Creative productivity. Intuitive Design. Powered by Humans.
This major release of OmniGraffle 7 adds many new features and improvements across the entire application. In addition to the following features, the areas of improvement include the Canvas, Sidebar, Inspectors, Resource Browser, the entire export process, and more.
- Infinite Canvas — Use the Canvas inspector to choose the direction—or directions—the canvas expands in (or click the canvas in the center of the autosize direction controller to toggle them all). Use a combination of the height or width fields and a direction to create a canvas at a specific size in one dimension and infinite in the other.
- Artboard Layers (PRO) — Use artboard objects on artboard layers to manage content on your canvas and to define export regions for later. Shapes drawn on an artboard layer only draw their stroke and always draw their stroke at 1 point in size regardless of zoom level. An artboard can be any shape that OmniGraffle can draw. Moving an artboard will move all objects above or overlapping it. Holding the control key while moving the artboard object will allow you to just move the artboard object, not the objects above it. When exporting a group of artboards, the individual objects in the group are exported as individual files (use shape combinations instead of groups if you don’t want this behavior).
- Artboard Tool (PRO) — Creating an artboard is as quick and easy drawing a shape. It works like the shape tool, but takes care of layer management for you. You can also use the tool to move and resize artboards.
- Make Artboard Option (PRO) — The “Make Artboard” option is a fast way to make a new artboard around all the selected objects. This option is available in the Arrange menu and the context menu for objects.
- Basic SVG Import — SVG is now a supported file type that OmniGraffle can Open, Place, or drag onto the canvas. You can even paste SVG code directly on the canvas and OmniGraffle will convert it to the appropriate shape.
- Copy as SVG — OmniGraffle 7 includes SVG in the “Copy as…” menu (under Edit) for quick access to your objects in SVG form.
- Keyboard Shortcuts — Set your own keyboard shortcuts for OmniGraffle commands or actions in the OmniGraffle menu bar.
- Keyboard Shortcut Sets (PRO) — Save your own sets of keyboard shortcuts to share with your other Macs or with others. OmniGraffle Pro even comes with a few other industry sets to get started!
- More Menu Options — OmniGraffle 7 adds a lot more options in various menus to make it easier for you to set custom keyboard shortcuts.
- Updated Tool Hot Key Functionality — Pressing a tool hot key lets you use the corresponding tool once, holding the hot key down keeps you in the corresponding tool for the duration of the keypress, and pressing the hot key twice locks you into that tool until you choose a new tool.
Canvas
- Convert Text to Shape (PRO) — Convert text to a shape for precise manipulation without having to create a new font elsewhere!
- Convert Line to Shape (PRO) — Draw the path you need, convert it to a shape, and customize the fill and stroke to exactly what the document demands.
- Point Editor Tool (PRO) — OmniGraffle 7 adds a dedicated tool for editing Bézier points on shapes and lines. When this tool is active, selected objects show their Bézier points and Bézier control handles, similar to how the selection tool shows resize handles for the selected object. You can find the Point Editor tool positioned between the Pen tool and the Artboard tool and available with the modifier key f. You can also use the Point Editor to move selected shapes and lines.
- Convert to Bézier Shape with the Point Editor Tool (PRO) — If you select a shape or line that is not yet Bézier, its points will be visible and any change to its points will automatically convert that shape into a Bézier shape.
- Center Movement Handles — OmniGraffle 7 adds a circle to the center of your selected object or groups to make it easier to grab objects that are obscured by other objects and move them elsewhere. The move handle is enabled even when the object is completely hidden. If you need to see under the Movement Handle, the View menu has an option to hide the movement handles.
- Quickly Measure Distance — Select one or more objects and hold the Option key; mouse over other shapes to see how far they are from your selected objects.
- Showing Line Points in the Ruler — When dragging a point on a line, OmniGraffle 7 now marks the beginning, center, and end points of the line in the ruler.
- New Layer from Selection — Create a new layer by selecting objects in any number of layers and choosing “New Layer from Selection” in the Edit ▸ Layers menu.
- Suppress Selection Highlight — When dragging shapes, pressing the Command key will now hide the selection highlight (in addition to smart guides).
- Apply Canvas Background Color with a Style Chit — Now you can quickly apply a canvas color from one canvas to another by dragging the color chit from the style tray and dropping it on the canvas in the sidebar.
- Quickly Hide Guides — A simple click on the ruler will show and hide your manual guides.
- Guide Positioning Cursor — When you mouse over a guide, the cursor now indicates that they are movable.
- Copy and Paste Object Style — Copy Object Style and Paste Object Style are now options in the contextual menu on the Canvas and in the Sidebar.
- Center Rubber Stamps — When you stamp a new shape onto the canvas the shape is now centered under the cursor.
