Adobe Illustrator Tools Cheat Sheet

[Muriel Pelley]

Iam having trouble finding a guide to the cursor symbols in Illustrator. By this I mean the hover symbol that the cursor turns into when over different sections of the artboard. I have had a lot of trouble with the Text Tool, and I need to know what the cursor symbols mean but I can't find any guidance on this. Is there a guide or cheat sheet somewhere? Perhaps similar to a keyboard shortcut guide?

They include a little black pointer with paragraph text, a little black pointer with a squiggle, a white pointer with a dotted square and others. There's a bunch. (I tried taking screenshots but the Windows keyboard commands switch my cursor to other Illustrator tools instead!). Basically, there are a lot of them I need to figure out so a cheat sheet would be really helpful.

This is one of them pixxxel_schubser but not the ones that are giving me difficulty. It is a little black pointer with tiny tiny lines that make up a paragraph. What's odd is that when I seach 'Illustrator text symbols' through Google, it gives me all the symbols contained in glyphs and fonts, not the hover cursor symbols/images that I see when I'm trying to work with the Text tool in Illustrator. (I likely have my search terms incorrect?)

Someone else who posted here is also right: I am a student, trying to learn Illustrator's tools, and it's daunting. A cheat sheet of the hover symbols/images such as the one that pixxxel_schubser just posted would be super helpful. When I click with my mouse with the wrong hover symbol engaged, the text tool does crazy things, so I need to know what those hover symbols are. I'm using Ctrl Z constantly.

While waiting for the cursor symbols sheet or the end of days, whichever occurs first, you may take photos of the troublesome ones and post those instead of screenshots, maybe collecting them in one image (you can use Clipping Masks).

Adobe Illustrator is an incredibly powerful app, but it can be difficult to navigate. With so many menus and toolbars, it's hard to find your way around. Fortunately, it offers a huge number of keyboard shortcuts to help speed up your workflow.

In this cheat sheet we've compiled some of the best Illustrator shortcuts, for both Windows and Mac. They'll help you quickly find the most important tools and panels, work more efficiently with complex documents, and access some hidden features that will get you designing faster than ever.

FREE DOWNLOAD: This cheat sheet is available as a downloadable PDF from our distribution partner, TradePub. You will have to complete a short form to access it for the first time only. Download The Adobe Illustrator Keyboard Shortcuts Cheat Sheet.

Learning the shortcuts above will help to make graphic design with Adobe Illustrator a whole lot easier. But that's only the beginning. Check out our guide to the best free Illustrator templates, as well as these essential Illustrator tips to help you design faster.

With this cheat sheet, you'll discover the power of hidden tools and short cuts that can cut your design time in half. You'll learn how to make optimal use of all the tools Illustrator has to offer, master essential keyboard shortcuts, and discover the most efficient ways to create and edit your designs.

Whether you're a seasoned Illustrator pro or just starting out, this cheat sheet is an invaluable resource that will help you take your skills to the next level. So why wait? Get your copy now and start turbocharging your Illustrator workflow today!

If you went to Inspire 2017 you probably picked up The Periodic Table of Alteryx tools, but only 100 of you were able to take home a laminated one. One of our ACEs, @Ken_Black, even got his autographed! That was a first for me. And then @Joe_Mako had me autograph my Icons of Alteryx Community card. You guys sure know how to make a girl feel special.

Back to the table. This is something I have wanted to do for a really long time and have even considered it for the last 5 or so Inspires. I had a conversation with my friend, @NeilR, who mentioned that he was classifying the predictive tools into a cheat sheet to better understand when and why you use them. He had a technology track speaking slot at this Inspire and I thought, not only would this content make a great side B, I finally had outside pressure to do this project and get it done for the conference.

I got the tool count data from @BenG and I joined it to the DefaultSettings.xml file and the Macros directory that installs with Alteryx. Once I had the list of tools and their counts, I needed to decide the classifications.

There are many things that are interesting about Alteryx tools. Each having a specific function, an engaging front end, yet mysterious backend, I sought to simplify down to specific, less-obvious categories. I posted in our Alteryx Associates discussion board on community, asking for suggestions on interesting ways to classify tools. The responses included:

I set up a call on Friday morning with @AdamR_AYX to do a quick run through with me. He helped me decide what to concentrate on in the list above. We decided embedded select and formula editor were probably not necessary, and instead to focus on the classification of how tools affect your workflow: macro vs tool, tools that require a data install, tools that are optimized by a data install, and this concept of blocking tools, conditional blocking tools and whether tools are multithreaded or not. After 30 minutes with Adam, I had enough data to get started.

Yes, there was a lot of repetition, but it was a fascinating exercise. It was really cool to see what tool came next and what set it apart. By Tuesday I had a rough draft that I could pass around and get feedback on. And I received A LOT of feedback!

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