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draw line
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Line (tool)The infinite line through two points.
Menu: Draw > Line | Node: Line | In depth: Lines, rays & segments
Click two points and the line runs through them, out to infinity both ways. Or select two points that already exist and pick the tool: it reads the selection and draws the line through them.
Both clicks work the way the Point tool works, so a line can be pinned to the construction as it is drawn: click existing points and it takes them, click a crossing and it takes a real intersection point that keeps up when the crossing moves.
Infinite is the whole reason to choose it. A line registers crossings along its entire length, not just between the two points you clicked, so it reaches the geometry a Segment cannot. When a construction needs the far crossing, where two edges would meet if they carried on, this is the tool that gives it to you as a real point rather than something you approximate.
The two points stay the definition. Move either one and the line swings to follow; the line does not own them, it is described by them, which is what lets you build a whole figure and then adjust it from its two drivers.
They look similar on screen and they behave nothing alike.
A line is a real object. Things are built on it, it can carry a style, and a point dropped where it crosses something else is a bound intersection point that tracks the crossing.
A guide is an annotation. Nothing is ever built on it, and a point dropped where a guide cuts an object comes out free, sitting at the right place but tied to nothing.
So the question to ask is whether you want the straight reference to be part of the construction or just help you aim. If anything downstream should follow it, draw a line. If it is scaffolding for your eye, use a guide and keep the construction clean. Lines you have finished with can be hidden and still snapped to: a retired construction host stays a live snap target even once it is out of sight. Guides have Lock Guides for the same sort of tidying.
Hold Shift on the second click to lock the angle. Constraining with Shift covers what the lock does and does not do.
< Previous: Segment | Next: Ray >
- In the node graph: Line - build the same line as a node.
- Lines, rays & segments: the three straight objects and when each is the right one.
- Rulers & guides: the annotation kind of straight reference.