# Inheritance

Notes can inherit properties from another note, the note’s prototype. Any note can serve as a prototype to another note.

If a note has a prototype, most of its attributes will be inherited from the prototype. If you do set an attribute’s value for that note, the value you supply overrides the inherited value. Inheritance lets you say, “Make this note just like that one, unless I tell you otherwise.”

Prototypes often establish the type or nature of a note. Notes about books might all share the prototype Book, and notes about people might all share the prototype Person. Prototypes make it easy to give related notes a special appearance, and also make it easier for Tinderbox to identify and reason about related notes. You can change a note’s prototype whenever you like.

Prototypes may themselves inherit from prototypes. Details of inheritance are discussed here.

A few intrinsic attributes are never inherited because inheritance would make no sense. Some attributes that aren’t inherited include Xpos, Ypos, Height, and Width.

> To mark a note as a potential prototype, select the note and check Prototype in the Prototype inspector.

> To set a note’s prototype, select the note and choose the prototype from the popup menu of the Prototype inspector, OR right-click the note’s icon in outline view, OR right-click the note’s prototype tab in map view.

Try now: Open the Prototype inspector

Tinderbox provides a variety of built-in prototypes. You can add built-in prototypes from the File menu. Built-in prototypes are created inside a top-level container named Prototypes; once created, you may change them to meet your specific needs.