On Tue, Apr 18, 2006 at 10:36:17PM +0100, Martin Owens wrote:
so it is a legitimate feature! we should work on this right away! it shouldn't be too hard if the base has been written right and the ability to add scripting would be a plus for sure.
Where do i sign up to help?
Right here! :-)
Perl, 92% VB, 67% C, 12%
Oh and no C++ experience. am I useless on the programming side?
As long as you're motivated to gain C++ experience you'll be fine. We've had several people who have learned C++ as they worked on Inkscape, which worked out well since you have a tangible goal to work towards, and some C++ gurus hanging around to get you pointed in the right directions.
But given your strong scripting background, I'd actually recommend a slightly different strategy that's worked really well for others:
Start by learning how to create extensions for Inkscape (it's pretty easy). Then investigate how to make extensions that'll allow animating things in SVG. This lets you focus on implementing rudimentary animation capability *now*, and put off having to learn C++ a bit. You can get some experience learning how to do animation in SVG, and produce animation functionality that others can start using ASAP.
But there's some limits to how far you'll be able to take this; you won't be able to have much UI, for example, and won't be able to directly animate stuff in inkscape itself. So, your next step would be to learn a little C++ so you can start enabling functionality inside Inkscape (c.f. DOM work). As you go, you'll get more and more confident with C++ coding in Inkscape, and can move into the core at your own pace.
As an example, you could start with an extension that implements some sort of animation effect (movement, color variation, or whatever) to a selected item. Then work on creating a perl script (using the SVG.pm module) to add that code. There's a few Perl script extensions you can use as examples.
Also, talk with ACSpike on chat for some more tips on doing this.
Welcome to the team!
Bryce