Preferences let you customize the visual appearance of MERLIN-Expo and to give settings for databases and simulation engines.

The preference window is opened from the menu File | Preferences.

• Log axes - Set log scale axes for new charts
• Paint gradient bars - Draw gradients on histograms and other bar charts.
• Display tooltips - Display tooltips when hovering the mouse over plot elements. This requires a little more computer power and might make updating the charts a bit slower.

Units

• Ignore - Do not validate units
• Warning - Display warnings for invalid units.
• Error - Report invalid units as errors. A model that contains errors cannot be run.

Language

• Language - Select the language used in the MERLIN-Expo interface.

Appearance

• Look and feel - Allow to select the “Look n’ Feel” for MERLIN-Expo, that is, the style and behaviour of windows, buttons, text, etc. Default is “System”.
• General font - Allow to select the font and the font size of the title and menu bars, the menu bar options and the table labels. Default is “Tahoma 11pt”.
• Table font - Allow to select the font and font size of the table contents. Some people prefer a mono-size font for tables. Default is “Tahoma 11pt”.
• Colorize links - Will color-code references to blocks in the information panel. Default is “disabled”.

Tables

• Number format - The default numerical format used in tables displaying numbers. Choose between scientific or decimal format.
• Max no digits - The maximum number of digits displayed.

* Auto-pack - If you check this option the table columns will be automatically packed when you enter any data. Default is “disabled”.

Tool tips

• Detail level - Set the amount of information to be displayed in the tool tip. The default is “Detailed”. Set the detail level to none if you do not want any tool tips to be displayed.
• Initial delay - The number of seconds from when the mouse cursor is at rest to when the tool tip is displayed. The default is 2 seconds.
• Time-out - The number of seconds until the tool tip is hidden. The default value is 10 seconds.

Matrix

• Highlight region - With this option, the area surrounding the currently focused region will be greyed out. Default is “disabled”.
• Highlight text - A white oval will be drawn behind the text of every Block on the matrix, useful when custom images are used. Default is “enabled”.
• Show images - On computers with limited graphics capabilities, or for users who care less about visual appearance, the images drawn on the matrix blocks can be hidden. Disable to speed up the matrix. Default is “enabled”.
• Antialias - Antialias blurs the graphics on the matrix, making it more visually pleasing but heavier for the computer to render. Disable to speed up the matrix. Default is “enabled”.
• Max no connections per cell - The maximum number of connections shown in one cell.

Graph

• Show grid - Shows a grid which simplifies placing boxes.

Memory

• Max memory - The maximum memory allocation allowed for MERLIN-Expo given in MB (megabytes).

• Search for updates - When selected, MERLIN-Expo will automatically contact the on-line update center to see if there are any available updates. If you work at a company with a http proxy, you must also fill in the proxy hostname and port below. Default is “enabled”.
• Proxy hostname - The proxy host name used for http traffic. To find the name of the proxy host at your company, check the connection settings in your web browser.
• Proxy port - The proxy port name used for http traffic. To find the name of the proxy port at your company, check the connection settings in your web browser.

• Info screen