Shapes

The Shapes button lets you draw basic shapes: rectangle, diamond, ellipse, and triangle. The button shows the icon of the last shape you chose; clicking it opens all the shapes.

Shortcuts

Key	Shape
R	Rectangle
B	Diamond
E	Ellipse
T	Triangle

How to draw

1. Click the Shapes button in the toolbar and choose a shape (or use the R / B / E / T shortcut).
2. Drag on the canvas; the shape sizes as you drag.
3. Hold Shift while dragging for proportional drawing, such as a square or circle.
4. You can double-click a shape to type text inside it.

Selection bar

When you draw a shape and select it, a selection bar appears above it. For shapes, these controls are available:

• Stroke color: the shape’s border color. Click the color swatch and pick a preset color or enter a custom color.
• Fill color: the interior fill color (can also be transparent).
• Fill pattern: hachure, cross-hatch, solid, dots, or zigzag.
• Stroke width: thin, medium, or thick.
• Stroke style: solid, dashed, dotted.
• Drawing style: Clean, Sketch, or Scribble. Styles other than Clean also show a bowing control.
• Corner: sharp or rounded (this control does not appear on cornerless shapes such as ellipses).
• Opacity: adjust the item’s opacity with the slider.
• Layer order: bring the item to front or send it to back.
• Duplicate / Delete: copy or remove the selected item.

If you double-click a shape and add text, the bar also shows font, size, and alignment controls.

Shapes panel

The Shapes panel on the right holds ready-made shape sets (flowchart, UML, sequence, and so on) and the shape libraries you import. For more, you can import libraries from shapes.letdraw.com.

Tips

• Grouped shapes move as a single unit.
• To connect shapes with arrows, see the Arrow (A) tool; the ends snap to shapes.