SMS:Display Options

Display Options in SMS refers to the control of what entities are displayed, and how (color and style) they are displayed. Each entity in each module has its own display options. The display options for the active module are shown when the Display Options dialog opens.

The Display Options dialog is opened by any of the following methods:

• Right clicking on the Module type folder in the Project Explorer and selecting the Display Options command from the right click menu
• Using the Display | Display Options menu command
• Clicking the File:Dispopts.gif display options Macro
• Using the keyboar shortcut CTRL+D

Entity Display Options

For each entity type, the dialog includes a toggle, and where appropriate, a button. If the toggle is selected, SMS will display the entity type. The buttons are of various types, as described below:

Points

If the display of an entity is focused around a single location, like a mesh node, the button displays a circle, drawn in the color that will be used to display that entity. To change the circle size, or color, the user can click on the button, and the point attributes dialog will appear. The color can also be changed by clicking on the combo box arrow next to the button. It is recommended that if there are many of points, and their position can be inferred from other displayed entities (such as the position of mesh nodes by the edges of the elements) that the symbols be turned off to increase efficiency.

Symbols

If the display of an entity is focused around a single location, like a scatter point, the button displays a symbol, drawn in the color that will be used to display that entity. To change the symbol, symbol size, or color, the user can click on the button, and the Symbol Attributes dialog will appear. The color can also be changed by clicking on the combo box arrow next to the button. It is recommended that if there are many of these entities, and their position can be inferred from other displayed entities (such as the position of scatter points by the edges of the scatter triangles) that the symbols be turned off to increase efficiency.

Line

If the entity to be displayed encloses a region, such as a triangle or element, the button displays a sample line drawn in the color and width that will be used to display the line around the edge of that entity. To change the color and/or width, the user can click on the button, and the Line Attributes dialog will appear. This allows the user to select a line style (dashed or solid), a width (in pixels) and a color. The color can also be changed by clicking on the combo box arrow next to the button.

Font

If the entity to be displayed is a text string, such as the node id, the button displays a sample string ("AaBb") drawn in the color and font that will be used to display the string. To change the font, the user can click on the button, and the Font dialog will appear. The color can be changed by clicking on the combo box arrow next to the button.

Color

If the entity has only a color associated with it, the button displays a square, drawn in the color that will be used to display that entity. To change the color, the user can click on the button, and the Color dialog will appear. The color can also be changed by clicking on the combo box arrow next to the button.

Options

Other specific display attributes can be accessed through the Options buttons. The options available will vary based on the current model and includes attributes such as boundary conditions assigned to nodes or nodestrings.

General Display Options

The general display options control display of entities not specifically associated with a module, including:

General Tab

• Drawing Options:

• Z magnification: the user may enter a magnification factor for the Z- direction. Since the range of values in Z is usually much smaller than the horizontal range this can be useful for oblique views.
• background color
• erase behind labels

• Copy To Clipboard:

• Scale factor applied when copying. When SMS copies data to the clipboard, the data can be scaled to prevent pixelization. The default factor is 2.0, increase to improve clipboard image quality.

• Triad:

• SMS can display a coordinate triad at the lower left of the screen to display the orientation of the data in the display window. The user can control the size and color of this triad.

• Scale Bar:

• Display Scale toggle allows the user to display a legend of the size scale. The Options button allows the user to position, size, and define the scale.

• Drawing Grid: SMS can display a grid (in plan view) behind all data on the graphics window.

• Grid Spacing: The user can enter the increment between grid points. Remember that the grid can be used for both snapping and display, and not all grid lines need to be displayed.
• Snap to Grid: If this toggle is on, newly created points, nodes and vertices are moved to the nearest point on the grid.
• Display grid lines every n spaces: This option allows the user to specify how many grid lines to between displayed grid lines. The line style is also selected.
• Display grid points every m spaces: This option allows the user to enable the display of a point at selected intervals along with the symbol attributes for the points.

• Texture mapping: Currently SMS supports images displayed in the background and texture maps draped over TINS, grids, and meshes.

Related Topics

Template:Display Options

SMS

Modules: Mesh Module · Cartesian Grid Module · Scatter Module · Map Module · GIS Module · Particle Module
Models: ADCIRC · BOUSS-2D · CGWAVE · CMS-Flow · CMS-Wave · FESWMS · FVCOM · Generic Mesh Model · GENESIS · HYDRO AS-2D · PTM · SRH-2D · Steering · STWAVE · TABS · TUFLOW