On-screen grid

To help you lay out your document, Xara can display a grid on the screen (the grid appears only on the screen; it is never exported or printed.) The grid helps you align objects (similar to using graph paper as a drawing aid).

Right click and choose "Show Grid/Guides" > "Show Grid" to turn display of the grid on/off or choose "Snap to" > "Snap to Grid". You can also choose "Window" > "Snap to Grid".

The grid points then act like magnets, and as you move objects, they snap to the nearest grid point. By default web documents have "Snap to grid" on, with a 1 pixel grid.

The type of grid (isometric/rectangular), the 0,0 point (the origin), and spacing of grid points is controlled by the Grid & Rulers tab of the options dialog box. Any changes you make apply only to the selected document.

Magnetic object snapping is also enabled by default in web documents (Designer Pro, Web Designer). Object snapping is a very powerful way of accurately aligning lines, points and the edges of objects to any other object so they exactly touch.

You can even use this to align the centers of objects, or align objects to the center of the page, or align them horizontally and vertically anywhere in the middle of the page or edge of the page.

To toggle object snapping, click the Snap to objects button or right click and choose "Snap to" > "Snap to Objects". You can also choose "Window" > "Snap to Grid".

Refer to Object Handling for details on snapping to grid and snapping to objects.

 

Copyright © Xara