Diagram editor

Diagram, family tree and corkboard editor

You can add events, characters, places, things, text, images and lines to diagrams. As such you can use diagrams for any number of purposes including planning chronology, designing family trees - or, as in the case of a corkboard, storing miscellaneous information and notes.

After adding a diagram, family tree or corkboard using the add diagram wizard, the diagram will be opened within the main workspace.

Before we delve into understanding how to create an example, it is useful to see a few examples:

Chronology diagram

Following is a typical diagram (taken from The Hero's Journey template) which displays the ordering / chronology of the primary events.

Basically, we start at 'the call' which is highlighted, then follow each arrow in turn to the next event - the last being 'the return / the frustration'.

Relationships diagram

This is a more complex example which details the relationships between the events of The Hero's Journey template and the characters within it.

The lines which are drawn between the events, characters and so on are created automatically when you add relationships between entities. For more information on relationships see the relationships topic. As soon as two entities which are related are dragged onto or added to a diagram the relationship is drawn between them as a line.

Corkboard

Following is a typical corkboard which enables you to pin miscellaneous information to it, in a similar way to the way you would use a real-life corkboard.

The corkboard ahove has two characters pinned to it. Ordinarily these will be mug-shots of the characters you intend to use! The images displayed in each note on the corkboard are taken from the character's images which you can add via the add character wizard or through the properties window. Only the first of the character's images is used.

Diagrams can contain arbitrary text, images and arrows

You can also add arbitrary text, images and arrows to a diagram. The following screenshot shows all three of these in situ:

How to use the diagram editor

When you open a diagram and it is available for editing, you use either the toolbar at the top of the diagram editor or the context menu which you can display by right-clicking anywhere on the diagram. Some commands are available only on the context menu.

	Cut	Removes the selected object from the diagram.
	Copy	Copies the selected object (text / image) to the clipboard.
	Paste	Pastes text or an image from the clipboard.
	Change	If the selected object is text, allows you to change the text. If the selected object is an image, allows you to select a different image.
	Bring to front	Brings the selected object to the front. Useful if it is being obscured by something else.
	Send to back	Sends the selected object to the back. Useful if the selected object is not as 'important' as an object behind it.
	Arrange items	This only works with a corkboard. Tidies all of the objects on your corkboard, arranging them neatly in columns and rows.
	Add	The add button on the toolbar allows you to add either an entity (albeit an event, character, place or thing), a text rectangle, an image rectangle or a line. Clicking the add button will add whatever kind of thing you added last time. If you added a line previously, clicking it again will add a line. By default it will bring up the include entity dialog (see below) to select an entity to add to your diagram.
	Add entity	Brings up the include entity dialog (see below) to select an entity to add to your diagram. The entity is immediately added to a default location on the diagram.
	Add text	Adds a text rectangle to your diagram. After clicking this button the pointer changes from an arrow to a cross hairs pointer. Depress the left mouse button where you want your rectangle to start, drag south-easterly to where you want your rectangle to end. After releasing the text rectangle will be ready to type into. To change the text later use the change command (above.)
	Add image	Adds an image rectangle to your diagram. After clicking this button the pointer changes from an arrow to a cross hairs pointer. Depress the left mouse button where you want your image rectangle to start, drag south-easterly to where you want your image rectangle to end. After releasing the mouse button, a button will appear to enable you to select the image you want to use. To change the image later use the change command (above.)
	Add line	Adds an line to your diagram. After clicking this button the pointer changes from an arrow to a cross hairs pointer. Depress the left mouse button where you want the line to start, drag to where you want the line to end.
	Add relationship	Adds a relationship between the selected entity and another entity which you will select.
	Add related	Adds a related entity to the diagram. This is a submenu which will contain all of the entities related to the currently selected entity.
	Show relationship text	Clicking this button toggles whether text is shown on the relationship arrows.
	New event	Adds a new event to this diagram, via the add new event dialog.
	New character	Adds a new character to this diagram, via the add new character dialog.
	New place	Adds a new place to this diagram, via the add new place dialog.
	New thing	Adds a new thing to this diagram, via the add new thing dialog.

Selecting objects

Having added an object to the diagram, select it by clicking on it.

Moving objects on the diagram

After selecting an object, to move it depress the left mouse button and drag it.

Resizing objects on the diagram

To resize an object, select it by clicking on it. Then drag any of the orange drag handles located at the corners of the object (or at the end of the lines.)

The include entity dialog

This dialog is shown when you click the add button or select add entity from the context menu.

Simply select the entity you want, within the tree, and press okay. All of the entities (events, characters, places and things) you have not already added to your diagram are listed. It is not possible to add the same entity twice. A character for instance can only appear once upon the same diagram.

If you use the expert novel explorer, folders you create in the novel explorer will be displayed in order for you to navigate through a large number of entities.

Important: you can also drag an entity from the novel explorer directly onto a diagram. This means you can avoid using this dialog box if you wish.