- I think I'll demo what I need for alignment on the hackfest, then you
can give advice that is more suited to the real case (these don't work,
esp. not if you're dealing with clones or symbols). I now understand
that you're restricting this suggestion to *drawing* invisible objects
(vs. creating them, or allowing them in the document) - so that's
probably fine with most people :)

Please do. I'm sure there's a lot we can learn from eachother. :)
 
It can't ever catch all the cases, though. Layers? Groups? Too much
blur? A clip or mask? Other objects above in a different layer? There
are so many of those that cause drawing invisible objects, and Inkscape
doesn't help with determining the cause (btw. opacity at 0 is the most
frequent cause, esp. as there is a bug about the opacity indicator field
in the current stable version, after that comes 'fill alpha at 0'. 'no
stroke, no fill' is a lot rarer, in my experience).

I'm sure we can catch some or most of these. I still maintain it's an error to draw a shape with no fill and no stroke, regardless of the reason ... with the possible exception of masking or clipping. I don't see how groups would be a problem unless the group were set to 0% opacity... another thing whic is inadvisable for all the same reasons. :) Regardless, if the user hits escape twice, it exits out of any groups etc. We should make sure that at least in this condition, where nothing else is interfering, the user is able to draw visible shapes effectively without having to tweak anything to see what they are drawing. :)

 
- It might be inadvisable, but it's quick and a way that is currently
available to change the line width of a line drawing (like a simple
cartoon). I wasn't talking about gradients, and also not about shape
properties.

A better method is to enter the group, select all, and adjust the line-width there. Being able to set the stroke, but not stroke gradient, or fill but not fill gradient on a group is inconsistent behaviour and needs to be fixed one way or the other - either the group is treated like selecting all its contents, or the group needs to be treated like a separate shape. Right now its both, and is confusing and inconsistent UX.

 
I just don't expect Inkscape to add a stroke when I change the line
width - I understand that it might help new users, but it's also
illogical.

Currently, if the user adjusts the line width and there's no stroke, the value is thrown away entirely. That's absolutely apalling UX. :)
If the user is adjusting the stroke width, its not at all unreasonable to give them a line to adjust the width of. What's illogical is the current behaviour, which is instantly tossing away the value that they entered - that makes precisely no sense at all. Throwing away user entered data is not acceptable UX. :)
 
Turning one knob should only change that knob's value, not
anything else. I find /that/ confusing. It also may become quite
annoying to people who do animations and other scripting stuff, and who
might need 'none' lines with a certain width, for example... And now
don't say "They can just remove it again" :-)

There is no such thing as a "none" line with a width. Try it - Set the line to none on a shape and try to adjust the width of the stroke. Annoying isn't it? :)

 
> Yes, that's sort of where the conversation ended last time. Its one of
> my to do list items to re-think the colour fill/stroke indicators to
> include helpful things that let the user know what's going on without
> having to call up the fill/stroke dialogue.

- Sounds good!

> Please correct if wrong, but I think thats what Brynn is referring to as
> "derailing", but it isn't. It's just part of a good wholistic solution
> which we have not sorted out yet.

- Thanks for sharing your ideas!

Sure thing. Looking forward to seeing you at the hackfest. :)

-C 

 

Maren

> -C
>
>
>     Maren
>
>     > I think this is a better solution than setting the default
>     behaviour of
>     > Inkscape to a bad workflow - users should not be getting used to
>     having
>     > to change the colour of the line and stroke each and every time they
>     > draw something. It is not intuitive because when you draw in real life
>     > you pick up a pen which is the colour you want and draw with it until
>     > you are done, then choose another colour when you want a different
>     one. 
>     >
>     >
>     > -C
>     >
>     > On Thu, 30 Aug 2018, 07:59 K B, <kmb999@...155...
>     <mailto:kmb999@...155...>
>     > <mailto:kmb999@...155... <mailto:kmb999@...155...>>> wrote:
>     >
>     >     Hi, Brynn:  
>     >     Thank you for the Link about the Bug fix.  Since Inkscape is free,
>     >     maybe the creators
>     >     are not very motivated to fix everything about  it ?
>     >
>     >     If it were a high price program like Adobe Illustrator, there
>     would
>     >     have enough money to
>     >     pay programmers to fix it and make it better. 
>     >
>     >     Ken
>     >
>     >     On Wed, Aug 29, 2018 at 10:47 PM brynn <brynn@...3089...
>     <mailto:brynn@...3089...>
>     >     <mailto:brynn@...3089... <mailto:brynn@...3089...>>> wrote:
>     >
>     >         Some developers may remember a message I posted to the mailing
>     >         lists some time
>     >         ago, maybe a year or 2 ago, asking to have at least some
>     of the
>     >         tools set for
>     >         Own Style (by default) rather than Last Used, to prevent this
>     >         kind of utter
>     >         confusion among new users.
>     >
>     >         At first, on the mailing list, some developers sort of
>     hijacked
>     >         it into their
>     >         own different project.
>     >
>     >         But ultimately (in a bug report) one developer suggested a
>     >         reasonable solution.
>     >         See this bug report: 
>     >         https://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/+bug/1704777
>     >
>     >         If anyone else (developers) could chime in on that solution,
>     >         perhaps we could
>     >         get it coded into one of the next new versions, and
>     prevent this
>     >         type of
>     >         headache for new users?
>     >
>     >         Thank you very much,
>     >         brynn
>     >
>     >         -----Original Message-----
>     >         From: K B
>     >         Sent: Monday, August 27, 2018 10:30 PM
>     >         To: inkscape-user@lists.sourceforge.net
>     <mailto:inkscape-user@lists.sourceforge.net>
>     >         <mailto:inkscape-user@lists.sourceforge.net
>     <mailto:inkscape-user@lists.sourceforge.net>>
>     >         Subject: [Inkscape-user] Inkscape can be extremely frustrating
>     >
>     >
>     >         All I want to do to begin with is draw a simple Line Circle.
>     >         (white background
>     >         with white inside the circle).
>     >
>     >         But instead it draws a dashed-rectangle with (4) little
>     >         squares.  Two squares
>     >         are on the rectangle and the other two are outside.  So, I go
>     >         into: Edit,
>     >         Preferences and the Circle it not even listed under
>     Shapes!   Crazy.
>     >
>     >         Does anybody know what I should do?
>     >
>     >         Thank you.
>     >
>     >         Ken
>     >
>     >
>     >
>     >
>     >
>     >       
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