In Figma’s playground file for the (beta) AI features, there’s a hands-on example for the AI feature called Replace Content. It sports a (vertical) auto-layout frame with two similar objects. When you select the frame, a wide handle appears on its bottom edge (in the instruction called the Duplicate Bar) , offering the option do drag up and down and add multiple instances of the same object(s).
It looks and works a lot like the Repeat Grid of Adobe XD – the only featured I missed now and then in Figma, so I’m a happy camper now ! 😄
The feature works very well, and the obvious next task of replacing the repetitive texts for uniquely generated dummy texts, also works very nicely BTW.
But how did they get this Duplicate Bar to appear ?
I can’t find anything about it in any Figma Help resources. Just this tidbit in the beta AI example.
So I tried and tested it a bit, and it seems to me that you need at least 2 by 2 elements: 2 elements in one group or auto-layout, copied or duplicated into 2 sets, and combined again into an auto-layout. This might be a bit overly complex to get it started.
And the term “Duplicate Bar” is also a bit misleading, because it’s not required to use the Duplicate command. Granted, it duplicates stuff, but maybe it’s better to call it the “Repeat Bar” or “Handle”, also to please former XD users ?
And while we’re on it: the Replace Content command should also be renamed into Replace Text, because it leaves image content untouched.