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Re: [Inkscape-devel] docs
by Joshua Facemyer / Impressus Art 18 Sep '07

18 Sep '07

> It has been mentioned several times, but never done. I guess nobody has > time for that...And in fact, i would do it > well (i hope) for french but my english is so poor taht i just usually > use the Release Notes as a basis for he EN version....Currently we > have some ongoing work in French version of the user > guide and not much of it in the English version I'd be happy to put some time in working on the English version of what you have already in French. My French is not nearly as good as your English, but I'm sure we can manage something. Is there currently someone heading English documentation? If so, please tell me where the best place is to begin. Otherwise, I'll need someone to start at the basics with me - you can email me off list so I can get the info that doesn't need to be posted here. > the more consistent it is the better I agree, and it's useless to duplicate work, anyways. I'd also be happy to dive into documentation of the new filter effects, and would be grateful for those who are working on them to help me get a layman's understanding of what they do. I realize that the best way is to actually use them, which I'll be doing, and read the specs, but that doesn't always bring better understanding :) Anyway, I may be able to begin the work in English which can be shared with the French version (and others). I'll be really looking at the docs, as I get some free time. Would someone be so kind as to point to all the current doc locations for me? Also, will I need any sort of commit access to those places? Thanks. jf

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Dockable dialogs, todo list
by Gustav Broberg 18 Sep '07

18 Sep '07

Thanks for all bug reports, comments and wishes regarding the dockable dialogs I've received in the last weeks! To sum it up, here's my todo list for the time to come: TODO (in no specific order) --------------------------- * Allow in-dock dialogs to be expanded even if there's no "slack". (I've got it kind of functional, but needs some more work). * Force GtkPaned to pass on F6 and F8 (i.e. those shortcuts can't be used now when the dock is displayed). * Make all the functionality provided by dialog-events.cpp work with the new dialogs. Perhaps by moving it into the Dialog class. This will lead a bit of to code duplication as long as there are "old" dialogs around, which is bad, on the other hand it allows the code to be C++-ified, which is good. * Tackle the problems with dockable dialogs and multiple desktops, i.e. the Dialog manager redesign. * Scroll dock to display docked dialogs when requested, and needed. * Remove old, obsolete object-properties dialog (a.k.a "Fill & Stroke"). Add methods for setting a specific tab in the new F&S. * Manage the Swatches dialog with the dialog manager, like any other dialog. * Fix minor problem with switching focus directly to dialog docked in main window, when a floating dialog have focus. Also give focus to a dialog that is deiconified. * Fix all GDL runtime warnings. * Fix all GDL compile time warnings. * See if anything can be done about the clashing mnemonic accelerators, i.e. allow them to be context sensitive for dialogs. * Add any (if any) major, user visible problem from above that didn't get fixed to "Known problems" sections in the release notes. Wish list (in no specific order) -------------------------------- * Add a "iconify/minimize all" button and bind a shortcut to it. * Pan/zoom drawing depending on dock size, behavior toggled by the current "Zoom drawing if window size changes" button. * Allow dock to "start" from menu bar instead of toolbar (and thereby giving it more space), by adding an option in "options.dock". * Add another, horizontal, docking area. Potentially hard if we wan't dialogs to be dragged and dropped between the docks. I might have missed something, please tell if there's something crucial that needs to be fixed before the code freeze that's not already on the TODO list. -- Gustav

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Re: [Inkscape-devel] docs
by Joshua Facemyer / Impressus Art 18 Sep '07

18 Sep '07

On a similar topic as documentation, I'd be happy to add some news items to the main page from time to time. I know that before I read the dev list I would get discouraged by lack of posted news, but there's so much going on. How would I contribute news items? What kinds of items would be desirable? JF

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Live effect preview
by unknown＠example.com 18 Sep '07

18 Sep '07

Thanks for adding the checkbutton Ted! But still, (all) effects crash for me on WinXP. Now that I have checked the "live preview" box, I get instant crashes when opening any effect dialog. So I cannot even uncheck the box to make inkscape work :( Could you perhaps add a #define to disable live preview on windows until it works? Does this crash for all Windows users? Or only for me? Johan

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Re: [Inkscape-devel] Hi
by Joshua Blocher 17 Sep '07

