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Help Using Inkscape => Inkscape Beginners' Questions => Topic started by: AFdS on April 22, 2017, 10:42:51 AM

Title: HELP. Cant select what I was working on
Post by: AFdS on April 22, 2017, 10:42:51 AM

I have spent several hours working on several items and ll of a sudden I can no longer select or do anything with any of them. I can select all of them but that's it. I have tried ungrouping. Copying and pasting into new file. Don't know what else to do. I appreciate any help someone can offer.

Title: Re: HELP. Cant select what I was working on
Post by: Lazur on April 23, 2017, 05:12:24 AM

Hi.

If you can select but cannot edit you may have a clone or a bitmap copy. Can't say for sure without looking at the file.

Title: Re: HELP. Cant select what I was working on
Post by: Moini on April 23, 2017, 08:53:01 AM

To find out more, you can also select it and look into the status line to understand what kind of object you have there.

Title: Re: HELP. Cant select what I was working on
Post by: AFdS on April 25, 2017, 06:13:03 PM

Thanks for the responses. I can only select it if I hold shift and click and it selects all objects together. Nothing seems to change when I ungroup. The line at bottom (is that the status line?) says Group of 2 objects in layer 1. I don't understand layers yet. What does it mean if it is a clone or a bitmap copy? HOw might I have done that?

Title: Re: HELP. Cant select what I was working on
Post by: brynn on April 26, 2017, 04:37:12 AM

When you see the status bar says "Group of 2" then you can click Object menu > Ungroup.  Next, deselect everything.  And then you will be able to select it.

However, sometimes newbies will accidentally make a lot of groups.  So after you click Ungroup, and you still can't select it, look again at the status bar.  You might have to click Ungroup a few times.

If you have it fixed by ungrouping, then you don't need to worry about bitmap copy or clone (or a few other reasons).  But there's still a chance (theoretically) that it was a bitmap copy which got grouped.

Edit menu > Make a Bitmap Copy can change a vector object to a raster object.  If you did that, the status bar will say "Image....".  If you did that, you can just delete it, and the vector object will still be hiding underneath, and you can select it.

If you made a clone by Edit menu > Clone (or clicked button on command bar or key shortcut) the status bar will say "Clone....".  Then you can click Edit menu > Clone > Unlink Clone, and it will be a regular object as before.

(Sounds like I might need to make a little tutorial which lists all the different possibilities for not being able to select a single object.  Seems like a common question lately  ;) )