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Cutting, copying and pasting in tables

Any selection of table data can be cut or copied to the clipboard, and the contents of the clipboard can be pasted into a selected location in a table. The clipboard can be used to transfer data between table views, graphic views, spreadsheets and other packages.

Cut​

Cut records from the document and put them on the clipboard. Complete records must be selected before cutting data. Cutting data to the clipboard replaces the contents previously stored there.

Many data records (e.g. loads) are deleted from the Table view after cutting the data. This avoids empty records and causes subsequent records to be renumbered.

Records that are not renumbered are those whose record numbers are cross-referenced to other data, and alteration would affect that other data. For example node record numbers are not renumbered as they are used to define element topology.

Copy​

Copy blocks of selected data to the clipboard as tab delimited text. Copying data to the clipboard replaces the contents previously stored there. Use the Export command to save selected data as tab delimited text.

Paste​

Use the Paste command to insert a copy of the clipboard contents at the currently selected location. Blocks of data (held in the clipboard in tab delimited format) are inserted if acceptable, see below.

Highlight a destination block to paste data to. After pasting, everything in the destination block will be overwritten. Ensure that the size and form of the destination block are the same as the source data block.

Pasting a block of data when no cells are selected results in the block being pasted starting at the current cell. In this case:

  • If pasting a block to an existing record, GSA gives the option to overwrite the existing data or to insert the new data. If insert is chosen, data is inserted before the record containing the current cell.
  • If pasting a block to a cell beyond the existing data, it is pasted appended.

Note: For any of the paste operations, if partial record data is pasted resulting in blank cells, the blank cells will be set to default values.

Other methods​

Note that Cell operators may also be used to copy values from existing cells.