Clone management using clones of clones

Once we get into more complex combinations of clones, we will want a good way to manage them. After all, if we happen to ungroup or delete our original cloned object accidentally, Inkscape will silently unlink our clones, and we will lose the ability to change them all at the same time.

This is why we will generally group the original, put a rectangle behind that with a label, then move it off the canvas, so it’s out of the way of the main design. Figure 10.8 shows what this looks like.

Figure 10.8 – Drawing a rectangle, labeling and grouping the original clone to move it off canvas

As you can see, the warning instructions and box show at a glance what’s going on, so there’s never any question as to what needs to be done (or not done, in this case).

This is even more useful when we start making clones of clones. Take, for example, our logo symbol, logo name, and tagline; we will...