June 2008 - Inkscape Devel - Inkscape Mailman

Minor inconsistency with disabling snapping by "key accelerators"
by Rock Star 05 Jun '08

05 Jun '08

Since I'm using Inkscape mostly for technical drawings I've come across minor inconsistency with disabling snapping by key accelerators. This is an extremely useful feature when you need to temporarily disable, otherwise turned on, snapping - for example for positioning text etc. However, I find the behavior a bit inconsistent. Currently it is like this: If you want to disable snapping by key accelerator while: 1) MOVING a path, shape, group, text etc., you have to press SHIFT. 2) MOVING a NODE of a CURVED PATH, you have to press SHIFT or ALT. 3) MOVING a NODE of a STRAIGHT PATH, you have to press ALT. If you press SHIFT, a straight path becomes curved. So, the 3rd behavior is somehow nonintuitive to me. I think it would be better if the same key accelerator would be used in all cases. I would vote for SHIFT since I'm used of it. In this case I guess that for straight paths SHIFT and ALT should be switched. Though, on the other hand, if ALT comes from "alternative" it would make more sense to use ALT for disabling snapping. Anyway, maybe I'm missing something here, because I'm really much more technically than artistically oriented. So, is there some other explanation of this? Rok

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Re: [Inkscape-devel] Tablet support on win32
by Bob Jamison 05 Jun '08

05 Jun '08

Hi, ->From: Stephen Silver <sasilver@...36...> >They can probably even use the libgdk-win32-2.0-0.dll now in devlibs, >as it should be compatible with previous ones: >https://svn.modevia.com/inkscape/devlibs/bin/libgdk-win32-2.0-0.dll > Yes, I would suggest using this "official" one, if that's what you want to do. And again, they changed PNG lib dependencies, so you will probably need the libpng12-0.dll file, also in the same place. But any builds in the future will have this fix. bob

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NEW: HPGL exporter
by Alexandre Prokoudine 05 Jun '08

05 Jun '08

Hi, A quick followup to the recent cutters thread :) A simple exporter to HPGL which is used by various cutters has just been committed to SVN. It was created by Aaron Spike on demand coming from a couple of users and it's a partial solution for the inkscape-not-handling-more-cutter-file-formats issue. Cheers to Aaron! ;-) Alexandre

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Tablet support on win32
by Bob Jamison 05 Jun '08

05 Jun '08

I have been hearing that there has been some trouble getting Wacom tablets working on win32. Gtk had a bigfix release today, 2.12.10, that mentions Wacom support as one of its fixes. Give this a look: http://inkscape.modevia.com/win32/Inkscape0806041806.7z I added the new Gtk, Glib, and Pango revisions to the devlibs. Just "svn up" now to receive them. If you notice that the build is a bit larger, it's because for some strange reason, Gtk changed the name of their PNG DLL dependency from libpng13.dll to libpng12-0.dll. Rather than spend several days recompiling everything that needs PNG, we'll just make a copy for now. (ARRRGH!) bob

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Fwd: Programming for Inkscape.
by bulia byak 05 Jun '08

