Concept: Visibility of drawing elements
Difficulty level: Intermediate
Class and layer visibility
Setting different visibilities for individual classes and layers within a drawing can make it easier to add, select, snap to, and edit objects, and to establish the desired appearance within viewports and saved views. There are various ways to control class and layer visibility, including setting global visibilities for the drawing, and setting the visibilities of specific classes and layers.
Objects in both the active class and active layer have normal visibility, regardless of the visibility settings. For objects that are in an inactive class and/or layer, the visibility is controlled by the lower visibility setting. For instance, if an object is in the active class, and therefore has normal visibility, but is on an inactive layer that is set to gray, the object is grayed. (See Organizing the drawing for a discussion of classes and layers as the building blocks on which to structure a drawing.)
Class Options and Layer Options commands allow you to establish global visibilities for the inactive classes and design layers in the drawing. As you change among classes and layers, the active class and active layer always display normally. All other classes and layers display and can be snapped or modified (or not snapped or modified) according to the class and layer options commands.
These global settings establish the maximum visibilities for the drawing. Individual inactive classes and layers cannot be set to a higher level of visibility with the Visibility columns or Visibility tool than the class/layer options setting allows, though they can be set to a lower level of visibility (such as made invisible or grayed).
Visibility columns appear in the Organization dialog box, Navigation palette (Vectorworks Design Suite product required), and other places throughout Vectorworks. They provide lists of the classes and layers in the drawing, which can be individually set to fully visible, invisible, or grayed.
The Visibility tool (Design Suite product required) can be used to set the visibilities of specific classes and layers by clicking on objects in the drawing. Additionally, there are tool preferences to quickly change the visibility for multiple classes or layers by double-clicking the tool.
Both the Visibility columns and Visibility tool can be used to set class and layer visibilities for the drawing area and viewports. For viewports with the visibility set by style, class and layer visibilities can only be edited from the Edit Viewport Style dialog box (see Creating and editing viewport styles). Visibility columns can be used to set visibilities for saved views, as well.
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Visibility change |
Method |
Description |
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Set global visibilities for inactive classes and design layers |
Select the Class Options and Layer Options commands to set the master visibility for all inactive layers in the drawing area |
Setting global visibility with class and design layer options |
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Quickly turn multiple classes or layers on or off |
Use the Visibility tool preferences and double-click operation Use the Navigation palette (Vectorworks Design Suite product required) |
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Change the visibility of the individual class or layer for an object clicked in the drawing area or viewport |
Use the Visibility tool modes from the Tool bar |
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Set the visibility of individual classes/layers in the drawing area |
Use the Visibility columns in the Organization dialog box Details view and elsewhere |
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Set the visibility of individual classes/layers in viewports and saved views |
Use the Visibility columns in the Organization dialog box Visibilities view and elsewhere; visibilities that are set by viewport style can't be edited from the Organization dialog box |
The inactive Furniture class is set to normal visibility (left), grayed visibility (middle), and invisible (right)
Object visibility
If a Vectorworks Design Suite product is installed, there are also various ways to hide or show specific objects. Depending on a Vectorworks preference, hidden objects can be invisible or shown "ghosted," meaning they display with a transparent blue tint so that you can tell them apart from objects that are grayed by a class or layer visibility setting. Hidden objects cannot be snapped to or selected, they won't show in viewports, and they won't print or export.
The View menu has the following object visibility commands. See Object visibility commands.
Unhide Objects unhides any hidden objects
Show Selected Objects Only hides all unselected objects
Hide Selected Objects hides all selected objects
Object Visibility allows entry of custom criteria for showing and hiding objects
The Visibility tool can show or hide selected objects. Additionally, you can set the tool preferences to quickly show or hide multiple objects by double-clicking the tool. See Object visibility changes using the Visibility tool and Visibility tool shortcuts.