Designer Workspace & Precision Tools

Use the four workspace areas and the millimetre-based precision system.

3. Understand the Designer workspace

The Designer has four working zones: the top command bar, the left toolbox and field browser, the millimetre canvas, and the right inspector.

The command bar controls history, sample records, regions, preview, print, zoom, alignment, transforms and display aids.

The left panel contains all element tools, model fields and company fields.

Top command bar

Undo / Redo: navigate up to 50 recorded layout states.
Filter Records: select a sample record and move to the next or previous record.
Show data: switch between field labels/placeholders and real sample values.
Body / Header / Footer / Watermark: choose the region currently being edited.
Preview: hides editing aids and shows a cleaner on-canvas rendering.
Print: opens PDF output for the selected sample record. Save first.
Align to document: left, horizontal centre, right, top, vertical centre or bottom.
Mirror / Rotate: mirror horizontally or vertically and rotate 90° clockwise or counter-clockwise.
Zoom: buttons, slider and direct percentage entry.
Display options: Grid, Snap, Guides, Areas and Ruler.

Canvas interaction

Drag a tool or field onto the page to create an element.
Click an element to select it; modifier-click adds or removes it from a multi-selection.
Drag a selected element to move it. Drag resize handles to change its dimensions.
Use Shift while dragging a selected item for axis-constrained movement.
Use the middle mouse button to pan the workspace.
For exact production placement, type X, Y, width, height and rotation in the inspector.

6. Format and position elements

Position

Every element belongs to a region and uses millimetre coordinates. X and Y define the top-left position; width and height define the box. Rotation is stored in degrees. Images and shapes can lock their aspect ratio. Lines expose their exact endpoints.

Layer and visibility

Background: behind normal content.
Main: standard content layer.
Overlay layers: controlled by the report's layer count and drawn above normal content.
Locked: prevents accidental editing of the element.
Print: turn off to keep an element visible in the Designer but hidden in final output.

Typography

Text, fields, computed fields and table text can inherit the report default or use an explicit font. Available controls include weight, point size, bold, italic, underline, uppercase, letter spacing, line height, horizontal alignment, vertical alignment and colour.

Colour system

Enter a hexadecimal colour, open the advanced colour picker, save reusable swatches or link supported colours to a field. Saved colours are browser-side conveniences; include critical brand colours in your design specification or backup process.

9. Regions, layers and precision tools

Regions

Body: normal report content and repeating tables.
Header: repeated upper page content, enabled and sized on the report record.
Footer: repeated lower page content.
Watermark: dedicated low-opacity content behind the report.

Switch regions before adding elements. Elements remain associated with their region when moved or copied.

Grid, snap, guides, areas and ruler

Grid: displays the paper-size grid.
Snap: aligns movement and resizing to the configured grid step.
Guides: drag guides from the rulers, reposition them and delete them from the guide inspector.
Areas: visualises printable margins and the Header/Footer boundaries.
Ruler: displays millimetre rulers on the canvas edges.

Alignment and transforms

Multi-select elements to move them as a group or align their left, centre, right, top, middle or bottom edges. The document alignment menu positions the selection against the active page/region. Transform commands mirror the group horizontally or vertically or rotate it 90 degrees in either direction while preserving relative geometry.

Text paths

A Text Path can use its own circle, ellipse, line or rectangle path, or it can link to an existing shape or line. Linked geometry can be edited from the Text Path inspector. Alt-click the design to select the linked geometry directly. Linked objects must remain in the same region.

Control reference

The screenshots below show the command bar and toolbox controls only.