Did you know? In Cacoo, the ‘Group’ feature allows you to merge multiple shapes or elements into one selectable and editable field.
As a group, they can be moved around more easily, resized, and styles applied collectively instead of each individually.
Here’s a quick tutorial on using grouped elements in Cacoo.
How to group several shapes
- Select the shapes that you wish to group together by holding down Shift key while clicking them, or click and drag over several shapes. The Group tool will be available in the editor menu.
- Click on Group, or use Ctrl + G (Win) / Cmd + G (Mac) to group the selected shapes.
To ungroup elements, use Ctrl + U (Win), Cmd + U (Mac), or choose Ungroup in the editor menu.
How to change the relative position of a shape in a group
- Click on the group once to select it (you’ll notice a blue box appear around it).
- Click again on the individual shape you want to move.
- Mouse over the + sign in the middle of the shape. When the pointer changes to four-directional arrows, click and drag the shape to move it.
- When you release the shape, its relative position has changed but it stays as part of the group.
Hold Shift to preserve ratio while resizing a group/shape
This ensures that the ratio won’t be affected by size changes.
Note: If it’s an imported image or the group contains an imported image, you do not need to hold Shift while resizing to keep its original ratio. Holding Shift to maintain ratio only applies to Cacoo shapes.
Use resizing constraints to maintain individual shape size in a group
In this example, the size of the blue visitor icon is fixed at the same size even when the group is enlarged.
To keep a shape in the group at the same size:
- Click the group once to select it.
- Click again on the shape whose size you are preserving.
- In the editor menu, choose Resizing constraints.
- Under the Fix column, click on the checkboxes to fix the height (H) and width (W) of the element. This will keep the element at a fixed height, width, or both when the group is resized.
When the checkboxes are enabled, a lock icon and green lines appear on the individual element, indicating that its height and width are locked.
Pin a shape in a group to maintain its margin
Sometimes, you may want to maintain a shape’s margin in the group during resizing. This is where pinning comes in handy.
Check out the image below as an example.
Image A: the orange rectangle is not pinned, so its margins decrease proportionally when the group is made smaller.
Image B: the left and right sides of the orange rectangle are pinned, so it maintains a constant margin even when the group is smaller.
How to pin an element’s margin in a group:
- Follow the same steps 1-3 earlier to open the Resizing constraints option.
- Under the Pin column, the settings are for pinning the element to the group margins.
- Click on the respective dots to pin the left, right, top, or bottom margins of the element.
