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This tutorial will demonstrate the usefulness of the "Z" window. Take a look at Figure 1.

Figure 1.

For a long time, I never thought this window had any value except to take up editing space. However, it offers some powerful management to map creation.

When you make a brush in top view, you have no information about its height in the main window. This is where the Z Window comes in.

Whenever you make or select a brush it appears in the Z Window as well (Figure 2). If you click in the center of the brush you can move it's vertical position, or you can drag the top & bottom edges to the desired size.

If your Z Window is not showing, you need to go Preferences and choose o­ne of the viewing options (the first o­ne is best). If it's still not showing, place your mouse cursor o­n the left border of the mapping window until it turns into a 2-way arrow, and drag it to the right.

Figure 2.

You can use Shift-Middle-Click in the editing window to position the Z Checker. If you load a map and move the Z Checker around you will see the Z Window change. What it's doing is showing you, via the Z Window, how much vertical distance there is between the floor and ceiling at that location.

You can also zoom in and out of the Z Window with Ctrl-Delete & Ctrl-Insert.

Although re-sizing can be done in any of the other views, the advantages of using the Z Window, are that you won't accidentally "twist" or offset a brush's vertexes, and you won't have to keep switching views.

Once you discover the added flexibility provided by Radiant's Z-Window, the more you'll find yourself using it.