THE XARA XONE | XARA.COM | THE XARA CONFERENCES

As always, we will be using Pixels as our units of measure. Right click on the screen and select Page Options... from the pop up menu. In the Units tabbed section, select Pixels for the Units and 0-255 for the Color Units. In the Grid and Ruler tabbed section set the Major Spacing to 100pix (key it in exactly like this please) and the Number of Subdivisions to 10. Press OK to close the dialog and apply the changes.

To see a tutorial on Xara Basics visit Workbook 20.

NOTE: You will notice from time to time I apply arbitrary colors to objects. I do this to make the objects easier to see. If I do not specify a fill for an object, you do not have to apply a fill or outline color.

When I show an ellipse or rectangle that has just been created, that has no fill, it is because I have set the fill to none before I exported the illustration. By default, all ellipses, rectangles and Quick Shapes have a black outline and a black fill. There is nothing wrong with your copy of Xara.

Naming Conventions. I use bold face to indicate the names of tools, galleries, keyboard shortcuts, and dialogs. Items such as unnamed icons and drop down lists, which have names when you let your cursor rest over them for a moment, are displayed in italics.

The Infobar is the context sensitive menu at the top of the screen and changes to reflect the options for the selected tool.

Some of the tool icons have changed in Xara X1, and this may cause some confusion for new users. If you are using an older version of Xara, click here to see my Rosetta Stone for translating the old buttons into the new.

New Users? I have created some quick start mini-tutorials to get you though the basics. Workbook 20, Workbook 30, and Workbook 31 cover the main things you need to know to get started.

If you are using an older version of Xara, click here to see my Rosetta Stone for translating the old buttons into the new.

Select the QuickShape Tool (Shift F2). Select the Starred Shapes option (the star icon), and change the Number of Sides setting to 3. Drag a triangle. Modify the Size to 340pix and press Enter to apply the change.

Double click on any of the corners to round the corners. Drag any of the control handles (the small squares) except the corner points, to increase the roundness of the corners so your triangle looks like the one shown above.

Switch to the Selector Tool (F2). With the triangle selected, from the Arrange menu, select Convert to Editable Shapes. With the triangle still selected, switch to the Shape Editor Tool (F4 ). Drag a selection rectangle around the lower 4 control points (the points change from black to red outlines when selected) and using the down arrow key on your keyboard, nudge the points down some as shown.

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