Identifying Local Overrides You can see local overrides by displaying the instance’s ShapeSheet (and some dialog boxes as well). Try it! Local Overrides Select an instance with one override, such as width. Display its ShapeSheet. Notice that a locally overridden formula is blue. Black text is inherited data. Note: Try it! Inheritance Open a stencil Shapes > More Shapes > General > Basic Shapes. Drag the square shape onto the drawing page and open its ShapeSheet window. Note that the Width and Height cells have black text indicating that these cells are inherited. PinX and PinY are blue because there values are determined by the drop point when the shape was dropped and are therefore local overrides. Move and resize the square on the page. Note that the text in the Width and Height cells turns blue. To re-inherit the defaults for the master, select the cell that you want to re-inherit and type “=”, then the press the Enter key.
Review: Defining Parametric Behavior Review questions What cells determine a shape’s position? What type of coordinate system is used in Visio? What is an Intershape reference? Can you of examples where they might be useful? What would the formula in a group member shape’s Width cell refer to? Under what circumstances would you choose to set the Selection mode for a group shape to Group only? Name an advantage of using a shape operation to build a complex shape over using a group to build the same shape? Answers PinX and PinY. Cartesian Referencing a shape cell in one shape from another shape. Useful anytime dependencies are desired between shapes. It refers to the parent group’s Width cell. The formula by default allows the member shape to resize with the group. Use Group only selection mode anytime users should not be able to select the member shapes of the group. Complex geometry paths can sometimes be created more easily using shape operations than using the drawing tools.
Containers Container shapes are designed to automatically sit behind shapes on the page and keep track of any shapes that are associated or “contained” within them. This is a new and distinct feature from groups. The contained shape can always be selected and manipulated independently of the container. By contrast, if a shape is in a group the user must first select the group and then subselect the shape in order to do something with it. The cross functional flowchart solution in Visio has been revamped for Visio 2010 to implement each of the individual Swimlanes and each of the Phase shapes as containers. Now when you add shapes to a cross functional flowchart, you are adding these shapes to Swimlane containers and to Phase containers. Each Swimlane and Phase shape is a special type of container that is automatically placed next to a shape of the same type. To keep track of all of the Swimlane shapes there is a special type of container which is of type List. There is a Swimlane List shape whose purpose is to hold all of the individual Swimlanes. There is also a Phase List shape that holds all of the Phase container shapes. Container Details Any shape with User.msvStructureType = “Container” is treated by Visio as a Container. The following ShapeSheet cells define additional container properties, several of which can be configured in the Container Tools contextual tab in the Ribbon. Cell Name Description User.msvSDContainerMargin Distance between container boundary and member shapes User.msvSDContainerResize Automatic resize behavior for shape (0 = No automatic resize; 1 = Expand as needed; 2 = Always fit to contents)