Palette View
The Palette view provides
the list of graphical model elements grouped by categories in a number
of stencils (palettes).
To show/hide the
Palette view
- Choose View >
Palette
from the main menu.
By default, the Palette
view is docked to the left side of the window.

The Palette view
The Palette view shares the
same area within the application window with the Projects view. If Projects or some other view (e.g. Search) is shown there, just click
the Palette view tab to bring
it on top:

The Palette
view is the place where you can find any AnyLogic graphical element and
add it onto a graphical diagram of some agent class or experiment.
To add an element onto
a diagram of agent type or experiment
-
Drag the element from the Palette
view to the place of the diagram, where you want to place this element.
Some elements (marked in the Palette
with
icons) also support drawing mode - the alternative way of adding these
elements onto the diagram in addition to common drag`n'dropping (please
refer to the
Adding palette elements to the diagram
section for more information).
The Palette view consists
of a number of default palettes and may also
display palettes of third-party AnyLogic libraries plugged-in by user.
To show a particular
palette
- Hover the mouse over the vertical navigation bar docked to the
left side of the Palette click
the icon of the required palette.
- Wait for the popup window with the palette names to appear:
- Then just select the required palette by clicking the
corresponding name in the list.
You can close any rarely used palette (or library palette as well)
whenever you need and reopen any earlier closed palettes.
To open/close a palette
- Click on the
Palettes...
button in the bottom of the Palette
view.
- This will open the list of currently available palettes and
library stencils.
- Select the required item from this list. The corresponding
palette will be opened and made currently selected in the Palette view.
Adding palette elements to the diagram
You draw model elements in the graphical editor by simply dragging them from the corresponding page of the
Palette
view.
To add an element onto a diagram of agent or experiment
-
Drag the element from the
Palette
view to the place of the diagram, where you want to place this element.
Drawing mode
The pencil icon
drawn near a palette element means that this element supports
drawing mode. Drawing mode is the additional way of adding elements onto the diagram in addition to common dragging.
When
you drag an element onto the diagram, you always get the shape of the
predefined size and form. But sometimes you may want to draw a shape of
the required form at once. In this case you should use the drawing mode.
To activate the drawing mode, double-click the element in the
Palette. The element icon should turn to
:

Now
you can draw a shape in the graphical editor using some common set of
actions. However, these actions slightly differ for different elements:
State, Rectangle, Rounded Rectangle, Oval, Line
Drag
to the graphical editor where you want to draw the shape. Stop dragging
when you've got the shape of the required form and size.
Connector, Transition, Polyline, Curve
Successively
draw points of a shape by clicking at the required points on the
diagram. Double-click to place the end point and finish.
Let's illustrate the difference between two ways by the example of a rectangle.
Drawing a rectangle of the predefined form using drag'n'drop
To draw a rectangle of the predefined form
- Drag the
Rectangle
element from the
Presentation
palette to the graphical editor (right to the place where you want to locate this shape).
- Now you can modify the appearance of the drawn rectangle by dragging its handles to required points on the presentation.
Drawing a rectangle of the required form in the drawing mode
Sometimes it would be more convenient to use drawing mode.
To draw a rectangle of the required form at once
- Double-click the
Rectangle
element in the
Presentation
palette.
This activates the drawing mode for this element (its icon turns into
to indicate that the drawing mode is currently turned on).
- Press the left mouse button in the graphical editor where the upper left corner of the rectangle should be placed.
- Hold the mouse button pressed; drag the cursor to the point where you want to place the lower right corner of the rectangle.
- Release the mouse button.
- As the result, a rectangle of the required form will be drawn at once.

Customizing the palette appearance
To simplify working with the
Palette
view, AnyLogic allows users to customize its appearance. The settings
are saved and applied again on next AnyLogic launches.
You can customize the way palette elements are displayed in the
Palette.
By default they appear as small icons. If needed, you can show them as
a list (if there are too many elements in the palette), or as large
icons (if small icons are hardly distinguishable).
To change the appearance of the palette elements
- Hover the mouse over the title bar of the required palette. Click the button
and choose the appearance type from the popup menu:
Small Icons,
Large Icons, or
List:
List |
Small Icons |
Large Icons |
 |
 |
 |
-
Small Icons
- In this mode elements are displayed as small icons that are arranged throughout the palette.
-
Large Icons
- In this mode elements are displayed as large icons that are arranged
throughout the palette. This mode is mostly used when the user chooses
elements by their icons, not by their names, and wants icons to be
clearly distinguishable.
-
List
- In this mode elements are displayed in one vertical column. This mode
may be useful when elements have too long names that do not fit in the
allotted space in other modes; and also when the Palette view is
vertically oriented - in this case this mode provides the most
effective way of arranging the elements in the palette space.
Element appearance settings are
defined individually for each palette. Therefore you can use various
modes for different palettes, e.g. use Large Icons
mode in
Pictures
and
3D Objects
palettes, and
List
mode in all other palettes.
Searching palette elements
AnyLogic
provides a convenient mechanism of searching elements in the palettes.
It may be needed when you can not find the required element in the
palette, or do not remember what particular palette contains it.
To find the palette element
- Click in the
Palette
view.
- Start
typing the element name You will see that the view contents are
filtered: only the elements with the names that start with the
specified string are shown in the view now.
- Having found the required element, add it onto the graphical diagram and close the search bar by clicking the button
to the right of the
Look for
string:
- This will bring the
Palette
view to its normal state.
If the element name consists of several words, you may start typing any of them (as in the given example - you may type
function
to find the
Table function).
This can be convenient for example when you are searching for
Pedestrian Library objects: since names of all objects of this library
start from Ped, you may directly type the second, meaningful, word, e.g. you can type just
GoTo
to find
PedGoTo.
Related topics
Working with views