Conventions¶

GUI Conventions¶

The GUI convention styles are intended to mimic the appearance of the GUI. In general, a style will reflect the non-hover appearance, so a user can visually scan the GUI to find something that looks like the instruction in the manual.

• Menu Options: Layer ‣ Add a Raster Layer or Settings ‣ Toolbars ‣ Digitizing
• Tool: ^{Add a Raster Layer}
• Button : [Save as Default]
• Dialog Box Title: Layer Properties
• Tab: General
• Checkbox: Render
• Radio Button: Postgis SRID EPSG ID
• Select a number:
• Select a string:
• Browse for a file:
• Select a color:
• Slider:
• Input Text:

A shadow indicates a clickable GUI component.

Text or Keyboard Conventions¶

This manual also includes styles related to text, keyboard commands and coding to indicate different entities, such as classes or methods. These styles do not correspond to the actual appearance of any text or coding within QGIS.

• Hyperlinks: http://qgis.org
• Keystroke Combinations: Press Ctrl+B, meaning press and hold the Ctrl key and then press the B key.
• Name of a File: lakes.shp
• Name of a Class: NewLayer
• Method: classFactory
• Server: myhost.de
• User Text: qgis --help

Lines of code are indicated by a fixed-width font:

PROJCS["NAD_1927_Albers",
  GEOGCS["GCS_North_American_1927",

Platform-specific instructions¶

GUI sequences and small amounts of text may be formatted inline: Click File QGIS ‣ Quit to close QGIS. This indicates that on Linux, Unix and Windows platforms, you should click the File menu first, then Quit, while on macOS platforms, you should click the QGIS menu first, then Quit.

Larger amounts of text may be formatted as a list:

• Do this
• Do that
• Or do that

or as paragraphs:

Do this and this and this. Then do this and this and this, and this and this and this, and this and this and this.

Do that. Then do that and that and that, and that and that and that, and that and that and that, and that and that.

Screenshots that appear throughout the user guide have been created on different platforms; the platform is indicated by the platform-specific icon at the end of the figure caption.