imPrintX

Drawing on an iPad

Every tool by finger or Apple Pencil: tap, drag, the chip that finishes a run, the selection bar, and long-press.

4 min read

  1. Tap to place, drag to move

    With a device or drawing tool armed, a tap places one device or one point, once. In Select, drag a device, a wall, a wall corner, a run, the end of a run, a bend, a room or its corners, or a camera's aim handle to move it. A finger has to travel about 8 pixels before a press becomes a drag, so a tap never nudges anything; an Apple Pencil needs only 4.

  2. Two fingers move the sheet

    Pinch to zoom and drag with two fingers to pan, from any tool. A second finger ends whatever the first one had started, so a pinch never drags a device or draws a box.

  3. Finish, Undo point, Cancel

    While a wall run, a cable run or a roof plane is being drawn, a chip floats at the top of the sheet. Finish ends it where it is and keeps the tool armed, the way Enter does (a wall needs two points, a run a second point, a roof plane three corners). Undo point takes back the last point you placed. Cancel drops the one you are drawing.

  4. The selection bar

    When something is selected, a bar at the top of the sheet offers Duplicate, Copy, Paste and Delete, four arrows that nudge the selection a step (hold an arrow to keep moving), and, for a single run, Add bend and Remove bend. Add bend puts a bend in the middle of the run's longest leg; Remove bend takes the bend you last held, or the last one. These are the same actions as ⌘D, ⌘C, ⌘V, Delete and the arrow keys.

  5. Selecting several things

    In Select, drag one finger across empty sheet to draw a box: everything inside it is selected. Turn on Add to selection in the bar and each tap or box adds to what is selected instead of replacing it, the way Shift does with a mouse. Tap it again to turn it off.

  6. Long-press

    Hold a finger still on a device, a run or a wall for half a second to open its menu (Delete, Duplicate, Deselect). Hold a finger on an icon in the bars to see its name, since there are no tooltips on a touch screen. To see the other tools in a group, tap the armed tool again.

  7. Typing

    When the on-screen keyboard is up, Properties shortens so the field you are typing in stays above it.

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