Using Palette Menus

In the top-right corner of many palettes is the palette's menu. Though easy to overlook, it shouldn't be forgotten. Many useful commands are hidden there; some—such as the ability to convert type to All Caps, Small Caps, Superscript, and Subscript via the Character Palette's menu—are not accessible by any other means in Illustrator. In addition to hidden commands, the palette menu often contains the toggle to enable or disable access to key features of the palette. The Gradient palette, for instance, shows up by default as only the preview ramp (see Figure 15.17); by choosing Show Options from the Gradient palette's menu, however, you may access features that exercise much more control over the appearance of a gradient.

Figure 15.17. The default Gradient palette (left) and the expanded Gradient palette (right) after selecting Show Options from the palette menu.