Scene Edit
The scene editor is used for designing custom scenes.
The editor consists of three areas:Display Area
The main part of the editor, where the position and size of elements are arranged. The display area has two modes dependent on the setting of the magnifying glass icon in the corner.Preview Mode
This mode shows the scene as it will appear when displayed.- Click-and-drag on the edge of the scene to resize it
Editing Mode
This mode is zoomed to make editing easier.- Long-click on an empty area to create a new element positioned there
- Long-click on an element to get options for the element
- Click on an element to edit it.
- Click-and-drag on the centre of an element to move it
- Click-and-drag on the edge of an element to resize it
When moving and resizing, the sides of elements are snapped to a grid to make alignment easier. The grid size is unique to each scene and can be changed via Menu / Grid Size.
Tool Bar
Touch Mode
There are four touch modes which decide the effect of taps on the display area. Normal Mode is described above. Edit Mode is the same as Normal Mode except that all controls except the Touch Mode selector are hidden to allow access to small controls along the scene edges. Move Mode is intended to make it easier to reposition elements. Resize mode is for making resizing easier.
Element Picker
Allows selection of an element by name. This is most useful when an element is difficult to directly click on due to other elements or because it's very small.
Both short and long clicks on the element names behave the same as short and long clicks on the element itself.
Undo
Allows undo of all operations, up to 20 steps in the past.New Element
Create a new element in the middle of the scene. Useful if the scene is already cluttered with a lot of elements so there is no free space.Menu Options
Background Colour
A complex background can be set by long-tapping an element and specifying it as the background element. If a uniform colour is sufficient, it can also be specified with this menu option.However, there is a special case where it's a good idea to specify a background colour even if you already have a background element. A scene is resized to fit the container into which it's placed, but in some cases (e.g. when it is shown as a full screen activity) there will be margins left on one side of the container because the aspect ration of the scene (the relative size of its width and height) of a scene is never changed. In such a case, the margins are coloured with the background colour specified here.
Element Long-Click Options
Set Background
An element which is set as the scene background is resized to always fill the whole scene and interferes less with selection of other elements. To reverse this, long-tap on it and select Set Foreground.Pin
When an element is positioned satisfactorily, it can be pinned to make it easier to select and manipulate other elements. To reverse this, long-tap on it and select Unpin.Set Depth
Each element has a particular depth which is unique to it. Deeper elements are obscured by shallower elements which overlap them.Orientation
The geometry (position and size) of each element can be configured independently for portrait and landscape display orientations by rotating the device to the desired orientation in the editor.
If no geometry is configured for a particular orientation when the scene is displayed, Tasker will attempt to fit the elements into the scene based on the geometry of the elements in the other orientation.