Comments on: I thought Visio was supposed to be easy.

Question: I thought Visio was supposed to be easy.

jak68 — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 23:29:48 -0800

visio noob question: connected two shapes from center of one to center of other. Moved one shape. Connector line didnt stick to the same point on the second shape, it moved around and connected to a different point on it. How make it so that connector line stays in the same location no matter where I move the second shape?

Googling hasnt helped, perhaps i'm not looking at right keywords. Found some pages which complained about the same problem. Surely a standard tool like visio has a way to 'freeze' connection points on shapes so they dont go all wonky if you move the shapes around? Or is that really too much to ask?

By: samj

samj — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 23:48:59 -0800

It's deciding whether you glue to a shape (visio will route the connection from the "best" connection point) or to individual connection points (always from that point).
Here's what the help says:

To glue an endpoint of the connector to a connection point on a shape, drag the endpoint to one of the shape's connection points until a red box appears around the connection point.

To glue an endpoint of the connector to the entire shape, drag the endpoint toward the middle of the shape until a red box appears around the entire shape.

Try adding your own connection points to shapes, it can make diagrams a lot easier to work with.
And always check your font size works ok when printed before you have finished a diagram at 400% zoom and find all your labels are in flyspeck 3pt!

By: jak68

jak68 — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 00:24:53 -0800

Ah, I see: The key words were "glue", "adding connection points", and "glue to shape geometry" on the "snap and glue toolbar". Wunnerful, thanks!

Seems like its a two step process: step 1, create a new connection point if its not connecting to where you want; and then step 2, turn on 'glue to shape geometry' and anything you connect (connector or line) to a shape's connection point should 'stick' there for good.

Seems to be working...

By: zpousman

zpousman — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 07:30:16 -0800

Wow I always thought this was a visio bug. Thanks!