How do I…
Move a blueprint and the drawing on it
Drag or resize a blueprint and everything drawn on it goes with it; move the image alone to line up a revised page.
Where to find it: Properties (nothing selected) › Sheet › Blueprints › the pencil beside the blueprint › drag it on the drawing
Dragging a blueprint moves everything drawn on it with it, by the same distance and in one step, for example to make room for notes. One undo puts all of it back, even after someone has changed the blueprint's opacity or scale.
What goes with it, and what stays
Goes with it:
- devices, with their labels, cable cards and pointers
- conduits, risers, and the lines and pairs between devices
- annotations: pen lines, shapes, clouds, arrows, text, the words beside a shape, and keyed-note numbers with their pointers
- its scale, which stays set
Stays where it is, because it belongs to the paper: the title block, the legend, the compass, the scale bar and keyed-notes tables, every part of one.
Hidden sessions, and devices a view hides, go too, so they are in place when they show again. So do locked groups: the drawing keeps its shape, so nothing locked moves on the building.
With Smart alignment on in the bottom toolbar, the blueprint snaps to the centre. The drag stops at the edge of the sheet as soon as anything drawn on the blueprint would leave it: an icon, a note's number in its ring, the words beside a shape. What someone else adds while you drag stays where they put it; if someone moves or resizes the blueprint itself meanwhile, your drag is refused.
Resize it with the drawing
Dragging a corner, the Size slider and the Spacing buttons resize the blueprint, and the same drawing follows: everything stays where it was on the image. A cloud around a room still surrounds it, a shade across a window still spans it, and a TV keeps its size in inches.
Icons, words, line weights, keyed-note rings and cable cards keep their size. The scale goes with the image, so real distances and cable lengths stay the same. A soundbar stays snug in front of its TV, so without a pointer its cables can change by a few inches.
While you drag a corner or hold Size, the drawing follows on screen, cable cards and labels too; held still for a moment, they settle where letting go leaves them. Letting go saves one undo step, stopping where something drawn would leave the sheet. If someone moves or resizes the blueprint meanwhile, your change is refused.
Turning it turns the drawing too: see turn a blueprint.
Move the blueprint alone
To line up a revised page under the icons already placed:
- turn on Move blueprint alone in the blueprint's Properties, then drag it, or
- hold Option (Alt on Windows) while you drag. Option works for a drag only; a corner, Size and the turn buttons follow the switch.
With the switch on, resizing changes the image alone and clears its scale.
On an iPad or a phone, use the switch. It comes on by itself for a page just added, or brought in with Replace blueprint, so you can put it in place. It turns off again when you close the blueprint's controls.
Several blueprints on one sheet
Each item goes with the blueprint it sits on: the top one where two overlap, or the nearest when it sits on none. A TV and its soundbar, and the two speakers of a pair, always go together, and a conduit goes with its icons, or keeps its angles when one end stays. The other blueprints' items stay.
More blueprint controls: move, resize or clean up a blueprint.