Hi,
Those two signals are different. Changed is emitted when the referee changes and reference starts pointing to a different object. The special case is when
referee is destroyed. Modified signal is emitted when referee attributes or child elements change. I'll add a comment.
SPItem needs to know when SPPattern references in it's style change, so as to call adequate SPPattern::show and SPPattern::hide methods. It is not
possible to use SPItem::modified method, because it is not called immedately, but by an idle handler.
Today and yesterday I have worked on solving bugs related to SPPattern refactoring. I've learned how to read valgrind output. The mentioned changes are
result of this bughunt.
Hatch tag support has been added to inkscape. I'm working on hatchPaths and rendering.
Tomasz