Hi all,
I would be grateful for feedback on this GSoC project idea which I would like to do. It should be reasonably orthogonal to the Inkscape core so it shouldn't interfere with refactoring. I haven't contributed to Inkscape before, but I did a GSoC project last year for BBC R&D (on Dirac motion estimation/mode decision).
Name: Andrew Lewis (1st year PhD Student, University of Cambridge, UK)
Abstract:
Inkscape is an ideal tool for producing the types of diagrams present in academic papers, but various features could be added to make it ideal for tool-chains which use LaTeX [1] to typeset documents.
Authors who want to use consistent fonts in diagrams and body-text (both font family and size) must currently put `position marker' text into their documents and then replace this when their document is compiled using a tool such as psfrag [2] to re-write an EPS file. This method has some short-comings with text alignment (baseline and right alignment) and is inconvenient at design-time as documents are no longer WYSIWYG. The tool to add LaTeX equations to Inkscape documents is not ideal for adding larger elements of text as it renders to a standard vector object, discarding information about baseline position, alightment, font-size and so on.
It is also difficult for new users to understand what information will be preserved during the EPS conversion. To make this clearer I propose a pre-export check where users are informed, possibly with a preview, if the appearance of the diagram will change when it is included in a LaTeX document, and online documentation with a tutorial and FAQ about exporting for LaTeX.
This project would make Inkscape easier to use when creating diagrams for eventual inclusion in LaTeX documents by keeping information about text alignment (for example, moving the text control point on aligment) and making font scaling clearer, which might require additions to the file format. As an extension, I would like to make a file output filter for generating .tex files which can produce posters with diagrams and standard body text which aims to produce output similar to what would have been made by hand.
This project would make Inkscape an excellent alternative to tools such as xfig [3] when diagrams must look consistent with body text, make changes on exporting clearer to the user (including those not targeting academic papers but still using EPS) and produce better output for LaTeX users who make their diagrams in Inkscape.
[1] LaTeX: http://www.latex-project.org/ [2] psfrag: http://www-h.eng.cam.ac.uk/help/tpl/textprocessing/psfrag.ps [3] Xfig: http://www.xfig.org/userman/
Notes
This project would first consist of a psfrag-like feature with LaTeX placeholders, where I would fix the problems with text alignment by inclusion of right-align/baseline information in the file format. (This might involve moving the control point on text which has been aligned.) I would then try to make this render nicely when Inkscape is able to find dependencies (the feature would be unavailable if LaTeX is not installed). The aim would be to get as close to WYSIWYG editing for this as possible without going as far as a TeXmacs style editor (so focussing on plain diagram labelling and simple equations to start with).
There would be an export to EPS for inclusion in LaTeX document feature, which would do a pre-export check and notify the user of any features which would be removed (gradients, effects, opacity and so on). Time permitting I would like to work on supporting as many of these features as possible; this might include improving the PDF output filter (its output can be included in a LaTeX document compiled using pdflatex) to, for example, support gradients. I would also write documentation and a tutorial to explain how to produce diagrams for LaTeX output.
One of the main difficulties here is integrating with LaTeX on different platforms. I would first make this work on (Ubuntu) Linux, other distributions and then Windows (possibly with MikteX).
If time permits I would also like to make an output filter for Inkscape which can produce .tex files for posters including standard body text and diagrams. The aim would be to produce a file which is as close to a .tex file written by hand. This would likely overrun the length of the programme, but would be useful and make it possible for people who haven't used LaTeX before to produce high quality posters in Inkscape.
Thank you for having a look at this!
Andrew