How to make multiple submenu items under a parent item (MM2)
Article Applies To:
MenuMachine 2 only
GoLive CS, CS2
Mac, Windows
Article ID: 000103
Category: Menu Editing Issues
Issue
Submenus open one item at a time instead of all opening at once.
Can't make multiple items in a submenu, just making more submenus of submenus.
Solution
A menu item can only have one submenu block – but that block can contain many submenu items.
The items in a submenu block should not open one-by-one. If this is happening in your menu, instead of creating a submenu block with many items, you are creating a submenu of a submenu of a submenu and so on.
Here's how to create a submenu block, then add more items to that same block:
There are two buttons which make menu items:
New Item button
When you click on the New Item button, it makes a new item (at the same level, in the same block) as the currently selected item.
New Submenu Item button
When you click on New Submenu Item button while you have an item selected, it creates a submenu/child/drop-down menu from the selected item. You can only use this button once for a particular menu item – if an item already has a submenu block, it can't have another one. Think of this as a New Submenu "block" button. Once you have created a submenu block under an item, you can add more items to this block.
To create a submenu block containing multiple items:
1. Click on the item you want the submenus to appear under when that item is activated.
2. Use the New Submenu Item button.
(You can only use this button if the item has no existing submenus)
3. A new submenu block containing one item has been created. Select the new item which was just created.
4. This time, you want to make a New Item, not another Submenu. Click the New Item button as many times as you need to make the number of items required in that same submenu block. This adds more items to the same block.
Note that this new block is also horizontal like its parent item. This may happen if there are no submenus already defined. The item has all the settings its parent has, including the block orientation. If you want to change the new submenu block to vertical, switch to Block Mode and change the orientation. (Applicable to cascading menus only.)
5. If you are not sure if you have made more Items or more Submenu blocks, you can turn on a preference which shows the links between blocks and items. This is a diagnostic tool, it doesn't affect the way the menu works.
MenuMachine > Preferences... > Draw Menu Hierarchy Lines
(There is more in the MenuMachine 2 User Guide about using this preference.)
Here, you can see one item has one submenu block containing two items:
If you have incorrectly repeatedly used the New Submenu button and created a submenu of a submenu of a submenu etc., the hierarchy lines would look a bit like this: (4 levels of submenus have been created instead of 4 items in a submenu block).
Don't forget to turn the Draw Menu Hierarchy Lines Preference off again!
Last updated: December 6, 2006
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