BKChem
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# 2.3. Modifying the drawing

To manipulate the items use the "edit mode". This mode is used for moving items or containers, selecting items etc.

## 2.3.1. Selection

To select an item just click it in the "edit mode". By default selecting an item unselects all previously selected items. To change this, hold the "Shift" key while clicking the items.

By dragging a mouse with button-1 down and nothing focused you can select all items in a rectangle. The "Shift" key works in the same way as in individual selections.

## 2.3.2. Moving objects or items

There are two different ways of moving objects or items. The first is used for moving of arbitrary number of items. Just select them and then catch one of them with mouse and drag them.

For moving of one object (container - molecule) (which is very usual situation) you don't need to select it. Just catch some unselected item from this object and drag it. (Note: You can see that behavior of dragging items with mouse depends on whether the item was or wasn't selected.) (Tip: The moving of a molecule in this way performs much better, so use it. When moving a huge number of individually selected items the dragging can be horribly slow.)

## 2.3.3. Deleting items

You can delete selected items in any mode by simply pressing "Delete" key. Atoms are deleted with their bonds and all orphan atoms (atoms with no bonds) are also deleted. When necessary the molecule is after deletion of some atoms split to two or more separate molecules.

| Newly created atoms or other items are automatically selected. Thus if you want to delete atom just drawn, simply press the "Delete" key.

## 2.3.4. Aligning

To align containers, select them and then use either the "align menu" or key-binding (C-a 'x'; where 'x' is one of 'tblrhv' - 't' stands for 'top', 'b' for 'bottom', 'l' for 'left', 'r' for 'right', 'v' for 'vertical center' and 'h' for 'horizontal center'). E.g. - "C-a b" moves all selected container (containers with at least one item selected) down so that their bottoms are in line.

## 2.3.5. Modifying item properties

You can change various properties of selected items by right-clicking any of them. A dialog window will appear that will let you do that.

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