Arrange menu

Move the selected object forward by one layer. The selected object becomes the back object in the new layer. In an animation document, this option is Move To Next Frame.

Bring to Front (Arrange control bar or Ctrl+F)

Or right click and choose Arrange > Bring to Front.

Move the selected object to the front of all other objects in the same layer. See Object Handling for more information.

Move Forwards (Arrange control bar or Ctrl+Shift+F)

Or right click and choose Arrange > Move Forwards.

Move the selected object one step towards the front (refer to Object Handling).

Move Backwards (Arrange control bar or Ctrl+Shift+B)

Or right click and choose Arrange > Move Backwards.

Move the selected object one step towards the back (refer to Object Handling).

Put to Back (Arrange control bar or Ctrl+B)

Or right click and choose Arrange > Put to Back.

Move the selected object behind all others in the same layer (refer to Object Handling).

Move To Layer Behind (Arrange control bar or Ctrl+Shift+D)

Or right click and choose Arrange > Move to Layer Behind.

Move the selected object one layer backwards. The selected object becomes the front object in the new layer. In an animation document, this option is Move To Previous Frame.

Group (Arrange control bar or Ctrl+G)

Or right click and choose Group.

Group the selected objects together to appear as a single object (refer to Object Handling).

Ungroup (Arrange control bar or Ctrl+U)

Or right click and choose Ungroup.

Split the group or groups into separate objects. Dimmed unless the selected object is a group. Or, for several selected objects, there is at least one group.

Apply soft group (Ctrl+Alt+G)

Or right click and choose Apply soft group.

Make the selected objects form a soft group. Unlike groups, soft groups can include objects on different layers. Refer to Object Handling for details.

Remove soft group (Ctrl+Alt+U)

Or right click and choose Remove soft group.

Disband the selected soft group, so the objects are separately selectable objects again.

Apply/Remove ClipView (Q/Alt+Q)

This option reads:

Apply ClipView when there are two or more objects selected.

Remove ClipView when there is a ClipView selected.

For Apply ClipView, the rear object in the selection (the object behind the other selected objects) 'clips' or 'masks' the other objects (the effect is similar to viewing the other objects through a window the shape of the rear object). Remove ClipView removes any clipping applied to the objects in the ClipView. See Object Handling.

Apply opacity mask

Shortcut to quick apply an opacity mask, see Opacity masks in chapter Transparency .

Flatten photo group

Converts a photo group to a single bitmap.

Alignment (Ctrl+Shift+L)

Or right click and choose Align.

Used to align several objects. Has no effect when a single object is selected (refer to Object Handling for more information).

Join Shapes (Arrange control bar or Ctrl +J)

Used to create holes within shapes (refer to Shape Handling for more information).

Break Shapes (Arrange control bar)

Cancels a Join Shapes command (refer to Shape Handling for more information).

Combine Shapes (Arrange control bar)

The Combine Shapes sub-menu lets you:

Add shapes together.
Or subtract the top shape from the other shapes.
Or discard parts of other shapes not covered by the top shape.
Or use the top shape to slice the other shapes.

Or use intersecting shapes to create slices of the grouped shapes.

Only shapes in the selection are combined. Unselected shapes do not change (refer to chapter Shape handling for more information).

Convert Line to Shape

This option converts a line into a shape.

Convert to Editable Shapes (Arrange control bar Ctrl+Shift+S)

Convert predefined objects such as rectangles, ellipses, and text into shapes, i.e. Designer no longer sees them as rectangles, ellipses or text but as a collection of straight and curved lines.

Create Bitmap Copy (Ctrl+Shift+C)

Create Bitmap Copy creates a bitmap version of the selected objects.

Fit Text to Curve/Remove Text From Curve

Or right click and choose Fit Text to Curve/Remove Text From Curve.

Lets you fit a line of text to an arbitrary curve or remove text from a curve (see Text Handling for more information).

Repelling and Anchoring

Or right click and choose Repel text under, Anchor to text or Repelling and Anchoring.

Make the object repel underlying text, and anchor an object within a column of text. See Repelling text objects and Anchored Graphics for details.

Create Navigation Bar

This command allows you to create a navigation bar from a single button. Read more in chapter Navigation bars.

Repeating object

The Repeating object sub-menu lets you:

Repeat on all pages (Shift+Ctrl+Alt+R) The selected object will be copied to the same place on all pages.

Stop repeating (Shift+Ctrl+Alt+O) Turns off the repeating nature of the object - either for the selected object only, or all copies of the object.

See Repeating objects for more information.

Live copy

The Live copy sub-menu lets you:

Create Live Copy (Shift+Ctlr+Alt+C) - the selected object is turned into an instance of a live copy

Stop Live Copy - turns off the the live copy object, either for the selected object only, or all copies of the object.

See Live Copies for more information.