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About this lesson
In this module, you will learn how to find many shapes that can be added to your diagram.
Exercise files
Download this lesson’s related exercise files.
2.01 Search-for-shapes - Exercise.docx79.2 KB 1st Diagram-2.1.vsdx
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Quick reference
Instructions
To search for a shape:
- Type in the search field on the left under "Shapes".
- Click "More Shapes" on the left and use its menu to browse shape categories, e.g. Business, Engineering, Flowcart, and more.
- Click the "Home" tab, then click the shape button (next to the Pointer Tool). You can choose rectangle, ellipse, line, freeform, arc, or pencil.
- 00:04 Let's figure out how to add some more shapes onto your diagram.
- 00:08 One quick thing that you can do is you can pick on the Home menu, and
- 00:12 then you click on this pull down for the shapes.
- 00:15 And you'll see a rectangle, an ellipse, a line, a free form is where you
- 00:20 can draw your own, an arc, and the pencil is another way to draw your own as well.
- 00:26 So if I pick in the word rectangle, then I'll come over here and
- 00:30 just draw a rectangle with my mouse, as you can see.
- 00:34 Now, let me give you a big tip right here.
- 00:36 Let me show you how to draw a perfect square.
- 00:39 So now, my mouse is still the rectangle icon.
- 00:44 So I'm going to hold down my Shift key.
- 00:47 If you hold down your shift key, and then drag your mouse,
- 00:50 notice how it becomes a perfect square.
- 00:53 If I click on this pull down, you'll see some other shapes there.
- 00:57 So I can pick an ellipse.
- 00:59 And again, if I drag my mouse, it becomes a nice ellipse there.
- 01:04 But if I wanted the perfect circle, I'm going to hold down my Shift key, and
- 01:08 then drag it, and it becomes a perfect circle, okay?
- 01:12 So that's how those can work.
- 01:13 And then the free form and the pencil are ones that you can draw yourself.
- 01:19 Also, once you're done with those, you want to go back to the pointer tool,
- 01:23 because otherwise your mouse is still that shape that you chose.
- 01:27 So pick in the pointer tool, and then you can go back to selecting things.
- 01:32 Once I have the pointer tool, I can click these shapes so I can get rid of them.
- 01:36 So I'm going to click on this one and press my Delete key.
- 01:39 I'll click on this one and press my Delete key, this one, and then this one.
- 01:45 All right, let's say I want to have a picture of a keyboard right where they
- 01:49 would enter their user ID, just to make it more visually appealing.
- 01:53 So I'm going to come over here where it says Search shapes and
- 01:57 I'll type in keyboard.
- 01:58 You can type in just about anything,
- 02:00 and you'll probably find the shape of what you're looking for.
- 02:04 So notice how I found some keyboards.
- 02:06 So I'll pick up the word keyboard and just drag it over here.
- 02:10 All right,
- 02:10 just to kind of show them that this will be somewhere they would type something in.
- 02:15 So you can search over here.
- 02:17 Now, I can click on this pull down and
- 02:19 see the different things that I've searched for in the past.
- 02:23 And then to clear that out and get everything back again I'm going to click
- 02:27 on this x, and now everything is back.
- 02:30 Now, watch my mouse and
- 02:32 I'll pick on More Shapes, and then you'll actually see other stencils.
- 02:36 So if you move your mouse to the different stencils, it goes down even further.
- 02:42 And then if I click on this one,
- 02:44 then I will start to see some other shapes and so on.
- 02:48 So you can go through the different stencils and see what's available.
- 02:51 You can search for them over here.
- 02:54 Now, when I just clicked on that, that's just added that stencil onto the diagram.
- 02:59 So notice how this other stencil is available.
- 03:02 Let me go back to the basic flowchart shapes as well, all right?
- 03:06 So very powerful here, you really find many, many shapes.
- 03:12 One thing that you can do is you can pick on the Home menu, and
- 03:15 then you'll find some really common shapes over here.
- 03:19 Then you can search for shapes over here.
- 03:21 You can search for just about anything, and
- 03:23 it'll probably find some kind of shape out there.
- 03:26 You can also pick on More Shapes,
- 03:28 and then you'll find many other stencils or categories of the stencils.
- 03:34 And then if I pick on that stencil,
- 03:36 it adds it to my available stencils over here, and that'll give you many shapes.
- 03:42 So you can see there's many great ways to find and
- 03:47 add shapes onto your diagram.
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