05 Jun '08

...forwarding this to the devel list... ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Pam B. <pamely@...329...> Date: Thu, Feb 14, 2008 at 2:26 PM Subject: Programming for Inkscape. To: buliabyak@...400... Hi, I have been told to contact you by Bibi Morris. I understand that in the past some wonderful people have made changes in Inkscape that made it an incredibly useful program for owners of Wishblade and CraftRobo personal media cutters. I have now been provided a tip that would allow users of Linux to drive their machines directly from Inkscape. The "tip" suggested that Windows users might be able to do the same if someone was able to do something with the windows binary for Inkscape. As is probably already obvious, I know nothing about Operating Systems, nor do I know anything about coding and software programming. Actually, I no longer even own a Wishblade, (I have moved on to a bigger machine.) but I do run a support group for over 1,000 personal cutter owners. This has the potential of being a very powerful tool to owners of these types of cutters and could save them hundreds of dollars in software upgrades. Would you please check into this and see if it is something that can be done for us? Thank you, Pam Beard and the 1,000+ in the yahoo group: EasyWishbladers The "tip" is pasted below: If the words Linux, RedHat, Debian, Inkscape and / or Python mean anything to you read on (warning, getting technical here...). How would you like to cut from inkscape? all in Linux? I have been lurking in Linux Printer Driver land and was very happy to find an early copy of a Python script designed to provide the necessary "linkage" between Inkscape and a craftrobo cutter. With a little change to the code, we verified it works with a wishblade as well. But you might have to wait until there is support in the down loadable python script. Basically, you print from Inkscape "using PostScript operators" (not as a bitmap). And, instead of sending the output to a printer, you "pipe" it to the python application. This operation is actually described in the Inkscape print popup menu. When you click on print, the python GUI pops up giving you more options. This GUI interface is *much* simpler than the actual graphtec software. Most anything to do with the image needs to be done in Inkscape. The only real control on the GUI are the paper size, the cutting speed and the cutting pressure. I suppose this can also be done in windows. My *assumptions* are that there is a windows binary for inkscape as well as python and python related software. If that's the case, then you may be able to skip setting up a Linux box. I know I am hitting only about 1% of you, but if you want to try the script you can get it here: http://vidar.gimp.org/graphtecprint/ ....I am sure feed back at this stage of development would influence what features are fixed, enhanced and / or added. -- bulia byak Inkscape. Draw Freely. http://www.inkscape.org

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Some issues with using .46
by MilesTogoe 04 Jun '08

04 Jun '08

As we're using .46, here are some issues that have arisen (some pre-date .46). Should they be added as RFE's? Sodipodi absolute paths - if you add an image, then delete it, the old image absolute path seem to remain in the file. Maybe it's the sodipodi namespace stuff. In fact is there a good reason for both an xlink and sodipodi:absref for the same image - seems like unnecessary duplication and chance for bugs. Effects|Modify Path|Color Markers - In .46 it's giving a weird warning message box (maybe it is being fixed) and does strange things like accessing the sodipodi full paths (see above). This effect has always seemed to be a kludge since stroke color should be applied when end markers are chosen in the object|fill & stroke|stroke style dialog Effects|Render|Grid - This is confusing. the right grid and guides are in document properties. I used the effects grid by mistake, then couldn't adjust it - had to undo. If the Render grid is for fill shouldn't it be under the object|fill & stroke |fill pattern Open Icon - the blue folder color is very similar to the old save icons (with blue floppy disk) thus, I keep clicking the wrong icon for save - the open folder color should be tan (manila). Object|Fill & Stroke|Fill gradient pattern - trying to use the awesome gradient tools more and I find there is an inside out gradient but not an outside in gradient and I can't figure out how to switch it. This also applies to left-right vs right-left (including the gradient adjustment tool) - this can be worked around by flipping the object but that's kind of kludgy. Finally here's a perfect patch opportunity for a newcomer wanting to get involved: Object|Transform|Scale - switch default scale proportionally to checked - this is a simple gtk checkbox setting

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Re: [Inkscape-devel] UI proposal for text in shapes
by Valerie 04 Jun '08

04 Jun '08

> On some 1,5-2 years or so old thread in this mailing list :) *looks at size of archive* :S > I don't think anybody else does it. Most other applications just > either separate type face/style from type family or just provide B/I > buttons. The bolder/lighter approach is more interesting, because then > you can easily cycle between multiple faces. I'd love to see how this > could be done in UI other than with two buttons (bolder/lighter) as > well, actually :) Well for me it will heavily depend on whether I actually Get the concept. Is the behaviour continuous or discrete (as in, can you set in just about any value or are you limited to a few specific ones?) Same for italics: you decide the slant of the text right? Can you specify just about any value? I remember a person who proposed this handy pop-up slider where you can click and drag left and right pretty easily. If the above behaviour allows you to take just about any value, then I Could see a "bold" drop-down horizontal slider where as you slide around the font becomes bolder. If there are a finite number of values possible, then you could constrain the values of the slider. Same with italics. How does Inkscape actually handle all that though? By distorting the fonts to hell? (something I don't really have a problem with, as long as it doesn't cause the memory usage to go to hell because handling of long text always seems to eat up my memory like no tomorrow right now?) Speaking of that person's handy slider thing, I don't suppose anybody is going to implement it anytime soon? (a pity, because it's real handy. One-click value adjustment. Somebody should really make that widget)

