Creating Your Own Palette

Mathematica Notebook front end comes with a collection of standard palettes. To read about the use of palettes, refer to the help screen on Mathematica Notebook or one of the Mathematica manuals.

Buttons on various palettes serve as additional keys on your keyboard and can be extremely convenient to use. However, often times, creating your own palette for a specific document or for commonly used characters or objects can save a tremendous amount of time.

Use the following instructions to create your own palette:

1.

You must begin with a new notebook. If a new notebook is not open, one can be opened by choosing File from the main menu of Mathematica Notebook and selecting New.

2.

Set up a blank palette by choosing the Input option from the main menu of Mathematica Notebooks and selecting Create Table/Matrix/Palette. A Create Grid Box window appears. Choose Palette and enter the number of rows and columns you wish to have on your palette. You can leave the default on the other items and click the OK button. Your blank palette should appear in a Mathematica Notebook.

3.

At this time you should open one or more of the standard palettes to insert some of the characters onto your palette. To do this, go to File on the main menu of Mathematica Notebook, select Palettes, and choose which of the standard palettes you wish to open. Now, you can insert whatever characters you wish onto each button of your palette by clicking on a particular button on your palette and:

• typing in a character or sequence of characters from the keyboard
  
• clicking on a character or expression from one of the standard palettes.
  

4.

Once your palette is complete, go to File on the main menu of Mathematica,/b> Notebook and select Generate Palette from Selection. To save the palette, first click the on your new palette with the right mouse button, then go to File, select Save as.. and choose a name for the palette. Your palette is now ready to be used.

5.

To edit, click on your palette with the right mouse button, choose File and select Generate Notebook from Palette. To edit a button, click on the button and use the delete or backspace key to get rid of items and type in or click on an item from another palette that you wish to add to yours. Then repeat step three above.

Note that the palette is saved as a Mathematica Notebook file and needs the necessary extensions. Additionally, this palette is opened as a notebook file.