With Edit Parts, you can organize a repository of frequently reused models. Then, you can assemble more complex models out of lower-level ?gparts?h stored in the repository. Cell Illustrator comes with several pre-registered parts to demonstrate this function.
The Edit Parts drop-down menu is displayed after clicking the Edit Parts button on the Edit Toolbar. With this menu, you can:
- Add a new part to the repository by clicking Add All or Add Selected.
- Manage and organize the parts in the repository by clicking the Edit menu item.
- Insert a model part into the active canvas by clicking on its name.
The Add All command adds to the repository the whole model in the active canvas while the Add Selected inserts into the repository only the elements that are currently selected in the canvas. Both commands open the Add New Part dialog box shown below:
Clicking Edit opens the Edit Parts dialog shown below:
Models in the repository are organized into a tree of components. Each model is stored as a separate file in the location selected by the user. The component tree is stored in the favorites.xml file in genomicobjectnet subfolder of the user preferences folder. It contains references to those files. Renaming or moving a file to a different location invalidates its reference in favorites.xml.
An item in the repository can be identified either by its name or by the name of the file where it is stored.
In the Edit Parts dialogs, the user can execute the following commands:
- Add Folder allows you to create a component group
- Remove deletes the references to selected components and/or groups from the list. The files that store the components are not deleted.
- Move Up moves a selected component or a group of components one position up in the list
- Move Down moves a selected component or a group of components one position down in the list
- Rename allows the renaming of a selected component or a group
- Change File Location saves a selected component into a specified file. The original file is not removed. The location of the component is updated in the list of components.
- Clicking the Edit button opens a selected component for editing in a new canvas window.
- The OK button saves the modifications to the list of components and closes the dialog, while the Cancel button closes the dialog without saving any changes.
- In the Add All and Add Selected mode, the Add New Part creates a new entry in the component hierarchy.
- In the Add Selected mode, after pressing Add New Part, the user is prompted to save the selected elements into a new file.