The workspace tour

This page names the main parts of the Octostitch window so the rest of the docs have a shared vocabulary.

The Octostitch workspace: toolbar (left), canvas (centre), side panel (right) and thread bar (bottom).

Prefer to watch?

The patch tutorial video starts with a tour of this same window.

Across the top is the menu bar:

Menu	What’s on it
File	New, Open (with a recent-files list), Save, Save As and Export
Edit	Undo and Redo, Copy, Paste and Paste in Place
Selection	Select All and Deselect, Combine and Break Apart, the booleans, Mirror and Branch
View	Zoom in / out, reset to 1:1 and zoom to fit
Tools	Font authoring, decorative motifs, the QR code and pixel art generators, and stitch-out simulation
Help	The docs, the keyboard shortcut list, Check for Updates…, your licence and About

Everything on the Selection menu also has a keyboard shortcut and a button in the side panel’s Modify group — the menu is there so you don’t have to know the shortcuts.

The toolbar

The narrow toolbar down the left edge holds the editing tools. Which tools appear depends on what you have selected, but the full set is:

Tool	Shortcut	What it does
Select	V	Select, move and transform objects
Pen	B	Draw and extend Bézier paths
Edit nodes	N	Move anchor points and control handles
Meta nodes	M	Place meta nodes that vary width/angle along a path
Satin column	C	Draw two-rail satin columns
Ruler	R	Drag out on-canvas measurements (offered when nothing is selected)

At the bottom of the toolbar are the create buttons — Bézier, Satin, Manual, Text and Shape — which arm the canvas to place a new object of that kind on your next click (or drag).

The toolbar: editing tools at the top, create buttons at the bottom.

The side panel

The panel on the right is organised into tabs:

• Stitches — the object list: every element in your design as a layer stack, the bottom row sewing first and the top row last.
• Colours — your design grouped by thread colour, for reordering colour blocks.
• Guides — the non-stitching guide paths that steer a fill’s direction or cut seams through it.
• References — imported reference images you’re tracing over.
• Hoop — the hoop frame drawn on the canvas.

Each row in the list has a thumbnail, a visibility toggle and the object’s thread colour. Below the list, Move Up and Move Down shift the selection through the sewing order and Colour Sort groups the design by colour to cut thread changes.

The bottom half of the panel holds the settings for whatever is selected, grouped behind the narrow strip of icons down its left edge. Only the groups that apply to the current selection appear, so the strip doubles as a map of what you can edit right now:

Group	What’s in it
Object	Name, thread colour and stitch count
Stitch	The stitch style — Running, Bean, Wide run, Zigzag, Fill, Appliqué or Decorative — and all of that style’s settings
Underlay	Underlay for fills and satin columns
Ties & trims	Whether this object locks and cuts its thread the way the rest of the design does, or its own way
Shape	Parameters for a parametric shape
Text	A text box’s contents, font and layout
Modify	Combine and Break Apart, the booleans, Mirror H / V and Branch — then, below a separator, the conversions: Convert fill to satin column, Bake to manual stitches and Bake to Bézier paths
Meta node	The selected meta node’s width and angle

The side panel: the tab bar and object list above, and the selected object’s stitch style and settings below.

The canvas

The central drawing area works in real-world millimetres. It can show a grid, axes and rulers and an optional hoop frame so you can see how your design fits the machine you’ll sew on.

• Pan with a middle-mouse drag.
• Zoom with the scroll wheel (or Ctrl + / Ctrl -, Ctrl 0 to reset, Ctrl Shift F to zoom to fit).

With the rulers on, the cursor’s position in millimetres is read out in the top-left corner, along with the centre and size of whatever is selected. Display options, in the top-right, is where the grid, axes and rulers are switched on and off — plus the grid’s spacing — along with Show all guides, which keeps every guide on screen rather than only the ones the selection uses.

The thread bar

Along the bottom is the thread palette bar. Switch between Library (a chosen brand palette), Used (colours already in your design) and Recent, and pick the brand from the dropdown beneath the toggle. Each swatch shows its thread code; click one to recolour the current selection. See Thread palettes.

The thread bar with its Library / Used / Recent toggle and a row of swatches.

View modes

The Technical / Preview / Simulation switch in the bottom-right corner of the canvas (also on the View menu) changes how the design is drawn, and Simulation adds stitch playback. These are covered in View modes.