17 Sep '07

No, I mean select it with the selection and transformation tool (F1), the Trace Bitmap has to have a target bitmap selected to trace use the above tool to select it then trace bitmap. Joshua L. Blocher verbalshadow On 9/14/07, Andreas.berg3@...128... <andreas.berg3@...128...> wrote: > P.S. or did you ment some different like import, > or afterwords mark the Bitmap as a path? > > I tried both......... > > Best Regards > > Andreas > Am 13.09.2007 um 22:55 schrieb Joshua Blocher: > > > Andreas, > > > > It sound like you didn't select the bitmap before tracing/vectorizing. > > Please check to see that is the problem. > > > > Joshua L. Blocher > > verbalshadow > > > > On 9/14/07, Andreas.berg3@...128... <andreas.berg3@...128...> wrote: > >> Hello im not really used to write in dev Lists, i even cant read > >> source code :o) > >> > >> OK i have a Problem and maybe a Bugreport, so see im an not that > >> much advanced User (like at my english, it says everythin :o) > >> > >> Id load today Inkscape, to try out, my aim is it to Trace or > >> Vectorize ,or how ever its called in english, an Bitmap or better an > >> Gif Image. > >> My first Step is it to Import it, then i open the Option "Bitmap > >> Vectorize" (i use it in German, so .....) and after i choose all my > >> preferences i click on action, but it seams like nothing hapens. > >> Id search and look at all manuals ( like i should do :o) did wait for > >> over 10 Min. but, guess what, yeah nothin happens. > >> So i dont know if i do some wrong and when it is like that i really > >> cant expect what it could be. > >> > >> OK, Im using Mac OS X, 10.4.10 on an Intel Mac, yeah i know its > >> running under X11 and i have to wait, but it starts up pretty fast. > >> > >> I really dont even know if its the right Place to talk about that, > >> but i hope so, if not exuse my please, but tell me tahn to where it > >> would be. > >> > >> If the one who answeres me is or know German, i would prefer that, > >> cause english is not my first Language, and im writing like > >> Simpleton, lol > >> > >> > >> Best Regards > >> > >> > >> > >> Andreas Berg > >> > >> --------------------------------------------------------------------- > >> ---- > >> This SF.net email is sponsored by: Microsoft > >> Defy all challenges. Microsoft(R) Visual Studio 2005. > >> http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/vse0120000070mrt/direct/01/ > >> _______________________________________________ > >> Inkscape-devel mailing list > >> Inkscape-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net > >> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/inkscape-devel > >> > >

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initial inkscape user feedback from a regular illustrator user.
by Andy Fitzsimon 16 Sep '07

