Selecting Lines not Shapes ... how?

[Rob Schneider]

I'm new to Visio 2003, but have had long experience with Visio before a
Microsoft product. I want to select all Lines but not the shapes (or
visa versa). I can't find this level of control in Visio 2003. Is it
available somewhere, or in controlled by a setting (or macro)?

My hunch this not available. If this true, then then why was this ever
removed?

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

What method did you select lines in a previous Visio version? I'm not aware
of one.

If your line are on a different layer than the other shapes in the drawing,
you can choose Select by Type from the Edit menu to accomplish your task.

 

[Rob Schneider]

Mark, thanks for your followup. My recollection (and to confirm this I
will look this up in the manual when I get home later today), is that on
Edit/Select by Type menu command the options distinguished between types
of shapes more than it does now and included the option to select
"lines", and "shapes". The simple example of the value of this is to
select all the lines and change line weight without changing line
weights of unselected shape objects.

(Maybe I'm confusing this functionality with Designer or something, but
I don't think so ... stopped using Designer in favour of Visio in 1992
or so and I can't remember that far back ... haven't used any of the
Microsoft versions until now).

I haven't constructed the drawing I'm currently working on in layers,
unfortunately. I'll start to look at that as a way to do this sort of
thing.

rms

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

Another possibility is that all the lines use the same Style - such as
Connector. In this case you can change the style formatting and update all
the shapes at once. Go to Format > Define Styles to try that.

 

[Rob Schneider]

Mark,

Thanks ... that's even better approach.

I can't find my Shapeware Visio manual (yet). But I know thats electing
by distinguishing different types of shapes was in this older version by
Shapeware. Another thing I used to do was to make all shapes, e.g. in a
flow chart, the same size by picking all shapes (but not lines), then
adjusting the dimensions of all at once.

How would that be done in Viso 2003 if all weren't using the same style?

Hopefully Microsoft will put distinguishing shape selection it back in a
future version..

Hope this is useful to you. Let us know.

rms

 

[Rob Schneider]

Mark,

Thanks ... that's even better approach.

I can't find my Shapeware Visio manual (yet). But I know that selecting
by distinguishing different types of shapes was in this older version by
Shapeware. Another thing I used to do was to make all shapes, e.g. in a
flow chart, the same size by picking all shapes (but not lines), then
adjusting the dimensions of all at once.

How would that be done in Viso 2003 if all weren't using the same style?

Hopefully Microsoft will put distinguishing shape selection it back in a
future version..

Hope this is useful to you. Let us know.

rms

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

You can modify the size of multiple shapes at once by selecting them and
then setting values in the Size & Position window, found in the View menu.

 

[Rob Schneider]

I know. The trick is to "select" them--the essence of my question.

I have about 56 shapes on one page, along with probably 100-150 lines. I
want to "select all shapes" at once with the a selection function that
allows to select just the shapes, not the lines. I want to avoid
clicking on 56 shapes (leads to mistakes, wasted time, and wear-and-tear
on wrist ... that's what computers are for). Once selected, I want to
adjust them to a common size and line weight without affecting other
unselected objects, e.g. lines.

Hope this is useful to you. Let us know.

rms

 

[Reinier Post]

I know. The trick is to "select" them--the essence of my question.

I have about 56 shapes on one page, along with probably 100-150 lines. I
want to "select all shapes" at once with the a selection function that
allows to select just the shapes, not the lines. I want to avoid
clicking on 56 shapes (leads to mistakes, wasted time, and wear-and-tear
on wrist ... that's what computers are for). Once selected, I want to
adjust them to a common size and line weight without affecting other
unselected objects, e.g. lines.

Put them in layers, or change their masters in the document stencil?

 

[Rob Schneider]

Layers is a solution suggested, and this is what I will learn how to do.
Changing masters is not necessarily the way as these particular ones
(the one where I discovered this reduced fuctionality of Microsoft Viso
vs. Shapeware Viso) they are text boxes which are of varying size simply
because of the text formatting/wrapping/resizing ... I didn't know how
big to make them until I had loaded them all with text.

The observation, at the start of this thread, is that in previous
versions of Visio by the original developer (Shapeware) had the ability
to selectively select objects, say "select all lines", "select all
shapes", etc. Microsoft's version of Vision has removed this. I don't
know why. I'm curious, but it does no really matter since they have done
it, apparently. It would be nice if they could put it back.

Meantime, I guess I will learn about layers. I think that too
complicated since I don't want to have to think about which layer to put
stuff on as I create it, but if that's how it works, that's how it works.

Hope this is useful to you. Let us know.

rms

 

[Randall Arnold]

Folks that have done this a while tend to create standard layers that depend
on what they're doing. For example, in facility layouts, that could be
Walls, Electrical, Plumbing, etc. I'm sure you'll come up with a layering
scheme that will become second nature after awhile.

I can't address the feature removal. Some of the decisions mystify me as
well.

Randall Arnold

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

I'd really like to see some confirmation that any selection feature was
removed from the product. I've been using Visio since 2.0 and I'm not aware
of any such cut. I do know that the Select Special dialog was expanded to
include more options a few releases back. Anyone want to check an old Visio
4.0, or do I have to dig my copy out of the attic?

 

[David Parker]

You can simply do it in VBA:-

Public Sub SelectAllLines()
Dim shp As Visio.Shape
Visio.ActiveWindow.DeselectAll
For Each shp In Visio.ActivePage.Shapes
If shp.OneD Then
Visio.ActiveWindow.Select shp, Visio.visSelect
End If
Next shp
End Sub

Public Sub SelectAllShapes()
Dim shp As Visio.Shape
Visio.ActiveWindow.DeselectAll
For Each shp In Visio.ActivePage.Shapes
If Not shp.OneD Then
Visio.ActiveWindow.Select shp, Visio.visSelect
End If
Next shp
End Sub

Been using Visio since version 4.1, and I don't remember this selection
method being on the Visio interface

 

[Rob Schneider]

Mark,

My apologies. I dug out a Visio 4.0 Technical CD from Visio Corp from
my own attic and did an install on my old Win 98 machine. I can't find
any older versions than tat.

I does *not* have what I was sure was there. It doesn't have menus to
distinguish selections of shapes and lines. I distinctly remember this,
though. While I could be dreaming this, perhaps it was another drawing
package (Designer?) I'm thinking of. It was in 1992-95 I was doing a
lot of authoring which required drawing with these packages, and not
much since then. Clearly a red herring from me! Sorry.

David Parker suggested a macro to achieve this ... I'll probably put
this into my setup since I can see value in this. I'll also start using
layers...

rms

 

[John Marshall, MVP]

I've been using Visio since 2.0

"using"? You're modest.

John...