Datasheet

Part I ✦ Illustrator Basics

type, or point type area must be selected with the Type tool. Paste is not available if

nothing is in the clipboard.

Illustrator also includes Paste in Front (Ô/Ctrl+F) and Paste in Back (Ô/Ctrl+B)

options that can be used to control the position of the object being pasted relative

to the other objects.

Now, the really cool part: Just because you’ve pasted the object somewhere doesn’t

mean it isn’t in the clipboard anymore. It is! You can paste again and again, and

keep on pasting until you get bored, or until your page is an indecipherable mess,

whichever comes first. The most important rule to remember about Cut, Copy, and

Paste is that whatever is currently in the clipboard will be replaced by anything

that subsequently gets cut or copied to the clipboard.

Cut, Copy, and Paste also work with text that you type in a document. Using the Type

tools, you can select type, cut or copy it, and then paste it. When you’re pasting type,

it will go wherever your blinking text cursor is located. If you have type selected

(highlighted) and you choose Paste, the type that was selected is replaced by what-

ever you had on the clipboard.

You can cut or copy as much or as little of an illustration as you choose; you are

only limited by your hard disk space (which is only used if you run out of RAM). A

good rule of thumb is that, if you ever get a message saying you can’t cut or copy

because you are out of hard disk space, it’s time to start throwing out stuff on your

hard drive that you don’t need. Or, simply get a bigger hard drive.

Thanks to the Adobe PostScript capability on the clipboard, Illustrator can copy

paths to other Adobe software, including InDesign, Dimensions, Streamline, and

Photoshop. Paths created in those packages (with the exception of InDesign) can

be pasted into Illustrator. With Photoshop, you have the option of pasting your

clipboard contents as rasterized pixels instead of as paths.

You have the ability to drag Illustrator artwork from an Illustrator document right

into a Photoshop document. In addition, because Adobe lets you move things in

both directions, you can drag a Photoshop selection from any Photoshop document

right into an Illustrator document.

Undoing and redoing

You can keep undoing in Illustrator until you run out of either computer memory

or patience. After you undo, you can redo by choosing Redo, which is found right

below Undo in the Edit menu. And, guess what — you can redo everything you’ve

undone.

Note

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