16 Sep '07

G'day guys, Someone new has started here in Brisbane who comes from a heavy illustrator background. During her first day using Inkscape she's written up this short document mentioning her initial reactions. a good quote to summarize: "I can find this stuff out by reading the manual. I'm just telling you what isn't immediately apparent enough as I feel like it ought to be." ------------------ Becc's Inkscape Hassles -------- Magnification in/out buttons: Wanting to zoom out, I hit the button showing the magnifying glass with a minus sign on it, then clicked on the page several times waiting for it to zoom out the same way it does when you've clicked on the button showing the magnifying glass with + sign on it. It didn't, but instead zoomed in. These buttons shouldn't imply they offer in/out aspects of the same tool but not behave consistently with this implication. Zoom level indication: The level of magnification indicator down beneath my work is out of whack with the zoom tools being up in the menu above it: I don't expect to hit a button on one menu and have to look to a field on another one to see the changes it's effected. At the time that I performed the above zooming in and out, I had nothing on my page and was zoomed in to a level where I couldn't see the edges of the page. As such, I was wanting feedback letting me know that my actions were having some kind of effect. (I expected this to be zooming me out, which turned out not to be the case – I was still zooming in, as mentioned – but any feedback would've been helpful in letting me know this button wasn't working as expected and that I should thus adjust my approach.) Ditto with the related shortcuts: I can hit Shift++ but not Shift+-, which is inconsistent. I can use a scrollbar to move my view horizontally but not vertically. Makes moving my focus difficult. (NB: I later worked out I can scroll up and down using the mouse wheel; okay, but having a scrollbar for only one kind of pan when both kinds of pans are possible is inconsistent and leads one to believe, as I did earlier, that only one kind of panning is possible – otherwise, surely both would be represented onscreen in the same way, y'know? Also, what do you do if you don't have a wheel mouse?) I'm not sure what to hold down to create a perfect circle. I seem to have managed it accidentally by holding down Shift one time, holding down Ctrl another time, and holding both together another time, but none of these seem to create a perfect circle consistently: in each case switching to an oval occurs if I'm not very careful about where I'm dragging my pointer while I have the appropriate key/s held down. If I want to select nodes, I seem to not only have to use the "node edit" tool but must first select the entirety of the object(s) the nodes are a part of in order to be able to do so. This slows me down by adding in a step that doesn't seem necessary or logical. It also took me some time to work out that the problem wasn't simply that the node selection tool doesn't work – I really only kept trying because I knew from having created that teardrop shape when you were standing there assisting me that nodes could be selected and edited somehow – which is going to present to potential converts from, er, say, Illustrator, as bugginess and incompleteness. Please let me rotate my object as easily as I can resize it, without opening the Transform menu. Sometimes I don't know how many degrees I want to rotate it, and sometimes I just want to turn it 'round 'til it looks about right, so need to be able to wiggle it around experimentally. :) So, I'm beginning to form an idea of this program (and point this out in the assumption that any user will do similarly) as having not just paths with nodes like Illustrator does, but also having something called "objects" that fit into all of this somewhere. My immediate difficulty with that is this: I'm working at present with a shape that's made up of a path. However I wouldn't know it to look at it when selected, because the fact that it has a path outlining it isn't readily apparent unless I not only select it but double-click on it. I don't recall having to ever double click on something to edit it. Is showing its path possible with just one click (also, can I see the wire line of the path rather than just the nodes on it when I do so? I can't make out the shape of what I'm working on when it's over/under an object of the same colour!)? Could doing this perhaps serve also to allow the user to easily see what's a shape and what's a path? As it is, I'm still having difficulties conceptualising what the building blocks of this program are (which is important because they're what I'm going to use to develop my drawings etc as a user), and I wonder if making the differences between the two more readily discernable might assist in getting that across... Is the node edit tool the only way I can alter a line once I've drawn it? I'm accustomed to being able to select it and alter it with the pencil – particularly when I'm using a graphics tablet, this is my preferred method of working, cuz it makes using a computer to draw just like using a pencil and paper. :( I've hit a numeral a few times when meaning to type something or enter a size or angle of a rotation into a text field and instead found my view suddenly changed. This isn't a bug – I've obviously had the focus in a place other than where I thought it was – but a suggestion that the numbers on the keyboard not be used to change the view without the use of the Ctrl or Shift key consistent with usual shortcut behaviour. Fill and Stroke colours are taking up so much real estate in their respective menus that they shouldn't need. I know you're trying to supply optimum control, but I'm being overwhelmed by details here when all I want is to select an appropriate shade of pink to colour the pieces of my exploded brains. Clicking on a colour swatch on the main screen shouldn't open up a menu offering me options to choose between fill, stroke, and stroke style, and then (once I've worked out that I should stay inside the 'fill' tab of that menu) decide between what kind of fill, whether I want to use RGB or CMYK or Pantone, the colour(s) amongst those I want to use, etc, all at once. I just want to change the colour. Wouldn't it make more sense when I click on a swatch of colour to open up a menu offering me only colour options? Sure, the colour is an attribute of a background; so offer the other background options in the menu's other (unfocused) tabs – not options having to do with strokes or stroke style. As with the Fill option, the Stroke options are taking up a lot of space because they're providing a lot of detail I don't immediately need if I'm just clicking on, say, a swatch (in which case I want to change the colour), or on a I can't seem to shift objects up and down within a layer. Does this mean that if I don't want to employ layers for something that before I start drawing I need to think about the order in which I need to draw objects, starting from the bottom up? :-/ Er... I can't scroll left to right using that scroll bar I mentioned earlier! I can't remember if it was working then; it certainly isn't now. Joining two path ends together would be handy – something I use all the time When I try to copy a style using the eyedrop tool, as an Illustrator user I'm expecting both fill and stroke to be applied to the object I'm working with. At the moment I'm getting only fill. Since I do have the whole object selected and not just its fill, I'm not finding any logical reason why both fill and stroke settings shouldn't be getting copied over. ------------

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Re: [Inkscape-devel] Scheme Scripting Console
by Ted Gould 16 Sep '07

16 Sep '07

On Sun, 2007-08-12 at 18:47 -0500, Samuel A. Rebelsky wrote: > I'm the faculty member who supervises David and Soren's work. Thanks > for your regular and rapid feedback on their work! I hope we'll find > a way to get some Scheme scripting console into InkScape, even if > it's not the one that they've written. Anyway, I thought I should > respond to your two questions. Great to meet you. I don't see any major barriers to using theirs, just a couple details we need to work out. > I don't have much to say about the document locking issue; if there's > a better approach, I'm sure that they'd be happy to adopt it. What would you guys think about building the patch without this? I know it'd be slower, but then we could get some of the code into the tree so that you'd have less of a branch to maintain. > In terms of the TinyScheme issue, as best as I can tell, TinyScheme > semms to have replaced SIOD as the implementation language for Script- > Fu in the Gimp, starting with 2.3 (development) and 2.4 (release, > eventually), but I'm working as an outsider. I'm pretty sure the > discussion was in mid-2006. Let's see ... the developers mailing > list had a note about the replacement in week 42. <snip> > If you'd prefer that Soren and David use guile, rather than > TinyScheme, as the base implementation of Scheme for their InkScape > scripting console, that's fine with me. (And probably with them.) > However, it will delay their work somewhat, since they're starting > classes again, and their available time is going away. It really isn't as much about which Scheme interpreter, as much as how to include it. The problem that we run into is that if we include it in our source tree we end up maintaining that code. If we keep it as an external dependency, someone else maintains it. I like less work if possible. :) It would also make sense that if GIMP is using the same interpreter that we are, we make it an external package. That way bugs can be fixed in one place. From some of the stuff I've been reading on the GIMP webpage it seems that their version of TinyScheme is patched to work better with GTK+ (UTF-8 fixes). Is that the version you guys have included? > p.s. Your message to the Gimp developers' list did get posted, it's > at http://www.gimpusers.com/mailmsg.php?1186687639.4436.4.camel%40bender Still haven't received any responses. I'll see what I can find out. I'll wait for "Monday" to finish around the world first :) --Ted

