Auto-Pan when Pasting - How can I stop This?

Started by jimatpetards, February 10, 2011, 10:36:28 AM

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jimatpetards

Hi All

In Visio 2000 I could copy an object, pan around my drawing and paste copies in appropriate places (well near to where I wanted to finally put them)

In Visio 2010, Microsoft have decided on my behalf that I really need to pan back to point in the drawing where I copied the selection and kindy slide me back there.

Does anyone know how to stop this totally stupid and pointless thing from happening? I've looked in options and Help but no joy!

Sigh

james

Paul Herber

Do your paste using the mouse right-click, the shape will be posted where you right-click. (or left-click if you have left-handed mouse operation).
Electronic and Electrical engineering, business and software stencils for Visio -

https://www.paulherber.co.uk/

jimatpetards

Hi Paul

Yes that works - however I use the keyboard short cut of CTRL V, that is where it goes wrong.

I always thought that the mouse was the fastest and best way to do stuff like this but I witnessed a software engineer using just the key board and he was blindingly fast and didn't get RSI!

I rather like to keep using the keyboard (and I'd like to put CTRL U back to 'ungroup, rather than Underline - what a bizarre thing to do - surely ungroup is more useful than underline in Visio!!)

Cheers
James

Paul Herber

There should almost never be a need to ungroup. Ungrouping can seriously and permanently damage shapes.
Electronic and Electrical engineering, business and software stencils for Visio -

https://www.paulherber.co.uk/

Paul Herber

I'm a software engineer (of ~35 years experience) and I use keyboard and mouse for different reasons, often the mouse is quicker for certain operations, copy and paste og graphical objects is usually quicker with the mouse, might depend on what you are doing exactly.
Electronic and Electrical engineering, business and software stencils for Visio -

https://www.paulherber.co.uk/

jimatpetards

Hi Paul

I group and ungroup constantly! I make up images that I need, copy and paste them, then I may need to edit them, copy them again or move them to another location. I'm designing on the page essentially. As the customers requirements and our implementation change so does the drawing.

In Viso 2000 you needed to group before using 'copy drawing' as cut and paste into Word had a 'bug'!

I guess you may be referring to the stencils - which I never use.

James

Paul Herber

Ok, your usage is not the normal, grouping and ungrouping your own shapes is very different to ungrouping a built-in shape or one provided by a 3rd-party. Ungrouping these shapes will break them, seriously and permanently. The warning message "This action will sever the object's link to its master" is both totally meaningless to most people, some may think "so what?" or even "yeah, I do wish to sever this link". It's the loss of shape formulae that link the shapes together and group shape properties that are really important. Are these mentioned? The warning message should be more like "This action could seriously and permanently damage this shape. If you just wish to edit this shape there are other ways of doing it."
Electronic and Electrical engineering, business and software stencils for Visio -

https://www.paulherber.co.uk/

jimatpetards

Thanks Paul

Just to steer back on topic - anyone know how to stop the short cut 'paste' keys from automatically steering me back to the point where I made the copy??

Unless this is configurable somewhere, the different action between a right click 'copy' and a keyboard shortcut 'copy' must be a 'bug'!


Cheers

james

agibbs

Right-click paste does not allow accurate replacement of shapes. 

I frequently change components on circuit board layouts, terminal blocks on DIN rail, and bolt sizes on sheet metal panels.  I used to be able to load the replacement shape on the clipboard with Ctrl+C, cllick on a shape in a drawing, zoom-in with the wheel (which centered me over the old shape), hit Delete, then Ctrl+V to paste the new shape EXACTLY where the old one used to be.

Please tell me somebody has figured out a way to still do this.  Nudging shapes around after pasting them on the screen is a real pain when you have screenfulls to change, and there is no way of knowing for sure your parts will fit togeher any more because the replacement shapes might not get nudged exactly where the old ones used to be.

chrispitude

Hi agibbs,

Yes, I used to do exactly this to change schematic logic gates in Visio 2007. Yes, it's maddeningly frustrating in Visio 2010. I have not found a solution.

Visio Guy

The different paste behaviors was intentional. If you are copying elements from one page to another, for example, many users wanted to paste the items in the exact same place as they were copied from. Imagine title blocks, frames, logos, legends, etc. So the old paste (what did it do, center of view?) frustrated a lot of people.

