The text on a Visio shape is located in a text block. You can reposition the text within
a text block with several buttons located on the Visio ribbon. You can
also reposition the entire text block by using the Text Block Tool you
learned about in the previous exercise.
In this exercise, you’ll reposition text within a text block, and you’ll move the text block to a new location.
Note
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Click once in the rectangle that contains the word text.
Tip
When you select a shape, the illuminated buttons in the Paragraph
group show the current text alignment for that shape. For example,
after clicking the rectangle, the Paragraph group should look like the
following graphic, indicating that the text is centered both vertically
and horizontally.
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On the Home tab, in the Paragraph group, click any of the buttons to observe the effect. For example, if you click the Align Top
button and then the Align Left button, the shape will look like the following graphic.
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On the Home tab, in the Tools group, click the Text Block button, and then click once on the rectangle that contains the word text.
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Click anywhere on the edge of the text block and drag the text block up and to the left. When the Text Block Tool
is active, the text block moves independently from the underlying shape. If you subsequently use the Pointer Tool to move the underlying shape, the text block also moves and remains in the same position relative to the shape.
Tip
If the shape designer has locked the text block in a shape, the rotation handle will not appear, and the resize handles will display a dotted diagonal line. You will not be able to move, resize, or rotate the text block.
You can also resize the text block whenever the Text Block Tool is
active by dragging any of the resize handles. Although moving the text
block on this particular shape may not make a lot of sense, there are
situations where knowing how to move and rotate text can be very
helpful as the remaining steps in this exercise illustrate.
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Press Ctrl+1 to activate the Pointer Tool
.
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In the Shapes window, click More Shapes, point to Network, and then click Computers and Monitors - 3D
. After the Computers And Monitors - 3D stencil opens, click anywhere on the drawing page to close the fly-out menus.
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Drag an LCD monitor shape onto the page, drop it below the circle shape, and type Hello. Notice that this shape was designed so that the text block is located below the shape.
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On the Home tab, in the Tools group, click the Text Block button.
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Click the word Hello and then reposition and rotate the text block so the word Hello appears on the LCD screen at approximately the same angle as the screen itself.
Tip
Repositioning and rotating the text
in the LCD monitor is an excellent situation in which to use the zoom
feature in Visio. Zoom in to enlarge the shape before attempting to
relocate and rotate the text. This will enable you to complete this
step more easily and more precisely.
Note
CLEAN UP Save your changes to the Orient Shapes and Text drawing, and then close it.