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UI proposal for text in shapes
by Valerie 04 Jun '08

04 Jun '08

Well, work on the vector brush interface is just about done, so I've tackled another thing I'd like to have (though it's not as significant): proper flowing of text into shapes (chart items in particular). At first I thought about making dedicated chart shapes, which have an automatic text box at the centre (or defined alignment position). Then I thought about adding the functionality to existing shapes. Though it still doesn't address the question of non-predefined shapes. So, the simplest way in the end is to add the functionality to the text toolbar, so that it can be applied to any shape. http://img294.imageshack.us/img294/1162/textinterfacelk4.png Note the grid by the way. Whoever thought of it first (not me, but I don't remember who. It was proposed for some other Inkscape feature though) is genius. You can align the text to: - top-left - top-center - top-right - middle-left - (you get the idea) Why this proposal? - because the align grid eliminates the need for calling up the bulky align dialogue all the time when doing chart items. The current flow functionality always starts at the top-left corner, unless I'm missing something. - because the padding means you can use the actual shape as border, instead of having to manually make a smaller version and stuffing the text into it. I suppose this would address the following wishlist items: https://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/+bug/171105 https://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/+bug/171602

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Re: [Inkscape-devel] Knotholder C++ification
by Maximilian Albert 04 Jun '08

04 Jun '08

Bob Jamison schrieb: ==> Hi. I'm getting link errors, like this one: build\libinkscape.a(knotholder.o):knotholder.cpp:(.text+0xbd3): undefined reference to `vtable for KnotHolderEntity' Was a .cpp file maybe missed in the commit? <== Dammit, yes. That's because I had applied a patch from my local git repo and forgot to do "svn add" despite me reminding myself a thousand times before. *grmpf* Thanks for reporting this. It should work now. Very sorry for having broken the build. Max

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Re: [Inkscape-devel] UI proposal for text in shapes
by Valerie 04 Jun '08

04 Jun '08

> but as an aside, the whole typeface generation engine is still very > much in development, and i'd venture to say that a stable/usable > version will not be out before August. I have been working on an > Inkscape plugin for testing it, so maybe that would be a better way to > introduce this type design interface into Inkscape - then we can talk ;) I can't help with that unfortunately, I have no idea what you'd be trying to achieve UI-wise. On the bright side, I've thought up a possible interface for the toolbar. However, I'd suggest the option to revert to "simple" mode for those who aren't used to it. The fontface choices would basically be done in a drop-down: http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/7818/textstylesmk2.png (rough drawing for now, I'll do the nicer looking version later) Mouse-over the values will also reveal their names (bold, ultra-bold, heavy etc) Now it would still be cumbersome no matter what you do because there are just that many options. However, Mouse-over to Each field Must reveal the shortcuts, which would get the users to quickly get used to them and thus minimize their usage of the drop-down. Shortcuts: - Ctrl+I: toggle between italic modes (normal, oblique, italic) - Ctrl+B: make bolder. - Ctrl+Shift-B and Ctrl+L: make lighter. - Ctrl+E: expand. - Ctrl+Shift+E: contract If gravity is added in there, then sure. As for "weight," it'd go like this: if for a style (say, Italic), there is no font for that weight, they the implicit weight value stays the same, but Italic takes on the next closest value. The explanation to the user is that "Italic with Bold" and Italic with Ultrabold" look the same. And that's about it. A possible alternate interface is that Italic gets drop-down value boxes and Bold next to it gets a drop-down horizontal slider. The other options still get stuffed into a drop-down.

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