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Re: baseline grid
by David Christian Berg 13 Oct '04

13 Oct '04

Sorry to break the thread but since my system time was set to April 6. 2000 after getting back my Laptop, I found it kinda annoying to scroll all the way down in evolution to this thread. Anyways, I don't have a 64-bit system, and it's not all that bad, it's just that I found releases before to be a little more stable. I'll have a look at 0.40 since it's worth the bug reporting. About the baseline grid: I'm not sure, if paragraph text (text in a shape) is already introduced, but if it isn't it's on the todo list and it won't be long from now. Now inkscape should have a seperate so called baseline grid, which usually would be something like horizontal guides only. Now when turning on the "snap to baseline" (or something alike) option for a text (not sure if just paragraph text) the lines of the text automatically snap to the baseline. This means that the height of the lines is not determined by any setting or by the font size but mainly by the baseline grid. If the baselines are closer than the set line height, the text will always skip one (or more) baseline to snap to. http://www.macworld.com/2000/01/publications/macworld/images/content/snap-t… http://www.macworld.com/2000/01/publications/macworld/images/content/snap-t… http://www.creativepro.com/img/story/121703_fg1.gif This is still some way to go, but it is so useful for prepress graphics design, that I already mention it now. I'll file an RFE once you understand what I'm talking about :)

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crash in hmm dunno
by David Christian Berg 13 Oct '04

13 Oct '04

I have the latest debian package, but dunno what that is... can't you put something in the about dialog, so that I know... I never remember this terminal stuff. Anyways, I get a crash when I try to copy a text with a gradient fill. That is strange on the one hand and annoying on the other. I hope it's an easy to fix or fixed already. David

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Several tweaks on the File dialogs
by Bob Jamison 13 Oct '04

13 Oct '04

I committed a few changes to the file dialogs, hopefully making them a bit easier to use. By cheating and getting pointers to previously-private items on the dialogs, we can modify its behaviour slightly. Now we have a callback on the SaveAs text field, and the browse list is automatically expanded. Also, I think that the initial file listing, which did not list the filtered types the first time, works OK now. What I would like people to try for me, is L10N stuff, and whether it works better now with non-ASCII filenames. Bob

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math operation in dialogs
by David Christian Berg 13 Oct '04

13 Oct '04

just wondering if I should file a bug, or if it's so simple that I don't need to. Especially in the guides and the positioning dialog it would be helpful to be able to put mathimatical stuff in there. Imagine you have a guide at 45.6 and want one 7 mm further to the right, you'd just type 45.6+7 and there you go... even more important is something like dividing by 2 or 3, I need that quite often. Btw: Since my laptop was for repair, I used CorelDraw, and I think for basic vector editing and layouting inkscape is by now better than Corel. That is something! Which also brings me to one other thing I'm missing: Baseline Grid. Even for simple flyers and brochures it's nice (or rather necessary) to have. CorelDraw just pissed me of for not having it! I got my laptop back, with working ethernet card, Yeah!! Take care! David

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Initial abort() ability during tracing
by Bob Jamison 12 Oct '04

12 Oct '04

Hi all... I added some hooks to the tracer to be able to update the GUI while in the midst of heavy processing, and to catch an abort() if the user hits the Stop button. I checked in an initial ability to do this. (Yes, I know that there are no status messages, the buttons don't make a 'clicky' sound when you hit them, there is no hour glass 'busy' icon, no multi-colored progress bar, etc, blah, blah, blah, all that other silly stuff. I just want to make sure that abort() works ;-) Bob

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NEW: default gradients, master opacity, node editing
by bulia byak 12 Oct '04

12 Oct '04

* When you switch an object to gradient fill or stroke, the new gradient is created with that object's previous fill or stroke color going from 1 to 0 opacity (instead of the hardcoded black-to-white fully opaque gradient as before). New objects do not share gradients now, unless you explicitly set two or more objects to use the same gradient via the Fill and Stroke dialog. * The master opacity slider is moved from Object Properties to Fill and Stroke and can now work on multiple selected objects. It is now more convenient to adjust the transparency of objects with gradients or patterns. * If a node has straight line path fragments on one or both sides, Ctrl+Alt+dragging that node in the node tool moves it along the direction(s) of these straight line(s) and their perpendiculars. This is an easy way to change the length of a straight line without changing its angle.

