Layer expansion showing objects (BikeMama)

[BikeMama]

My 12 year old daughter has been using Affinity Designer for a while.  Tonight she got super frustrated because the program has suddenly started behaving differently.  She's noticed two things, and one of them drives her CRAZY.  First, every time she draws a line, the layer the line is drawn on expands in the layers window/panel to show all the object under the layer.  She says it didn't used to do this.  She says it's confusing to see all those objects listed under the layer.  She wants to know if there is a way to keep the layer collapsed while she draws.  She'll collapes it, then as soon as she starts to draw, the layer "expands" to show all the objects.  It's driving her crazy.  Second (seemingly less offensive but nonethless confusing to her), she can now draw on the black space behind the white canvas.  Is this normal?  New?

 

She suspects these changes are either due to an update to the software, or maybe she changed a setting someplace that she doesn't realize she changed.

 

Thanks so much for any info!

[toltec]

There is an option, right at the very bottom, in preferences. Edit > Preferences > User Interface called "Show selection in layers panel"

 

 

If that is ticked, as soon as you select an object, the Layers panel opens to show that layer. That might be the cause of the first issue.

 

I have no idea about No2, you should only be able to draw on a layer.

[dutchshader]

nr 2 could be that she hit the \ on the keyboard, unclipping to canvas. just hit it again.

[R C-R]

8 hours ago, BikeMama said:

Second (seemingly less offensive but nonethless confusing to her), she can now draw on the black space behind the white canvas.  Is this normal?  New?

It is not not new. Users have always been able to draw outside of the canvas. As @dutchshader suggested, it is likely she has previously had View > View Mode > Clip to Canvas enabled, hiding the off-canvas elements from view. The default keyboard shortcut for clipping/unclipping the canvas view is the backslash key, & she probably tapped that by mistake.