Editor › Docs › Workspace: Rulers, Guides, Grid and Snapping

How do the rulers, guides, grid and snapping work in PhotoAIA?

Rulers, guides, the grid and snapping are all in the View menu, and every preference persists between sessions. Snapping uses screen-space tolerance with engage and release thresholds so objects stick predictably.

Rulers

Toggle with Cmd/Ctrl+R. Units follow the status-bar selector: pixels, millimetres, centimetres or inches. Tick spacing adapts to zoom and to the document resolution.

Guides

• Drag from a ruler to create a guide.
• With the Move tool, drag an existing guide to reposition it, or drag it off the canvas to delete it.
• View ▸ New Guide… places one at an exact numeric position in any unit.
• Lock Guides prevents accidental movement; Show Guides toggles visibility with Cmd/Ctrl+;.

Grid

Show Grid (Cmd/Ctrl+') draws a document grid with configurable spacing, subdivisions, colour and opacity. A separate pixel grid appears above 600% zoom.

Snapping

Snap To… enables each target independently: guides, grid, document bounds and centre, and other layers’ edges and centres. Tolerance is set in screen pixels (default 8) so the pull feels the same at every zoom level, and a snapped object holds until the pointer moves about 1.6× that distance away.

Hold Ctrl or Cmd while dragging to suspend snapping. Press Escape to cancel a drag and restore the original position.

Shortcuts

Open the editor