Brief replies:
On 22-4-2012 22:26, Diederik van Lierop wrote:
On 04/22/2012 06:08 PM, Johan Engelen wrote:
Apparently, I cannot stop you guys from adding this extremely fine-detailed control of snapping.
This has not been done at all, and this has nothing to do with the issues you have with the current state of the UI. Before we had a distinction between sources and targets in the snap buttons. This has been removed to make things easier, and I truly believe it's easier now. Basically, I did exactly what you' re asking: NOT adding fine-grained control!
But you are planning to (hence the future sense of the sentence).
Please do not add it anywhere in the toolbar UI, but hide it somewhere deep instead
That is exactly what I proposed a few mails ago (adding only a single button to pop-up the document properties dialog, making it discoverable while avoiding clutter), to allow power-users to achieve what they need and to allow novices to find their way around the snapping toolbar.
Choice of snap targets is interesting and should be in UI, choice of snap sources like nodes isn't.
You're basing your opinion too strongly on the node tool only, I believe.
You're basing your opinion too strongly on the selector tool only, I believe. There is no other tool that needs precise control of snap sources. Note: you would have to add *separate* node snap sourcing in the selector tool from node snap sourcing in the node tool. I think the majority of grid users want node snap sourcing in the node tool, and not in the selector tool.
In the selector tool for example you really need to be able to control what snaps to the grid, and what not. So control of snap sources is a must, also for novices. Buttons are much easier for this than options such as "snap-closest-only",
Really? For each move you do, you go to the toolbar and set the correct snap buttons?
and are in some cases even indispensable as Luca explained.
This is only relevant for the selector tool, right? How often is "some cases", and does the tab cycling solve it easily, or is that too cumbersome?
I would feel the same about the node tool, because in general I don't want to snap smooth nodes to anything. But it should be possible for power-users.
If snapping is on. And you have only one single thing that could possibly snap. The most logical thing to do is snap it. Full stop. If you don't want it to snap, press shift. (sorry for being repetitive)
(other examples of toggles ready for removal: grid and guides snapping toggles. shift+3, shift+| work fine for disabling the showing/snapping of grids/guides. yes you won't be able to see them but... come on....
What would removing those toggles bring us? Only more space on the snap toolbar? They're not confusing, they're all at the bottom, and on top of that the window size is still limited by the tools toolbar.
Yes more space and less clutter. They are not confusing, they just have very little use. What would adding those toggles bring us?
Perpendicular and tangential snap toggles would be a much better of that space)
I've thought about that too, but these options currently still depend on the snapping to paths. Therefore, they should be greyed out when snapping to paths is disabled, but this would add another sub-group to the snap toolbar. So it requires a bit more work than just dropping the buttons there.
The graying-out for the snap buttons is not necessary and is arguably annoying for quickly setting snap preferences. If at all we want this, it should have the lowest priority and can be added at very late stage; no need to worry about that now.
Can I go ahead and restore node tool snap behavior?
Regards, Johan