Skip to content
Molkit

Squiggle Line

The squiggle is a wavy line. You can draw it free-floating anywhere on the canvas, or anchor it across the end of a bond as a cut-off mark, the convention chemists use to show that a structure continues past the point drawn. It is a graphic annotation, not a bond, so it has no chemical meaning of its own.

Choosing the tool

Open the Bond tool’s flyout menu and pick Squiggle. The flyout lists it after the bond orders and stereo styles. Selecting it switches you into the line tool in squiggle mode, so the next stroke you draw is a squiggle rather than a bond.

Two ways to draw

The tool decides which kind of squiggle you get from where you start the stroke.

  • Free-floating: click and drag across empty canvas to draw a straight wavy line between the two points. With Smart Guides on, the angle snaps to 15 degree increments; hold Shift for a free angle.
  • Anchored cut-off mark: start the drag on the open end of a terminal bond (an atom with a single bond and no custom label). The squiggle anchors to that bond end and draws perpendicular across the bond, like a pair of scissors cutting it.

Release to commit. An anchored squiggle snaps its angle to 15 degree steps around the bond; hold Shift while dragging for a free angle.

How an anchored squiggle behaves

Once anchored, the squiggle is tied to its bond:

  • It rotates and moves with the molecule, so the cut-off mark stays put as you reposition or rotate the structure.
  • Selecting the molecule selects the anchored squiggle with it, inside a single selection box rather than a separate one.
  • If you delete the bond it was anchored to, the squiggle does not vanish. It falls back to a free-floating wavy line at its last position, which you can then move or delete on its own.

Adjusting the look

Select a squiggle and the Shape Properties panel shows a Squiggle section with two sliders.

  • Waves: how many crests the line has, from 2 to 12. The default is 7.
  • Amplitude: how far the waves swing out, from 1 to 10 pixels in half-pixel steps. The default is 2.5.

Double-click either slider to return it to its default. The squiggle’s color and line thickness come from the standard stroke controls in the same panel. A squiggle never carries arrowheads.

See also