could not edit stencil

[Jack Zhong]

My MS Visio 2003 worked fine before, but it is very strange that I
could not edit stencils today. Some of them about Network structures
are editable but none of the shapes about UML could be edited. What's
wrong mith my Visio?

 

[Chris Roth [MVP]]

Jack,

I think that the stencils that ship with Visio 2003 are set to "read-only"
in a special way. They are somehow registered with Visio so that Visio won't
let you edit them.

You can always save a copy ("My Basic Networks.vss") and edit that.

--
Hope this helps,

Chris Roth
Visio MVP

More Visio shapes, articles, development info and pure diagramming fun at:
www.visguy.com

 

[Jack Zhong]

Chris Roth [MVP] expressed precisely :

I think that the stencils that ship with Visio 2003 are set to "read-only" in
a special way. They are somehow registered with Visio so that Visio won't let
you edit them.

I am afraid not. These stencils are all built-in ones, and they could
be edited the day before yesterday. Those shapesheet I created with the
same Visio application in the same computer are not editable either.

 

[Chris Roth [MVP]]

Do you mean the Shapes themselves or actually adding masters (icons) to the
green things (stencils)?

The UML shapes probably have lots of protection to make it difficult for
users to change them. That is because the special UML code that makes the
UML solution work needs the shapes to have certain properties. If a user
alters these shapes, then it could break the UML solution.

You might try selecting a shape and looking at Format > Protection. Also,
there's a ShapeSheet section called "Protection". Go to Window > Show
ShapeSheet to view this.

--
Hope this helps,

Chris Roth
Visio MVP

More Visio shapes, articles, development info and pure diagramming fun at:
www.visguy.com

 

[Michel LAPLANE]

Chris is right. Stencils shipped with visio 2003 are protected from
modification.
What you must do is saving the stencil you want to modify to another file
with the save as command of the right click caption menu of the stencil you
want to modify. This new stencil is therefore editable.

 

[Jack Zhong]

Chris Roth [MVP] explained :

Do you mean the Shapes themselves or actually adding masters (icons) to the
green things (stencils)?

My Visio 2003 is a Chinese edition, so it is hard for me to know the
elements' names in English, I translated them from Chinese.

You might try selecting a shape and looking at Format > Protection. Also,
there's a ShapeSheet section called "Protection". Go to Window > Show
ShapeSheet to view this.

I have upselected all the protections of the shape. For example, I
would like to create a new UML static model sheet by selecting "New" in
File menu, -> "Software" -> "UML Static Model", then I drag a icon
"Class" from the left area in green and drop it to the sheet, I could
not add properties and/or operations(methods) to the Class, even if I
unprotect it, or, in anohter word, I could not add anything to it.

But if I drop an icon from Computer and Monitor, say PDA, to the sheet
just created, I could edit the icon and add words to it.

 

[Paul Herber]

Chris Roth [MVP] explained :

My Visio 2003 is a Chinese edition, so it is hard for me to know the
elements' names in English, I translated them from Chinese.



I have upselected all the protections of the shape. For example, I
would like to create a new UML static model sheet by selecting "New" in
File menu, -> "Software" -> "UML Static Model", then I drag a icon
"Class" from the left area in green and drop it to the sheet, I could
not add properties and/or operations(methods) to the Class, even if I
unprotect it, or, in anohter word, I could not add anything to it.

But if I drop an icon from Computer and Monitor, say PDA, to the sheet
just created, I could edit the icon and add words to it.

Right click on the shape and select Properties

 

[Jack Zhong]

Right click on the shape and select Properties

I am afraid it makes no difference, especially I could not add
properties to a class, even I failed to modify the class I created
before.

 

[Jack Zhong]

Michel LAPLANE pretended :

Chris is right. Stencils shipped with visio 2003 are protected from
modification.

I googled Visio introduction in English and found I made a mistake on
the terms. What I read want to modify is the Shape not the Stencil.

 

[Jack Zhong]

Jack Zhong used his keyboard to write :

My MS Visio 2003 worked fine before, but it is very strange that I could not
edit stencils today. Some of them about Network structures are editable but
none of the shapes about UML could be edited. What's wrong mith my Visio?

I reinstalled the Visio but it was still out of work, this afternoon I
reinstalled Windows and Visio, this time it worked fine. But I do not
the problem is.

Thank you anyway.

Jack

 

[Michel LAPLANE]

For sure but when i tell stencil editable, ypu must understand shapes of
stencil editable :
Right click on the caption of the stencil
Select the modify command.
Right click on the shape you want to modify in the stencil and select the
modify shape command.