Compound Layouts

Compound layouts

This page explains the optional tools for arranging selected compounds or grouped figure elements without changing their chemistry.

Compound layout tools are off by default. Enable Compound layout tools in Settings or Preferences; until enabled, the layout toolbar items, context-menu items, and customization entries stay hidden. The same preference is stored locally on macOS and Windows.

Arrange a selection

Select at least two objects or groups, then open Arrange Selection. Choose one of:

Command label	Result
Arrange in a Circle	Places the selection around a circle
Arrange in an Oval	Places it around an oval
Arrange in a Grid (Left)	Reads items by row and left-justifies an incomplete row
Arrange in a Grid (Centered)	Reads items by row and centers an incomplete row
Arrange in a Grid (Right)	Reads items by row and right-justifies an incomplete row
Arrange in a Row	Places items in a horizontal sequence
Arrange in a Column	Places items in a vertical sequence

The same actions are available through the selection context menu’s Arrange submenu. Circle and oval preserve clockwise spatial order; grids read the existing selection by row. The tools use visible bounds and molecule ring-system anchors, so the arrangement is based on what a reader sees rather than on a hidden atom coordinate alone.

What is preserved

Layouts translate selected objects; they do not shrink or redraw molecules. Molecule size, internal coordinates, styles, SMILES, stereochemistry, atom and bond counts remain unchanged. Existing rotations remain unchanged as well. Groups and associated marks move together, so a grouped caption or an anchored charge mark does not get separated from its compound.

Each completed arrangement is one named Undo step and leaves the arranged objects selected. Save and reopen preserves their resulting positions.

To keep a compound’s name, panel, and annotation together, group them before arranging. Unselected objects and other pages are not obstacles, so plan around them yourself. The layout is spatial, not a reaction-order or chemical-relationship inference.

Adjust spacing

Choose Adjust spacing… from the Arrange flyout or context submenu to open a preview for the selected page. The control offers a 25–150% range around the original spacing. Smaller values bring anchors closer around their centroid; larger values spread them. The preview shows the full page boundary, and Save commits one Undo step while Cancel or Escape makes no change.

The preview will not permit a save that overlaps selected items or runs beyond the page. Row and column layouts normally start with 48 document pixels of clearance and can tighten to 12 pixels when needed; a layout that still cannot fit is refused rather than silently shrinking compounds. An explicitly supplied spacing value is honored rather than automatically tightened.

On desktop, the preview is a movable, resizable window owned by the originating document. On Windows it does not appear in the taskbar; on macOS it follows the same document-owned utility-window behavior. In the browser-only build, the same form appears as its fallback surface.

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• Art Objects and Styling
• Documents, Pages, and Tabs
• Selection and Editing