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misc dock issues
by bulia byak 16 Sep '07

16 Sep '07

Hi Gustav, some glitches and questions as of rev 16035: Docked dialogs don't scroll to be visible when I call them, if the dock contains many dialogs scrolled down. Is this fixable? Hightlighting the title of the dialog which was just called by a shortcut is nice, but it does little else - the keyboard focus is still not in the dialog. Or at least, I can't use Tab to travel between widgets in the dialog as I was able in the dialog as a top-level window - Tab works to select object on canvas no matter what. On the other hand, the accelerator keys (underlined in labels) work indiscriminately across all dialogs and all UI in general. For example, select an object, open fill&stroke and switch to HSL tab, then press Alt+H. The first time, the Help menu is opened; the second time, focus jumps to the H field in the dialog. This is a really bad problem - few people use accelerators in dialogs but many call menus by Alt+letter, so this needs to be fixed somehow. Is it possible to limit the scope of the accelerators to the dialog only, so that they only work when some widget in the dialog has focus? By the way, if I can highlight the dialog with its shortcut, it would be logical if it was also highlighted when I click some widget in it, or just click on its title bar. Is this feasible? Press Ctrl+Shift+W - the swatches dialog pops up. Press it again and you get "** Message: Failed to find an existing dialog". Works with other dialogs but not this one. Is it possible to not show the separators between dialogs in the dock with resize handles when resizing is not possible? This is misleading. Open several dialogs, then open fill&stroke, iconify it, then restore. It works but I get in the console: (inkscape:3948): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: value "-313" of type `gint' is invalid or out of range for property `preferred-height' of type `gint' Now that you've replaced them, can you remove the obsolete fill&stroke code from src/dialogs? Note that the selected-style.cpp calls sp_object_properties_fill and sp_object_properties_stroke, which open the old (non-gtkmm) dialog and switch to the corresponding tab. Can you provide similar accessor functions for the gtkmm docked dialog and replace these calls? -- bulia byak Inkscape. Draw Freely. http://www.inkscape.org

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I'm back!
by Gail Carmichael 15 Sep '07

15 Sep '07

As you may have noticed from an earlier email, I'm more or less back from all that wedding stuff. The ceremony was wonderful and the honeymoon trip to the Dominican Republic really fun! Email me if you want to see some photos and I'll send some links. So now down to business. School is ramping up, but it looks good to be able to spend some time every week looking at Inkscape. Which is good, because I have several loose ends to take care of. I am aware of the funky newline behaviour that a few of you have logged bugs on. That will be my first priority. Once that's ironed out, I will be cleaning up my last patch from SoC. Finally, once that's checked in and working, I will finish the end goal with that code, namely sorting out the UI lists to be what we want and looking into Pango limitations with those folks. No idea how long that will all take, but will be definitely making a good effort to get the most urgent stuff done as soon as I can. Cheers, Gail

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object properties
by Alexandre Prokoudine 15 Sep '07

15 Sep '07

Hi, I have a very tough question, so feel free to punch me for that one :) What do we actually plan to do with Object Properties palette? It looks like it wasn't touched for ages. Recently I had a talk with a newbie user and he told me that he expected seing there more properties, both "global" and "specific". In that particular case he couldn't figure out how to change amount of an already created polygon's sides and he expected to see that in Object Properties palette. Then there was another feature request to make it possible choosing what properties of selected objects can be changed. E.g. in a selection of 25 objects you can have 12 objects which should not lose either fill or stroke or opacity or any specific for this type of objects property or any combination of the above, when you change it for the whole group. And as you know ;-) Inkscape, unlike Scribus, doesn't store changes per object within a session, so you can't aply changes to a group and then undo it for individual objects. So the second part of the question is whether we can make a better use of the Object Properties palette. In addition to what there already is in that palette we could add two groups of options: 1. Global options, i.e. Fill, Stroke, Opacity, Filters. 2. Specific options, i.e. the ones from tools options toolbar. For selections with multiple objects of different types (e.g. 2 stars and 3 rectangles) specific options would be greyed out. Each option would have a checkbox to allow/forbid changes to it, with 3 positions: yes, no, fuzzy (when at least two of the selected objects have different values, gtk supports it). Am I daydreaming? :) Alexandre

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