# The &kruler; Handbook

Lauri Watts

    &Lauri.Watts.mail;

&FDLNotice;
2001 &Lauri.Watts;
2013-06-24
&kde; 4.11

&kruler; can be used to measure objects on the screen.

KDE KRuler kdegraphics

## Introduction

&kruler; is a very simple application, with only one aim in life. To measure pixel distances and colors on your screen. It is useful for working on layout of dialogs, web pages &etc;

To start &kruler;, choose Applications Graphics More Applications Screen Ruler from your &kmenu;.

&kruler;
&kruler;

Clicking with the &LMB; on the &kruler; will turn the cursor to a cross with four arrows and enables you to drag &kruler; around the screen.

When you move the mouse over &kruler;, your cursor will turn into an elongated arrow, with a circle at one end. As you move the cursor, &kruler; will display how far from the point marked 0 the circle on the end of the cursor currently is. &kruler; will also display the &HTML; color code of the color currently under the circle. This is very useful for picking out colors from an image. If you move the mouse far enough that the arrow cursor is no longer touching &kruler;, the cursor will revert to normal, allowing you to carry on working with your other applications.

You can change the orientation in three different ways:

- Clicking the &MMB; switches the ruler from vertical to horizontal orientation
- By clicking the rotation buttons to turn 90 degrees to the left or right. If the rotation buttons are not displayed on the ruler, enable them with Show rotation buttons in the settings dialog
- Using the context menu, described in the next chapter

## Menu Reference

Clicking with the &RMB; on the ruler will pop up a context menu, with the following entries:

Orientation

  This submenu contains entries that allow you to change the orientation of &kruler;

  N Orientation North

    Turns &kruler; so the ruler is horizontal, and the measurements are on the top (North) of the ruler

  E Orientation East

    Turns &kruler; so the ruler is vertical, and the measurements are on the right (East) of the ruler

  S Orientation South

    Turns &kruler; so the ruler is horizontal, and the measurements are on the bottom (South) of the ruler

  W Orientation West

    Turns &kruler; so the ruler is vertical, and the measurements are on the left (West) of the ruler

  R Orientation Turn Right

    Turns the ruler 90 Degrees to the right. For example, if it is oriented South, it will rotate to be oriented West.

  L Orientation Turn Left

    Turns the ruler 90 Degrees to the left. For example, if it is oriented West, it will rotate to be oriented South.

Length

  This submenu contains entries that allow you to change the length of &kruler;

  &Ctrl; S Length Short

    Makes &kruler; short - about 385 pixels long.

  &Ctrl;M Length Medium

    Makes &kruler; a medium length - about 640 pixels long.

  &Ctrl;T Length Tall

    Makes &kruler; long - about 960 pixels in length.

  &Ctrl;F Length Full Screen Width

    Makes &kruler; the same size as your screen width.

  Length Length...

    Opens a dialog to enter the size in pixel.

  Additionally, you can change the length and move the right side of the ruler using the mousewheel. When holding the &Shift; key the opposite side will change.

Scale

  This option lets you set the ruler scale to Right to Left (D), Center Origin (C), Offset (O) and Percentage.

  Changing the offset via the mousewheel is also possible when holding the &LMB;.

Opacity

  This menu item displays a slider to change the opacity of &kruler;.

Configure Shortcuts...

  The Configure Shortcut dialog allows you to assign shortcuts to &kruler; actions, and configure the shortcuts already assigned.

  For more information, read the section about the Shortcuts of the &kde; Fundamentals.

Configure &kruler;...

  &kruler;'s settings dialog

  &kruler;'s settings dialog

  In this dialog you can change the background color and font, enable rotation and close buttons on the ruler and enable the tray icon.

&Ctrl;C Copy Color

  Copies the &HTML; color code of the color currently under the circle to the clipboard.

&Ctrl;W Close

  Hides &kruler;. It can be shown again using the icon in the system tray. The context menu displays this item only when Show tray icon is checked in the settings dialog.

&Ctrl;Q Quit

  Quits &kruler;

&kruler; has the common &kde; Help menu item, for more information read the section about the Help Menu of the &kde; Fundamentals.

## Credits and License

&kruler;

Copyright 2000, 2001 Till Krech till@snafu.de

Copyright 2009 Mathias Soeken msoeken@tzi.de

Thanks to Gunnstein Lye gl@ez.no for the initial port to &kde; 2

Documentation Copyright &Lauri.Watts; &Lauri.Watts.mail;

&underFDL; &underGPL;

## Installation

&install.intro.documentation; &install.compile.documentation;
&documentation.index;