With Visio 2010, you have two choices, which is pretty cool. Someone made the comment that "right-click paste isn't accurate". I don't see how the old mode was accurate either--unless rolling with the wheel truly centered on a selected shape. (I don't remember.)

What might make most sense is a macro that does a paste that is centered in on the current selection, so you'd do this:

1. Copy or cut shapes
2. Select shape to be replaced
3. Click a button that called the "Paste-Replace" macro
For articles, tips and free content, see the Visio Guy Website at http://www.visguy.com
Get my Visio Book! Using Microsoft Visio 2010

chrispitude

Hi Visio Guy,

Thanks for responding. According to item #6 at

http://blogs.office.com/b/visio/archive/2012/09/25/10-ways-to-be-more-efficient-in-the-new-visio.aspx

paste is supposed to place the object in the view if the original object location was off-screen; it's not supposed to pan the window to an offset relative to the original location (unless I'm interpreting it wrong?).

I do like that Visio keeps the same placement when copying from another page. And I don't mind that it pastes with an offset on the same page, as long as the newly offset location is in the same view with no panning for the first paste. For repeated pastes (creating a series), panning would be fine.

Visio Guy

Hi C-tude,

That post is for Visio 2013. It looks like they've added another feature to paste. The matrix of paste behaviors is getting rather large.

Note that there is a quirk in how Visio handles multiple pastes. Visio seems to maintain some sort of count of the number of times you've pasted. Subsequent pastes are offset down and to the right. This is weird, but makes it so you don't have a stack of shapes on top of each other. This affects all Ctrl + V behavior.

Visio 2013

Ctrl + V shapes from cut/copied from different page:
If the shapes you've copied are from a different page, and you press Ctrl + V, the shapes will be placed in the same location on the target page as they were in the source page. The window will pan to that position if necessary.

Ctrl + V shapes cut/copied from from same page:
Visio places the shapes in the same location (plus the multiple-paste offset), if it is in view. Otherwise shapes are pasted to the center of the current view.

Visio 2010

Ctrl + V shapes cut/copied from from different page:
If the shapes you've copied are from a different page, and you press Ctrl + V, the shapes will be placed in the same location on the target page as they were in the source page. The window will pan to that position if necessary.

Ctrl + V shapes cut/copied from from same page:

Visio places the shapes in the same location (plus the multiple-paste offset), and pans the view to that location.


When copy-pasting to the same page, the original shapes are likely to already be there, so you almost always run into the multiple-paste offset "feature". If you cut and paste, then the result will be in the original location (unless it is out-of-view in Visio 2013.)

If a page has AutoSize, then "original position" also becomes dubious. Say a shape is copied from (1cm, 1cm) and pasted a few times. As the offset progresses, the pasted shapes go off the bottom of the page, causing it to expand downward, due to AutoSize. Now the original shape is at (10cm, 30.7 cm) but continuing to paste offsets from the original shape. This makes sense visually, but logically, the shapes should be pasted at the bottom of the newly-expanded page.
For articles, tips and free content, see the Visio Guy Website at http://www.visguy.com
Get my Visio Book! Using Microsoft Visio 2010

agibbs

Ah, so it is the new multiple-paste-offset "feature" that has crippled the new version.  This is serious.  Removing the ability to paste a shape accurately on a page is functionality we should not have to give up.  I use Visio for real work--more than any other software on my machine.  In spite of the nice features in 2010, I am going back to Visio 2007.   

Is there any way to set the multiple-paste offset value to zero/zero so I don't have to wipe Visio 2010 off my machine next week?

agibbs

Has the multiple-paste-offset bug ever been fixed?  Just checking in from 2013 as I am still using Visio 2007 because that was the last good version before Microsoft ruined our ability to replace an object on the screen in the same location via Ctrl+V WITHOUT having it offset.  I still use Visio every day in my work, but this bug was a deal-breaker for me.  I'd like to upgrade to the current version, but can someone please let me know if this has finally been fixed?

1. Copy a circle shape to the clipboard via Ctrl+C
2. Center on a square shape by clicking on it, and zoom in or out a bit.
3. Paste the copied circle shape via Ctrl+V

    -Did it appear centered on the shape, or was it offset, down and to the right?

Last time we checked, the first paste was always offset--even when the multiple-paste offset value was set to zero/zero.

Thanks for your help.