In the Frame editing module, Calamus makes a fundamental distinction between two modes: Create frame and Modify frame. The Create mode allows you to draw new frames, and the Modify mode (see below) allows you to alter existing frames. You can select a mode by clicking on its icon, or switch between the two modes by clicking with the right mouse button.
You can tell which mode is active either by checking which icon is inverted, or by the shape of the mouse pointer in the layout window – in Create mode, it will appear as an arrow, and in Modify mode it will appear as a pointing or gripping hand. A cross might also appear, but we will explain that below.
So: You want to create a new frame. First select Create mode by
clicking on the Create frame
icon if it is not yet selected.
Move the mouse cursor to the layout window and place it where you want
a corner of the frame to be on the page. Click the left mouse button
once, and the pointer will change to the Set size
cursor (a
hollow cross). Now, put the Set size cursor where you want the
opposite corner of the frame to be – the corner marked first
remains fixed and the frame will be created so that it lies between
that and the current cursor position. A Calamus specialty here is that
the left mouse button does not have to be held down while
drawing out a frame. So you can click in the scroll bars and arrows of
the layout window to move the current displayed portion of the page,
or alter the magnification, in order to define a frame larger than the
current layout window area. A further click of the left mouse button
creates the frame, where the second corner corresponds to the position
of the cursor at the time of the click, of course. A click of the
right mouse button cancels the operation and the new frame will be
discarded.
While you are drawing the frame, the Coordinate display will show
the position and size of the frame at all times. If you want to alter
these values, you can click in the Coordinate display directly
after creating the frame (when this is still displayed with its resize
grab handles). Then you can enter the desired values from the
keyboard. In the same way you can position a frame very precisely:
Simply create a frame without paying regard to its size or position.
Now click on the Coordinate display and you can enter the position and
size precisely to three decimal places. The unit of measurement that
will be used for this is the one you have set in the Page module for
Page size
.
