What are Properties?

A property is a user-defined variable (or default) that every shape in the library can access and the end user can modify by using Friendly pages.

It is important that you understand that ShapeMaster deals with shape settings at four levels...

1. Library Properties
   • Only users with Developer Software can access the Library Properties (.qil files).
   • These are overwritten with Catalog properties (.qim files) and together they initialise Drawing properties for a new drawing.
2. Catalog / Library
   • The Catalog Properties are where the global defaults for shape construction etc. are set and are applied to all new jobs.
   • The background colour is pink and can also be accessed via the Library Catalog Manager.
3. Drawing / Job
   • The global defaults can be overridden by Drawing/ Job Properties [F4] for individual/current jobs, which is useful as each job/drawing has its own criteria.
   • If turned on in the Options [F10], these will be presented when you start a new drawing, displayed with a light grey background.
4. Shape / Object
   • The above defaults can be overridden by Shape Properties.

Difference between Catalog and Library

A starter catalog (.qim) and a 'Based on' library (.qil) is provided to all users. By default, when loading a library, ShapeMaster looks for a .QIM file as well as a .QIL file, and loads them both together. The difference can be seen when viewing the Library Catalog Manager for the ShapeMaster library.

The Catalog allows you to save multiple versions of shapes, each with different settings. Therefore the catalog structure provides a helpful separation of the library design into two levels...

1. Base Library (.qil) - is supplied and supported by ShapeMaster with numerous construction methods to suit most businesses.
   
2. Catalog Level (.qim) - can be used by the end user to override the "Based On" library and have variations of it.
   

It is therefore possible to have one shape such as a Rectangle and then 6 variations of this, as per above example, 500Panel, 800Panel etc with different default parameters.

The other very useful feature of this separation is that it lets a library designer update the .QIL file(s) slipping in new based on libraries leaving the end user to update the catalog (.QIM) files independently - see note on Insert Unused BasedOns.

Provided the two are kept compatible and the administrative roles are kept separate, this provides a very reliable way of updating libraries in the field, as new construction methods get supported and other features get added to a base library.

Default Library Files

By default, when loading a library, ShapeMaster looks for a .QIM as well as a .QIL file, and loads them both together.

For the following example, we are looking at the library for the ShapeMaster software product. If you select the library ShapeMaster-2, it will load the pair ShapeMaster-2.qil and ShapeMaster-2.qim. The shape image gallery is the .QIZ file. These are found in the .../Library folder but originally distributed files (shown) are kept in a separate folder in case later required.

Example of file location...