Maps - stacking & overlapping
$OutlineOrder does have an indirect effect on your map, insofar as it sets the z-order (stacking order) that is applied when map icons overlap. When two container or note icons overlap, the item with the lowest $OutlineOrder is shown in front of the other icon. Thus, in the early stages of a map or outline, the$OutlineOrder tends to reflect the order in which the notes were added. In such a circumstance, in a map you can work on the principle that older notes will stack on top of newest notes (this can be slightly counter-intuitive at first encounter as we tend to think of putting the newest item on top of an older one). Tinderbox's Note menu has 'move to front/back' and 'move up/down' controls (and associated shortcuts) which change this stacking order but do be aware that such an action also affects outline view. How? The change the map z-order - the overlapping order - these commands change the selected note's $OutlineOrder. In turn, this moves the selected note(s) higher or lower in outline view. If there is more than one adornment on a map the same rules as above apply if adornments overlap, though this can be hard to see due to the opacity of adornments.
In the screen grab, map icons have been arranged with some overlapping to give visible proof of how $OutlineOrder affects this. Looking in the top right corner 'ee' sits over 'cc' but under 'bb'. Described in $OutlineOrder terms it is clearer: #6 sits over #7 but under #4; the lower the $OutlineOrder, the more siblings in front of which it will sit if overlapping of icons occurs. An interesting thing the screen grab reveals is that adornments in the outline order aren't simply always (re-)allotted an outline order lower than the highest note $OutlineOrder. Rather, they take an initial $OutlineOrder in sequence of creation within the current container. Witness the highest $OutlineOrder on our map is #18 but adornment 'pp' has an $OutlineOrder of #20.
A small difference with default adornments is that they are slightly translucent so the background items border shows through. This is deliberate as it allows more creative use of adornments - for instance to create zones to place icons that are relevant to two or more different adornment-denoted ideas. Thus, something that was pertinent to both 'rrr' and 'ppp' might be placed on the darker blue rectangle where the two adornments overlap.
From v5.9.2, new adornments are placed on top of existing adornments, i.e. added as the first adornment in outline/sibling order. This is the reverse of past behaviour (and continuing behaviour for notes) but should be more intuitive for users as generally a new adornment would wish to lie atop an existing one. The effect is achieved by the new adornment being inserted in $OutlineOrder before all existing adornments in the map, as opposed to after them as in the past.
Next… Adding / Moving Items