spider daigrams

[merlin]

Does anyone know of a set of shapes for spider diagrams? I found some mind
map shapes but they don't quite do enough for me.

 

[merlin]

or I might have meant bubble diagrams.

Always been a bit woozy on the difference.

 

[David Parker]

Does this help?
http://blogs.msdn.com/visio/archive/2007/02/06/introducing-the-bubble-chart.aspx

 

[merlin]

Ah, yes it does. Now I know I definitely meant Spider Diagram rather than
Bubble Diagram. Thanks for clearing that up.

What's eluding me at the moment is having ovals and circles able to be
joined with a straight line. At the moment the connection handles are too
few and too inflexible for convenience. For instance, if I use a circle it
will only have 4 connector points so I have to add more either becuase they
are in the wrong place or not enough. When I've connected to them with
straight lines and then want to move connected bubbles around, the
connectors can't change position so the diagram looks untidy.

I guess what I'm looking for are shapes with lots of connectors and
connectors that adjust themselves to a position on the edge of the shape
which is closest to the shape its joined to.

Any thoughts?

 

[John]

Merlin,

It sounds like you're not connecting the shape's centre. Try this:

1 - Drop two circles from the Basic Shapes stencil onto a new page.

2 - Click the "Connector tool" from the top toolbar.

3 - Hover the mouse over centre of the first circle so that a red square
appears around the circle.

4 - Whilst the red square is visible press and hold the left mouse button
down and drag it to over the centre of the second circle shape so that
another red square appears and release the mouse button.

Right click on the connector and select "straight" if it's not already and
now try moving one of the shapes.

Does that help?

Best regards

John

This kind of dynamic glue allows the connector to "walk" round the shape to
just the right point.