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typos and a translation question
by Arpad Biro 11 Oct '04

11 Oct '04

Hi, A few textual problems in Inkscape CVS: "of objects" is duplicated: #: src/dialogs/align.cpp:506 "Distribute centers of objects of objects at even distances horizontally" should probably be ";" instead of ",": #: src/nodepath.cpp:2701 src/nodepath.cpp:2725 "Node handle: drag to shape the curve; with Ctrl to snap angle; with Alt to lock length, with Shift to rotate the opposite handle in sync" ":" should probably be outside the tag (like in other strings): #: src/nodepath.cpp:2677 Node: #: src/select-context.cpp:647 Ctrl: #: src/select-context.cpp:649 Shift: #: src/select-context.cpp:651 Alt: "x" may not be the most appropriate character here (probably "," could be used instead): #: src/select-context.cpp:894 Move by %s x %s #: src/seltrans.cpp:1000 Move center to %s x %s should be "to": #: src/tools-switch.cpp:185 "top copy the color" probably meant "Image": #: src/trace/trace.cpp:158 "Trace: mage has no bitmap data" --------------------------------- Also a question: what does the "Export just the object with export-id" string mean? Export only the object that has export-id? A comment: the status bar messages can easily be too long in translations, so probably we should do something to make it possible to display/scroll longer strings somehow. Arpad Biro __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com

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building on win32
by john cliff 11 Oct '04

11 Oct '04

Hello all,

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NEW: on-canvas rounding and randomization
by bulia byak 11 Oct '04

11 Oct '04

* More on-canvas star interactivity: The Roundedness and Randomization fields in the star controls panel are precise, but not very convenient. Now you can round a star interactively by Shift+dragging a star handle on the canvas, or adjust a star's randomization level by Alt+dragging a handle. Correspondingly, Shift+click on a handle zeroes roundedness, Alt+click removes randomization.

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Publishing the User Manual
by cedric 11 Oct '04

11 Oct '04

I've been on holidays for few weeks so that the User Manual has been written very slowly during this period. But I've seen on the website that there was a particular wish to publish such a book. I always think precise documentation is a good thing for softwares. This a kind of respect for users (who cannot know everything!!) For this we need two things : A) a very good/precise manual, eventually with creative exemple and some step by step tutorials (I think there are good basis for this). All this means that there's a need of criticism in a reader team. This may need a special discussing line. This is very long to explain each option, but I think this necessary. What should be exluded is something like this found in the Gimp user docs (approximative translation) : "Sobel: less interesting than specific Sobel; Prewitt: result not very different from Sobel. [...]Roberts: no difference with Sobel. Differentiel: border less clear. Laplace: Less intersting than specific Laplace." Of course there are many good pages in this manual, nut why not this ? because i suppose the aim of a manual is to explain how it works in general and how it behaves in specific case and not only give opinion (the user can do this alone). And that's why it is hard, and that's why it is long to do. I have myself some difficulties in understanding some inkscpae or gimp functionnalities. That's also why, it would be easier if we where more at writing, but that's the way it is. The other difficulty is that the manual should be complete but understandable, even for non initiated people. B) as most of user can read a bit of english/us, a good english translation should be interesting (I'm trying to make my best but it's very hard for me). And issues : A) Ask for a well known publisher, that will give large diffusion of the book. But regarding at this : 1. Vector drawing is not as popular as bitmap 2. Inkscape is still young and this will be kept as a default and economically very risky 3. Gimp is much more famous than Inkscape, but you can just count books about it with the finger of a unique hand I know some people at Oreilly, I can ask what they think about this, but I've already put it in some discussion and it has never been kept. B) Do our best to do a self-published one. As a Gimp book author and editor, I have already done this (french only). I still have a free ISBN number that could be used for it. Blender Manual has been made with a subscription. Why not, because it worked ! But the difficulties are : 1. to do advertising for it 2. to a sufficient number of commands to get an interesting price (For the gimp book, there was not enough, so that I've made it in numeric printing which is not the best, especially for pictures) If there is a particular wish for this, I'm very interesting in working for it. May be may little experience in the subject could be useful. Let me know. Cedric

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