# Text

Single line text primitives can be created and added to your image. To create a text primitive, press the text button on the mode palette. Point to where you want the center of the text to go and click the mouse button. Use the "Edit/Properties..." option to define the text string to be displayed. Multiple lines of text can be entered.

There are two different types of text, vector text and system text. Vector text fonts are fully scaleable in any dimension and are portable between MS Windows and X Windows platforms. A vector text font can be assigned to a primitive by pressing of the eight style palette buttons showing "Ab".

System text fonts are "built in" to the toolkit on which your server is running. Text defined using a system font is non-scaleable and can only be resized by changing the font. A system font is defined by font name, point size, and whether or not is uses italic and/or boldface calligraphy. To assign a system font to a text primitive select the primitive, then press the "dialog box" button on the lower right hand corner of the style palette. The resulting font box will display all fonts, point sizes, and calligraphy styles on loaded on your server. The font you select will be applied to the selected text primitive. This same font can now be applied to other primitives using the "ST" button at the lower left corner of the style palette.

Text alignment with respect to the image can also be defined. For example, if you wanted a text primitive defined with a system font to remain centered as an image is scaled, its alignment should be centered horizontally and vertically using the "Edit/Properties..." option.

SIMSCRIPT Users:

Through the “Properties” dialog box, SIMSCRIPT users can define whether the text can be defined programmatically through the DTVAL.A attribute of the display entity. Text color can be defined through DCOLOR.A. For example, if this option is chosen and the pointer to the display entity is “ICON.PTR” you can include code of the form:

Let DTVAL.A(ICON.PTR) = “Hello World”

Let DCOLOR.A(ICON.PTR) = 15