Paste In Place

[Ron Cates]

I'm hoping someone else has seen this. When FM 12 first came out I watched every video I could find about it. I recall seeing in one of them the demonstrator copy a layout object, go to a different layout and paste the object in place. He even commented on how nice it was that FM 12 included this paste in place feature. Since then I have rewatched many of the videos trying to find where I had seen it but with no luck. Was I just dreaming or is there now a way to paste in place rather than have to make note of the position and type it in in the new layout every time?

[liltbrockie]

I agree this would be nice! Or at the very least, allow us to see the right, left, bottom and top values for a selected group of objects.

[Lee Smith]

Hi Ron,

Are you thinking about the Snap to Grid, and Guides?

FM Academy has a couple of videos on layouts, this might be the one you are thinking of Link

[Ron Cates]

No. I just thought I saw it on a video, I guess maybe i was mistaken. But it would be so nice to be able to copy something from one layout and be able to to "Paste in Place" and have it paste at the exact same position as the layout it was copied from. Perhaps with a keyboard combination like shift, ctrl, V. It would save having to notate the position and readjust on the new layout. Since you can't see the position anymore when selecting multiple objects in FM 12 without grouping them. I currently either, select the objects, group them, note position of the group, copy the group, then ungroup because i didn't want the selected items grouped in the first place, Then go to the new layout, paste the group, adjust the position and then ungroup. Either that or I use the x, y, position that appears in the yellow box, but it is only shown when you move the item or items. So you have to move it to see the x, y, then move it back to where it was originally to note the right position. But then you run the risk of not moving back to the correct orriginal position.

[Vaughan]

I put a rectangle in the top left corner, select it and the other objects I want to copy, then change to the other layout paste, then move the pasted objects to the top left. Delete rectangle.

Works in all versions!

[Ron Cates]

I use to use that technique. Don't know why I haven't thought of it lately. I hadn't been working on layouts as much for quite a while until I started this new project in FM12. It deffinitely does the job. Thanks for reminding me :)

[Vaughan]

Of course with FMP 12 the rectangle can now be filled with a gradient. LOL

[HALBURN]

Like a trained monkey, for the past 10+ years I have been using the same technique as Vaughan to paste in place.

 

Today I discovered that if I copy an element (switch to browse mode and then back to layout mode) and then paste, it pastes the darn thing in the exact same place as the original.

 

I am not sure how long this has been the behavior but now that I know that this works (with FileMaker 13 on a Mac) I am using a little app called Keyboard Maestro to make a shortcut that executes a "paste in place" when I type "Command-shift-v".