A Diagram Key is a legend that fills itself in. It lists every line style your arrows use and every tag colour on the tab, and you write what each one means. Switch an arrow to dotted and the key gains a row; stop using it and the row goes.
It sits in the palette's Layout category (Build Elements), after the containers (Lane, Frame, Stack, Boundary and the Timeline).
Take the tour
Select a diagram key and press Start Diagram Key Tour in the bar along the bottom of the editor, just left of Search, for a short walkthrough on your own key: the rows it builds from your arrows and tag colours, writing a meaning, and its title. Once you've taken it, the button makes room for other tours; to take it again, switch it back on in Settings, under Tours (Show Me). (Element tours aren't offered on a phone.)
Writing the meanings
Select the key and click a row's words to write its meaning, such as "Request: waits for the reply" for a solid line. Enter keeps it and Escape puts it back. A row you haven't written shows a starting meaning, "Dashed line" or the tag's own name.
Double-click the title ("Key") to rename it. The key grows to fit its rows; resize it to change its width.
A meaning is kept even when its row goes, so switching a style off and on again doesn't lose what you wrote.
Colour by tag
Cards carry tags, such as a team, a status or a layer. Colour by tag gives a tag one colour across the whole tab:
- Select a card with the tag, right-click and open the Card section.
- Under Tag Colours, pick a colour for the tag.
Every card with that tag now has a coloured edge and a tinted chip. Retag a card and its colour follows; change the tag's colour once and every card changes. Clear removes it. A card with its own edge colour keeps it.
Each tag colour also shows in the diagram key, so the colour-coding explains itself.
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