Moving Tools

You may move a tool or a selection of tools within the Tool Flow panel to adapt the workflow of your application. The focus tool The focus tool is the editable tool shown in the Tool Workspace. It also serves as reference position when several tools are moved within the Tool Flow panel. serves as reference position for the new place of the tools to move.

How to Move Tools via Drag-and-Drop
  1. Select the tools you want to move.
  2. Drag the selected tools over the Tool Flow panel. The new position is indicated by dashed lines. The respective color indicates if all connections can be maintained (blue) or if any connections will be lost (orange).
  3. Drop the at the new place.

While dragging a tool over the Tool Flow panel, the new position is indicated by dashed lines. If a tool is moved between two directly adjacent tools, a new row or column will be added.

Behavior of Existing Connections

The behavior of existing connections when moving a tool follows the same rules as adding a tool to the Tool Flow. If a tool is moved to a place on the same level or above a connected tool, the connections between these tools cannot be maintained because a tool parameter can only be connected to the result of a prior tool. When dragging a tool over the Tool Flow, you can instantly see if any connections would be lost because in this case, the new position and the respective connections are highlighted in orange.

Moving a Tool to a Free Place

If a tool is moved to a free place, MERLIC automatically determines and creates suitable connections for the tool. Previously existing connections of the tool will remain whenever possible.

This adjustment might be useful to provide a better overview of the tool flows of a MERLIC Vision App. The tools are automatically adjusted to ensure that they are still visualized according to the top-down principle.

Moving a Tool Next to an Existing Tool

It is possible to move tools into rows or columns which will be newly inserted when the tools are placed. This means, when the tools are placed, new rows or columns will be created in the Tool Flow panel. To the user if will look like the existing rows or columns with tools will be shifted to the respective direction, e.g., to the right or downwards. The reference position, where new columns or rows are inserted, is marked with dashed lines and arrow. The respective color indicates if all connections can be maintained (blue) or if any connections will be lost (orange). In the same way, it is also possible to move one or several tools to a non-empty place between two tools or between a tool and the Tool Flow panel boarder. In case of moving several tools, the selected tool, marked with a blue filling, counts as reference position.

The existing connections of the tool will be maintained wherever possible.