Getting started

Open the studio at ordinate2d.com/app. It works in current Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari on a computer; nothing is installed.

#The window

• Title bar: the File, Edit, View, Docs and Help menus, the scene's name (click it to rename), the Sandbox / Research switch, and (on ordinate2d.com) Sign in.
• Ribbon: tabs of buttons by task.
  • Home: Play, Step, Stop, Reset and Time; Undo and Redo; the Select and Pan tools; New, Open, Save, Share, My Assets, Marketplace (with the examples) and Script.
  • Build: bodies, supports and guides, mechanisms, the Slice tool and parts (Building scenes).
  • Connect: ropes, cables, joints, springs, bars, gear meshes, belts and thrusters (Connecting bodies).
  • Annotate (Pro): labels, dimensions, frames, angles, centre lines, the gravity sign, stroboscopic snapshots and free-body diagrams (Figures).
  • Analyze (Pro): tracks and trails, graphs and tables, member forces and parameter sweeps (Graphs and tables).
  • Export (Pro): SVG, PDF, TikZ and PNG figures, video and GIF, the table as CSV (Exporting).
  • View: grid, snapping and overlays, the camera, the panels, presenter mode and the theme.
• Explorer (left): every body, support, joint, rope and annotation of the scene. Click one to select it.
• Properties (right): whatever is selected, or the active tool's options, or the scene's own settings (gravity, air, the time step) when nothing is selected. See Properties.
• The editor area (middle): the scene in a tab. Its Graphs, Table and Script open as tabs too; drag a tab to split the area or to float it as a window.
• Command bar (bottom): type a command such as gravity 3.71, atwood or help.
• Status bar: what the tool does next, the cursor's position in metres, the time step and the frame rate.

Drag a panel's title bar to move it to the other side or to stack the two panels; View → Reset Layout puts everything back.

#Placing and editing

1. Pick a tool on the Build or Connect tab (or press its key: C circle, B box, P polygon, R rope).
2. Click or drag in the scene. The status bar says what the next click does.
3. Press V or Esc to go back to Select. Click a body to select it, drag it to move it, and edit its numbers in Properties.

⌘Z undoes, ⇧⌘Z redoes, ⌘D duplicates, Delete deletes, F frames the selection. Scroll to zoom, drag empty space with the right button to pan.

#Running

Space plays and pauses, N steps one frame, Stop goes back to where the run started, Reset to its first frame. In Research the time bar (⌘J) lets you scrub through the recorded run; pressing Play from an earlier time continues from there.

#Saving and opening

• File → Save (⌘S): with a Pro account, a scene that came from My Assets updates its item there (a new version), and any other scene asks once whether to save to My Assets or download a file. Without Pro it downloads the scene as a .physics.json file; with several scenes open it saves the project (every scene and the layout). File → Download as a File always downloads. Open (⌘O) reads one back.
• My Assets (Home tab) keeps scenes and scripts in this browser, and in the cloud if you sign in and upload them. See Account, My Assets and sharing.
• The studio autosaves unsaved work every few seconds; after a crash or a closed tab it offers to restore it.