Creating an Instance From a Field

You can create an instance from any Instance field in the Instances Form. Creating an instance from an Instance field creates the instance in one of the Allowed Classes for the slot associated with the field. 

To create a new instance from an Instance field:

  1. In the Class Pane at the Instances Tab, highlight a class which has a slot of type Instance. For example, to create an instance for the class Section, you could select the Article class, which has a Section slot. 
  2. In the Direct Instances Pane, select an instance.
  3. In the Instances Form, go to the field for the Instance slot. Here is the field for the slot Section:
  4. Click the Create button at the top right of the field. If there is more than one Allowed Class for the slot, a Select Concrete CIs dialog box is displayed. Select the class you want and click OK.
    If there is only one Allowed Class, you can skip this step.
  5. An Instances Form will appear for the new instance. It will have a default name, such as project_INSTANCE_00001.
  6. Use the Instances Form to fill in the slots for the instance. 
  7. The new instance is added as a slot value for the instance you selected in step 2. 
  8. To view the instance, you can select the class it appears in in the Class Pane at the Instances Tab. The new instance then appears in the Direct Instances Pane for that class.

Note: The slot value is a reference to the selected instance. This means that if you edit the instance in any location, the changes will appear in all the locations where it is referenced.

You can also create an instance by clicking the Create instance button at the top of the Direct Instances Pane. See Creating an Instance Directly for more information.


Next: Viewing an Instance

Instances Table of Contents