1. First, start fresh and go to a CONUS projection.
2. Create a Drawing Control with either the Displays→Special→Drawing Control menu item or with the toolbar button.
3. When the Drawing Control first comes up it is in polygon drawing mode. Note the button.
4. Draw some shapes
   • In the main display click and drag to draw.
   • Select the button and check on the "Straight" button to draw a straight line polygon. Click and drag in the main display. Press the "space" key to add a polygon point.
   • Select the button to draw a rectangle. Click and drag in the main display.
   • Go to smooth polygon mode with the button.
   • Tilt the display and draw some more shapes. Note how you are drawing in 3D.
   • Go back to the overhead view (Control-R).
5. Go into move mode by pressing the the button. Move some of the shapes. Note: You have to select on the corners for squares, at the start for text, etc.
6. Select and delete the shapes.
   • Select the button to go into selection mode.
   • Click on one of the shapes to select it. You should see small blue highlight rectangles.
   • Press Control-X to cut the shapes.
   • You can select multiple shapes by pressing the control key when you click on them.
   • You can select all of the shapes by pressing Control-A
   • Delete them by pressing Control-X
7. Change the properties of a shape.
   • Add a new text shape.
   • Select it with the mouse or with a Control-A. Note: to select text you need to click at the beginning of the text.
   • Press Control-P to bring up the properties dialog.
   • Change some of the properties and press OK
8. Creating text shapes
   • Select the button and click in the main display to add text.
   • In the dialog box add in some html. e.g.:

     <h2>Some example text</h2>
     <a href="https://www.unidata.ucar.edu">Click here</a>
     

   • The HTML is shown in the preview window.
   • Press "OK" when you are done.
   • Try clicking on the link.
9. Add a Quicktime movie.
   • Select the movie reel icon:
   • Click in the display. In the File dialog select /data/idv/misc/storm.mov
   • Note: Not all movie encodings can be displayed in the IDV.
10. Drawing in coordinate systems.
    • There are 4 coordinate system you can draw in: Lat/Lon/Alt, Lat/Lon (with fixed Altitude), X/Y/Z, X/Y (with fixed Z).
    • Draw some shapes.
    • Change the projection to a world projection (Projections→Predefined→World menu item) and note how the shapes are reprojected.
    • Select X/Y from the Location menu.
    • Now draw some more shapes.
    • Change the projection to back to CONUS (Projections→Predefined→US→CONUS menu item) and note what shapes get reprojected.
11. Export/Import
    • You can export and import drawings with the File→Export and File→Import menu items.
    • Try exporting your drawing to the file workshop.xgrf.
    • The xgrf file can be loaded as a data source or imported into an already existing Drawing Control. Let's try loading it as a data source.
    • Remove the existing Drawing Control
    • In the Data Source Chooser go the Files tab and select the workshop.xgrf file.
    • You should see a new Drawing Control created with what you exported.

Unidata IDV Workshop for version 6.3 > Accessing and Displaying Data > Miscellaneous Displays