You cannot use the DEPICTIONS statement to specify the way a line symbol should look on the diagram workspace. Only the Menu clause of the DEPICTIONS statement works for line symbols: you can use it to tell System Architect how to represent the line symbol on the Draw menu or toolbox.

However, you can use the DEPICT LIKE clause to specify that a new symbol type be drawn like an existing line symbol type, as long as the “draw like” symbol type that you specify in the DEPICT LIKE statement is a line type. This is the only mechanism by which you can designate a new user symbol type as a line. If you do not use a DEPICT LIKE clause for a new symbol type, or use the clause but refer to a non-line symbol type, the new type is deemed a non-line, or regular, symbol type.

This logic only applies to a new symbol type. When an extant symbol type’s description has a DEPICT LIKE clause, the referenced type must have the same topology (line or node) as the referring type.

When you make one of the new symbols types a line in this fashion, the line is drawn as any other line symbol is drawn. If the new symbol type is being drawn on an extant diagram type, it is subject to the settings in the Notation dialog (if any) for that diagram. If the new type is drawn in a new user diagram type, it is drawn with arrows or without arrows as the referenced line is capable of being drawn.