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Tip:
To print a list of Illustrator shortcuts,
click Export Text in the Keyboard
Shortcuts dialog box (Edit > Keyboard
Shortcuts).
Common panel actions
A
E
A. Click to collapse/expand panel.
B. Click to collapse/expand panel.
C. Click to close panel.
D. Show pop-up menu for the panel.
E. Creates a new iteration of the panel's "subject, "
such as an action, brush, style, layer, or swatch.
Option-click (Mac OS) or Alt-click (Windows)
to set options (except action and brush). Drag
onto button to duplicate action, brush, style,
fill/stroke (appearance), layer, or swatch.
F. Deletes action, brush, layer, or swatch; Option-
click (Mac OS) or Alt-click (Windows) to delete
without confirmation (except for Variable
panel).
other panel shortcuts
• Shift+Return/Enter to apply value and keep text
box active.
• Command/Ctrl+~ (tilde) to highlight last-used
text box in panel.
• Command/Ctrl+click to select noncontiguous
actions, brushes, layers (same level only), links,
styles, or swatches.
• Tab to show/hide panels.
• Shift+Tab to show/hide all panels except the
Tools panel.
T H E I L L U S T R A T O R W O R K S P A C E
Context-sensitive menus
You can access many commands using context-sensitive menus. Context-sensi-
tive menus display commands that are relevant to the active tool, selection, or
panel. To display a context-sensitive menu, right-click in the document window
or panel (or Control-click on Mac OS).
B
C
Keyboard shortcuts
Illustrator lets you assign keyboard shortcuts for many operations. The
D
Keyboard Shortcuts dialog box serves as a shortcut editor, and includes all
commands that support shortcuts, some of which aren't in the default shortcut
set. Shortcuts for tools are also shown in the knowhow palette. For a list of
F
keyboard shortcuts, see page 44.
Preferences
Before you begin creating artwork with Illustrator, familiarize yourself with the
program's default settings—specifically the options available in the Preferences
dialog box (choose Illustrator > Preferences > General in Mac OS or choose
Edit > Preferences > General in Windows). You can customize these settings
to suit your needs, creating a work environment that's both productive and
comfortable. As you look through the panes in the Preferences dialog box, you'll
see that many of the options are identical to those in FreeHand. You'll also find
several unfamiliar but useful options, such as the option to use the clipboard to
transfer selections between an Illustrator file and other Adobe applications.
The clipboard is particularly useful for moving paths from one application
to another because paths are copied to the clipboard as PostScript language
descriptions. Artwork copied to the clipboard is pasted in PICT format in
When you right-click (or control-click on Mac
os) on selected text (left) or a path (right),
a menu allows you fast access to contextual
commands.
the Illustrator Workspace 13
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