Navigating the editor

The editor is built for whole drawing sets, not single files — tabs across the top, sheets on the left, panels on the right, and a command palette that gets you anywhere.

Document tabs#

Open as many documents as you need; each gets a tab in the top bar.

• Click a tab to switch — it's instant, no reload.
• Close with the × or a middle-click.
• Right-click for Close, Close others, Close tabs to the right, and Duplicate.
• The + button opens a searchable browser of your workspace documents.
• Closing the last tab returns you to the workspace.

Your open tabs survive a page reload, so a set you're working through stays put.

The n menu#

The n at the top left holds everything that isn't a tool: Back to workspace, Actions…, Organize (page changes — see Managing pages), and the File, Edit and View menus. File has New, Open…, Export…, Keep on this device, Document properties… and Remove PDF protection…; View toggles Snap, Grid, Rulers, the sheet's display, the cursor style, both sidebars, and zoom. Help & feedback, Account settings and Workspace settings sit at the bottom.

The command palette#

Press Ctrl+K (⌘K on Mac) anywhere in the editor. Type to switch to an open tab, open any document in the workspace by name, close tabs, or zoom — it's the fastest way to move around a big set.

Sheets and search (left sidebar)#

The Pages button at the top of the tool rail opens the sheet navigator — thumbnails of every page, in a grid or a list, click to jump. Double-click a sheet's name to rename it. Organize at the top of the navigator is where pages are reordered, inserted, rotated and deleted.

The Search button (or Ctrl+F) searches the document's text across all pages: results show a snippet per match, click one to jump there with every match on the page highlighted.

Zoom and pan#

Documents open fit to the page. Zoom with the − % + controls in the status strip, or grab the Zoom tool (Z) and drag a box to zoom to exactly that region. With the Zoom tool armed you can also just click to zoom in a level, or Ctrl/⌘ + click to zoom back out. The Hand tool (Shift+V) pans; Select (V) is the default pointer. What the mouse wheel does — scroll or zoom — is your choice under Settings → Account → Preferences.

The status strip#

Along the bottom:

• the current page number;
• the page's scale — green when calibrated, click to set one. A small AI or PDF badge means Notch read the scale from the title block or from the PDF itself; check it before you rely on quantities;
• Snap, Grid and Rulers, each with its own settings;
• Display — show the sheet Light, Inverted, Greyscale or Black & white, dim it toward white so markups stand out, or replace one colour in the drawing with another;
• the Worksheet toggle (see The worksheet);
• and zoom.

Panels (right sidebar)#

• Layers — every markup and measurement, grouped by layer. See Organizing with layers.
• Measurements — the takeoff roll-up with grouping and totals.
• Tools — the Tool chest: your team's stamps and saved tools, then the built-in libraries. See Stamps, custom tools & signatures.
• Bookmarks — pin pages you return to often: + bookmarks the current page, click a row to jump, hover to rename or remove. Bookmarks are shared with the whole document.
• Overlays — the revision-compare tool. See Comparing revisions.
• Properties — style and details for whatever is selected on the canvas.
• Discussion — team chat and pinned comments about the drawing. See Comments & discussion.
• Assistant — ask Notch AI about the drawing set. See Notch AI.
• History — a timeline of your edits this session, grouped by time. Click any entry to jump the document back to that state.

Working together#

When teammates have the same drawing open, their avatars appear in the top bar, with their cursors and selections on the canvas and a live preview of what they're drawing. Click an avatar to follow that person — your view moves to their sheet and zoom — and Stop following to go back.