Techniques for working with Visio

[tap1956]

Hello!


The following questions arose:
1. How to make a connecting line with right angles in one go? I'm asking a question because there may already be a solution that I'm not aware of. For example, you can draw a horizontal line and when you press a key (functional or Ctrl, Alt, Del), change the direction to vertical, and when you press another or the same key, return to the previous direction. Now I'm making a line using several horizontal and vertical segments and then connecting them, it's not very convenient.
2. How do I make a dotted line with text around a certain group of shapes? I would like to outline the shapes with a rectangular outline of solid or dotted lines, preferably with explanatory text. There will be several blocks in the real image, each of which I would like to frame with a rectangular outline with explanatory text. The text file is attached.

[Guessed]

Connectors can be far more complicated than they appear and you should explore a bit to figure out the properties which can be configured.

Firstly, go and find the Stencil called Connectors. In there are two particular connectors that are my 'go to' connectors. Drag the Dynamic Connector onto your page and also find the one called Layout Connector and drag that onto your page.

Grab the ends of the connector and drag it to the shape you want to connect to. Do the same with the other end.
The Dynamic Connector will automatically route to join the shapes while avoiding the other objects on the page. You can experiment with it by moving the shapes around after the connector is attached.
The Layout Connector is a bit more constricted and it has some options you can explore by right clicking on it and choosing to Configure Connector. If you have more than 2 legs, you will be able to drag the inner legs to specific locations.

You can add boxes on the page and set their fill to nothing and the border to dotted lines.

[Paul Herber]

For your item 2 look at containers.