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The Select menu includes several selection commands that enable you to quickly select (or deselect) many nodes, including Select All (Ctrl+A), Select None (Ctrl+D), Select Invert (Ctlr+I), Select Children (Ctrl+C), and Deselect Children.

If the Select⇒Sync Selection option in the Select menu is enabled, then the node of any object that is selected in the viewports is also selected in the Schematic View window, and vice versa. If you disable the Sync Selection option, you can select different objects in the viewports and in the Schematic View at the same time. The node of the object selected in the viewports is outlined in white, and the interior of selected nodes is white. To select all the objects in the viewports that match the selected nodes without the Sync Selection option enabled, just use Select⇒Select to Scene.

Tip

All animated objects have their node border drawn in red. •

Rearranging nodes

The Schematic View includes several options for arranging nodes. In the Options menu, you can toggle between Hierarchy and Reference modes. Hierarchy mode displays the nodes vertically with child objects indented under their parent. Reference mode displays the nodes horizontally, allowing for plenty of room to display all the various reference nodes under each parent node. Figure 25.11 shows these modes side by side.

FIGURE 25.11

The Schematic View window can automatically arrange nodes in two different modes: Hierarchy and Reference.

You can move nodes and rearrange them in any order. To move a node, simply click and drag it to a new location. When a node is dragged, all selected nodes move together, and any links follow the node movement. If a child node is moved, all remaining child nodes collapse together to maintain the specified arrangement mode. The moved node then becomes free, which is designated by an open rectangle on the left edge of the node. Figure 25.12 shows two nodes that were moved and thereby became free. The other children automatically moved closer together to close the gaps made by the moving nodes.

FIGURE 25.12

Free nodes are moved independent of the arranging mode.

Using the Layout⇒Free Selected (Alt+S) and Free All (Alt+F) menu commands, you can free the selected nodes or all nodes. You also can auto arrange all the children of a node with the Layout⇒Arrange Children menu command or arrange just the selected nodes (Layout⇒Arrange Selected). The Options⇒Move Children (Alt+C) command causes all children to be moved along with their parent when the parent is moved. This causes free and non-free nodes to move with their parent.

If the Options⇒Always Arrange option is enabled, Max automatically arranges all the nodes using either the Hierarchy mode or Reference mode, but you cannot move any of the nodes while this option is enabled. If you move any nodes when the Always Arrange option is selected, a dialog box appears telling you that your custom layout will be lost. If the Always Arrange option is enabled, the Arrange Children, Free All (Alt+F), Free Selected (Alt+S), Move Children (Alt+C), and all the Align options are all disabled. If two or more nodes are selected, you can align them using the Layout⇒Align menu. The options include Left, Right, Top, Bottom, Center Horizontal, and Center Vertical.

Hiding, shrinking, and deleting nodes

If your Schematic View window starts to get cluttered, you can always hide nodes to simplify the view. To hide a node, select the nodes to hide and use the Display⇒Hide Selected menu command. The Display⇒Unhide All menu command can be used to make the hidden nodes visible again.

Note

If you hide a parent object, its children nodes are hidden also. •

Another useful way to reduce clutter in the Schematic View window is with the Layout⇒Shrink Selected command. This command replaces the rectangular node with a simple dot, but all hierarchical lines to the node are kept intact. Figure 25.13 shows a Schematic View with several shrunk nodes. Shrunk nodes can be unshrunk with