge of the object.
  2. Set text justification to center.
  3. Type the "pipe" character: | (a shifted backslash)
That's it! You can use the pipe character as a guide to drawing a vertical rule, positioning another object, or whatever! When you're done, just delete it.
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Last Modified 2 Mar 1999