Adobe InDesign CS5 - Manual (Page 91)

85 USING INDESIGN
Layout
Last updated 11/16/2011
Because a frame is just a container version of a path, you can do anything to a frame that you can do to a path, such as
add a color or a gradient to its fill or stroke, or edit the shape of the frame itself with the Pen tool. You can even use a
frame as a path, or a path as a frame, at any time. This flexibility makes it easy to change your design and provides a
wide range of design choices.
Frames can contain text or graphics. A text frame determines the area to be occupied by text and how text will flow
through the layout. You can recognize text frames by the text ports in their respective upper left and lower right
corners.
A graphics frame can function as a border and background, and can crop or mask a graphic. When acting as an empty
placeholder, a graphics frame displays a crossbar.
Text frame (left) and empty graphics frame (right)
If you don’t see the crossbar inside an empty graphics frame, the frame edges display may be turned off.
More Help topics
“ Understanding paths and shapes ” on page 340
Show or hide frame edges
Unlike paths, you can see the nonprinting strokes (outlines) of frames by default even when the frames aren’t selected.
If the document window is getting crowded, use the Show/Hide Frame Edges command to simplify the screen display
by hiding the frame edges. Doing this also hides the crossbar in a graphics placeholder frame. The display setting for
frame edges doesn’t affect the display of the text ports on text frames.
Note: The frame edge is defined as a frame’s stroke, not the outer edge of the stroke’s weight.
❖ Do any of the following:
• To show or hide frame edges, choose View > Extras > Show/Hide Frame Edges.
• To hide frame edges, click Preview Mode at the bottom of the Toolbox.
Using placeholders to design pages
When your final text and graphics are available, you can simply add them to a document; InDesign automatically
creates frames when you import them (unless you’re importing text or graphics directly into existing frames).
However, when you don’t have the content yet or you want to block out the design before adding text and graphics,
you can use frames as placeholders.