View - Panes

Panes are sub-areas of main windows. They are often used within a main window to keep some information in view while another part of a window shows a changing display.

Manifold has several panes that can either be docked into the main Manifold window or that may be left undocked to float about "always on top" as independent dialogs. Panes may be opened and closed within the View - Panes menu. Panes may also be closed by clicking the X box in their caption bars.

Call Stack	Display and manage the scripting engine's function call stack. Used to debug scripts.
Control Points	Control points are used georegister images and drawings. The Control Points pane provides a listing of control points defined in the current image or drawing.
Errors	Reports errors arising from compilations of .NET language scripts.
GPS Console	Provides interactive control over a GPS (Global Positioning System) device connected to the computer via a serial port, including moving map functions and fetching information from the GPS.
History	Displays a running history of actions and results.
Info	Reports useful information about the active layer or window.
Layers	Displays the layer stack in a map and allows specification of layer restrictions. The layers pane is more convenient to use with many layers than the tab controls at the bottom of the map. When used with image windows, the layers pane turns individual R, G, B or alpha channels on and off and also controls whether the image border or background is displayed. When used with print layouts the layers pane shows the vertical ordering of elements in the layout.
Notes	A text dialog box allowing user entry of text notes and commentary. As the focus changes from one component window to the other, the contents of the Notes pane will change to the notes made for that component.
Project	Shows all components in our project. It also shows how components are associated, such as a drawing and its table. We can use the project pane to open components in windows, to drag and drop components into maps, to rename components and to organize components within folders. The status area at the bottom of the pane will provide summary information about any highlighted component.
Review	Interactive dialog used to resolve conflicts arising from multi-user editing.
Selections	Provides a scratchpad for saving selections that have been made so that they may later be re-used.
Tool Properties	Displays settings for the current tool in use, for example, threshold for Select Touch when selecting pixels within images or the opacity of a paintbrush when editing images.
Variables	Display and manipulate variable values within scripts. Used to debug scripts.
ViewBots	ViewBots are one-line analytic instruments that report a result or otherwise make a calculation using the contents of a window.
Views	Saves specific views into a window at a given location and zoom level under a name. At any time we can jump directly to that view by clicking on its name.
Watches	Watches are one-line dynamic instruments that watch and report upon values of variables in scripts or other process parameters. They are used to debug scripts by signaling watched-for conditions.
World	The world pane allows setting linked views and position reticules and also shows the current location of the active window on a small world map.

Most users will leave one or more panes open while working with maps and tables. A typical setup would leave Selections, Info and ViewBots panes open on one side of the display with a Layers pane docked to the other side of the display. (This assumes we have a reasonably modern computer system with a larger screen and high-resolution display).

Panes will automatically become enabled or disabled as the focus switches between different windows. For example, the Layers pane is active only when a map window, image window or drawing window has the focus.

As the focus switches between different windows, panes will automatically be loaded with the correct information for that window. For example, the Selections pane will change to show the correct saved selections for whatever window has the focus.

Docking and Undocking

Panes can be docked into the main Manifold Window. Drag and drop a pane onto one of the main Manifold window's borders to dock it. Panes may be docked into the upper, lower, left or right borders of the main Manifold window.

To undock a docked pane, double click on its margin. It will undock itself.

When a pane is dragged near to or on top of a margin using a click and drag, it will automatically dock itself. To override this, use a CTRL click and drag. This will allow us to drag a pane over top of a toolbar row or near to a window margin without the pane docking itself.

Manifold Keyboard Shortcuts for Panes

In addition to the standard Windows keyboard shortcuts, Manifold provides a set of keyboard shortcuts for opening/closing panes.

ALT-SHIFT-(letter)	Show or hide a pane. Press the keyboard combination at any time to open or close a particular pane. The letter used is usually a mnemonic for the first letter of the name of the pane as shown below.
K	Call Stack
C	Control points.
E	Errors
G	GPS Console
H	History
I	Info
L	Layers
N	Notes
P	Project
R	Review
S	Selections
T	Tool Properties
A	Variables
B	ViewBots
V	Views
W	Watches
O	World

ALT-SHIFT keyboard shortcuts are very important for turning panes off and on when working with systems that have small screens. If your screen display area is limited in size it will be inconvenient to open panes and leave them open because they will cover up too much of the active window. ALT-SHIFT shortcuts will allow you to instantly pop open a pane when needed and to make it vanish when it is not needed.

These shortcuts are listed in the View - Panes menu next to the pane they control.

Autohide / Popup Panes

Panes used for controls can be minimized when docked so that they autohide themselves when not in use and automatically pop open when the mouse cursor moves over their tab. Virtually every experienced Manifold user employs this feature to maximize the amount of screen area available for working with component windows.

$images\sc_popup_panes_01.gif$

Consider a Manifold workspace open with the project pane docked in its usual position.

$images\sc_popup_panes_02.gif$

Clicking on the Minimize control for the project pane will minimize the project pane into a small tab on the right-hand margin.

$images\sc_popup_panes_03.gif$

This frees up a lot of screen real estate for use with windows.

$images\sc_popup_panes_04.gif$

Moving the mouse cursor over on top of the project pane's tab (no need to click the tab)...

$images\sc_popup_panes_05.gif$

...will expand the project pane.

As long as the mouse cursor stays over the project pane it will remain expanded. As soon as the mouse cursor moves away from the project pane the pane will collapse again to a small tab.

$images\sc_popup_panes_06.gif$

Using autohide panes is a great way to maximise the available working area on a computer monitor. Consider, for example, the above view in which the project pane has collapsed into a small tab. In this view the active window has been maximized so that it uses all available space.

$images\sc_popup_panes_07.gif$

When open the project pane consumes much area which would be useful for work in the main component window. Although it is true that this example uses artificially small Manifold sessions (sized to fit reasonably as illustrations), even in the case of large, high-resolution monitors it makes sense to save work area if panes are not immediately needed.

Ending Autohide / Popup Mode

To end auto hide mode simply click on the pane's tab or click on the pane's caption. This will restore the pane to full size and will end autohide mode. In addition, although Manifold will remember autohide settings for future sessions, opening a new project will cancel autohide mode for the project pane. This allows the project pane to be immediately available for component usage as a new project is opened.

Notes

These illustrations show only the project pane. Most experienced Manifold users will have several panes open when working with projects. In such cases autohide capability is even more useful, because it enables multiple panes to be kept available as minimized tabs. When needed, each pane can expand to fit the entire space available for panes with a simple mouseover.