WeaveMaker User's Manual — Edit Menu

Undo
Undoes whatever you last did in WeaveMaker. If you click in the threading, for example, Undo will reverse the effect of that click. Undo handles even large-scale changes. If you change the size of the loom, Undo will put it back the way it was.

You can repeat Undo up to five times; each time you click it, it undoes one more thing. Redo has the opposite effect of Undo.

Watch Out for

While Undo works on pencil and crayon clicks, it’s generally easier just to click again with the tool rather than using Undo, because both tools have the property that a second click in one spot is an Undo of the first click.

Cut, Copy, Paste, Clear, Select
These commands duplicate, move, or erase pieces of the threading, peg plan, tie-up, treadling, or drawdown. You can copy and paste within WeaveMaker or into other appli-cations such as a word proces-sor or drawing program. And these commands work across grid boundaries, so you can (for example) copy a threading and paste it into a tie-up or treadling (and vice-versa).

Cut, Copy, and Clear operate on an area you have designated with the Marquee tool or with Select Entire. Therefore, before using them you must set up a selection (please see “Marquee” in the Index for details). Cut, Copy, and Clear are grayed out if you have not established a selection.

Copy copies your selection to the clipboard. From there it can be pasted into any grid within WeaveMaker, or into other applications such as word processors or painting programs.

Paste copies the clipboard into the threading, tie-up, treadling, or peg plan at one or more places you select. To paste, first select Paste from the menu. The cursor shape changes to indicating that you can now paste (this is the Paste cursor). Move the paste cursor to the upper left hand corner (thread-ing) or upper right hand corner (peg plan, tie-up, or treadling) of where you want to paste, and click. The contents of the clip-board will overlay the selected portion of the design. You may paste over and over again, as many times as you wish.

If you paste between the threading and the treadling or peg plan, the image will be rotated by 90° (a “tromp as writ” effect).

Clear erases the selected area to white.

Cut combines copy and clear. First it copies the selection to the clipboard, then it erases the selection from the grid.

Clear Colorway puts the colorway back to the way it would be on a new design. Only two colors are defined, black in the warp and white in the weft.

Select Entire creates a selec-tion exactly enclosing one part of the design (the entire threading, for example). This is useful for copying an entire threading, treadling, or peg plan.

Clicking on Select Entire “pops up” a small submenu as shown, to permit you to select just the grid you desire.

Clear Entire combines Select Entire and Clear. It permits you to conveniently clear the threading, tie-up, treadling, peg plan, or color bars.

Lock Warp, Lock Weft
Some designs naturally divide into two parts, for example, a pattern and a ground (or tie-down). In WeaveMaker, you can divide your design into two parts and then temporarily lock either part while you work on the other.

For example, you might input the ground for a design, and then lock it while you work on the pattern. This is particularly useful when working with the Cornucopia tool (please see Section 16: “Cornucopia Tool” for details). You can create and lock a ground, and then use the Cornucopia tool to try out various patterns.

In the threading, you can separately lock harnesses and individual ends. For example, you might want to lock the first two harnesses. Or, you can lock every third end. These will typically be done in combination. In the peg plan, you can separately lock pegs and picks.

When you click on Lock Warp, a pop-up menu appears:

If you choose Lock Ends, the cursor changes to a small pad-lock. Move the cursor over the threading and click on any ends you wish to lock. Locked ends will turn gray. Continue clicking with the padlock cursor until you have locked all the ends you wish to lock. Clicking on a locked end unlocks it. Then, click on any of the tools in the Tool window to deselect the padlock cursor and end locking mode.

If you choose Lock Harnesses, you will then be asked to specify the range of harnesses you wish to lock. Those harnesses will turn gray as well.

Once you have established your locks, notice that you can no longer edit the grayed-out ends and harnesses. If you click with the Cornucopia tool in the threading, only the unlocked threads/harnesses change. You can temporarily remove the locking by choosing “Unlock.” You can restore the locking by clicking “Relock.” Use “Reverse Locks” to lock every unlocked thread and to lock every unlocked harnesses.

Locking in the peg plan or treadling follows these same rules.

Algebraic (Input)
Algebraic input is used to create threadings, tie-ups, peg plans, treadlings, dentings, beaming, and color arrangements by typing the harness/treadle/end/pick/color numbers and letters rather than clicking in a grid. If you have a threading, for example, which consists of a list of harness numbers, you can use algebraic input to convert those numbers into a WeaveMaker threading.

When you click on Algebraic, you pick one particular part of your design to input algebraically.

The rules for Algebraic input depend on the design element you are entering. Please consult the following sections for details.

Threading, Treadling
As an example, the expression “1-8 5-8 1 3 5 7 2 4 6” yields this threading:

Here are the exact rules:

Color Arrangement (Warp/Weft)
  • The values you type specify the color arrangement from left to right, starting with end number 1 (weft is from bottom to top, starting with pick 1).
  • Colors are indicated by letter codes. You may use either uppercase or lowercase letters. Warp letters will automatically be converted to uppercase, and weft to lowercase. The left-most warp color chip in the Colorway window is chip “A,” the next is “B,” and so on, without regard to the major/minor/accent divisions. The weft colors are treated similarly, with the left-most chip being “a.” You may put a blank between color codes, but this is not required.
  • Repeats are indicated using parentheses and a repeat number. So, for example, the expression “4(ABC)” means “color 12 threads by repeating the color arrangement ABC four times.” Repeats can be nested. Repeating a single letter can be done by using the repeat count without parentheses (“AAA” can be written “3A”).
  • If the expression specifies fewer ends (or picks) than are in the design, the pattern you have specified is repeated across the design.
Denting
  • The values you type specify the denting arrangement from left to right, starting with end number 1.
  • Denting is indicated by a number, which indicates the number of ends to place in the dent. For example, “2 2 2 2” means “put the first two ends in the first dent, then the next two ends (threads 3 and 4) go in the next dent, et cetera.” Use 0 to skip a dent (in effect, you are saying “put no ends in this dent.” For example, “3 0 1 1” means “put the first three ends in the first dent, then leave the next dent empty, and then put one end in each of the next two dents.”
  • Repeats are indicated using parentheses and a repeat number. So, for example, the expression “4(2 1)” means “put two ends in the first dent, and then put one end in the next dent, and repeat this pattern four times.” Repeats can be nested.
  • If the expression specifies fewer ends than are in the design, the pattern you have specified is repeated across the design.
Beaming
  • The values you type specify the beaming arrangement from left to right, starting with end number 1.
  • Beaming is indicated by using the letters “b” and “t” to mean “bottom beam” and “top beam.” You may put a blank between codes, but this is not required.
  • Repeats are indicated using parentheses and a repeat number. So, for example, the expression “4(bbbt)” means “put the first 3 ends on the bottom beam, and then put one end on the top beam, and repeat this pattern four times.” Repeats can be nested. Repeating a single letter can be done by using the repeat count without parentheses. The expression used just above could also have been written as 4(3bt).
  • If the expression specifies fewer ends than are in the design, the pattern you have specified is repeated across the design.

Remarks Window
With each design you create, you may type comments which are kept along with the design (so when you save your design to disk, your comments are saved along with it). The Re-marks window is illustrated at the bottom of this page.

Preferences
Use this menu item to define the characteristics of your loom, so when you launch WeaveMaker or use New, you will get a blank design with the right number of harnesses, treadles, and the proper choice of tie-up or peg plan.