Sidebar
- Single List of Canvases, Layers, and Objects — OmniGraffle now shows all Canvases, Layers, and Objects in one hierarchical list in the left sidebar. There are 4 tabs across the top to choose between canvas/layer/object management, guide management, outline view, and the selection matrix.
- Rename from the Sidebar — Set your own name for an object or group by double clicking the name in the sidebar. We even added a
<%GraphicName%> variable so you can use this name in text on your canvas.
- Context Menus for Objects in the Sidebar — Use the contextual menu on an object in the sidebar to get relevant Quick Actions. OmniGraffle now has navigation options in the menu to make it easier to find content on the canvas.
- Expand and Collapse Groups — Groups in the layer list sidebar have a disclosure triangle so contents are visible. You can even reorder the contents of the group or drag objects in or out of the group.
- Contents of Locked Layers are Visible — When you lock a layer its contents are still visible.
- Duplicated Objects Stay on their Layers — When duplicating one or more objects they stay on the original layer. Pasted objects always move to the active layer. The “Duplicate Selection” menu item has been renamed to “Duplicate and Maintain Layers” to better reflect the new behavior.
- Retain Layer Name When Duplicating — When duplicating a layer that has a custom name, OmniGraffle preserves that custom name and appends a number.
- Duplicated Layers Stay Adjacent — When duplicating a layer, it will no longer go to the top of the layer list. Instead, it moves just above the original.
- Compact Sidebar — The Use Small Icons option for the sidebar uses icons (instead of live previews) allowing you to see more of your documents’ contents. This is an app-wide preference: changing it once changes the future!
- Optional Page Counts in Sidebar — Page counts in the sidebar can be turned on and off using the “Show Canvas Page Count” option in the sidebar’s gear menu.
Inspectors
- Quick Access to Colors in the Fill Inspector — OmniGraffle now has 30 color swatches visible in the Fill Inspector when using a solid fill.
- Text Follows Shape Path — Wrap text around the edge of a shape: look for the new “Follows Shape Path” option in the Text Position Inspector.
- Connections Inspector now in Standard — The Connections Inspector is now available in the Standard version of OmniGraffle.
- Input Fields for Gradients — Know the exact values you want for your gradient fill? Enter them instead of using the slider.
- Refined Inspectors — Many common tasks are just one click away.
- Alignment Inspector — The Alignment Inspector now uses a series of buttons that depict the various alignment options.
- Geometry Inspector — X & Y position icons in the Geometry Inspector are now blue to indicate that you can click them and change where the position distance is calculated from.
Export
- Export Previews — Preview exactly what you’re going to get when selecting from the many new export options.
- Export Multiple Sizes at Once — Create multiple asset sizes in the export panel to get multiple scaled versions in one export.
Resource Browser
- Stencils and Templates — The first time you launch OmniGraffle 7 it checks for previous versions of OmniGraffle and copies the stencils and templates from that version to OmniGraffle 7’s Resource Browser. Look for them in folders named after the OmniGraffle version they came from.
- Search the Resource Browser — OmniGraffle 7 adds a search bar to the Resource Browser for searching all your templates and stencils.
- Stenciltown in the Resource Browser — Browse or search Stenciltown from the Resource Browser, including our Featured Stencils: handpicked stencils from Omni and others.
- List View in the Resource Browser — View stencils and templates in a list with metadata columns available for sorting.
More
- Stencils Toolbar Button — OmniGraffle 7 now has a Stencils toolbar button that opens a dedicated Stencils popover for quick access to Stencils. You can navigate your stencil library on the left and even select multiple stencils at once and see a combined view of all the stencil objects on the right. Clicking the “Detach this stencil window” button in the upper right corner switches the popover to a window for longer access. If you prefer to always have a floating window there is a preference in the General preference pane. Opening a stencil in the Resource Browser will now show that stencil in the Stencils window (rather than opening the stencil for editing). From there, you can Edit Stencil from the gear menu to edit it. (You can also edit it directly from the Resource Browser using the “Edit” action from the contextual menu.)
- Appearance Preferences — OmniGraffle 7 adds a new Appearance preference pane for setting your default guide, smart guide, and Bézier handle colors. You can still set a custom color for individual guides, but if Ocean Mist looks better than Bubble Gum to you, look in OmniGraffle’s preferences.
- Missing Font Warning — OmniGraffle will warn you when a document uses fonts you don’t have installed on your system.
- iOS App Icon Shape — The Shape Inspector has a new shape option called “iOS App Icon”, the corners have the same curve as iOS icons from iOS 7 to iOS 10 and they look just perfect.
- Blank Document on Launch — When you launch the app without opening a document, we default to creating a blank document rather than asking you to choose a document from the template picker. You can configure this behavior in preferences, and you can customize your templates using the Resource Browser.
- Terminology — The Style Well is now referred to as “Style” in the toolbar instead of “Tool” and the Style Tray is now “Style Tray” instead of “Style”.
