Actually, I think the slight deviation from normal undo behaviour can be made even less intrusive depending on the number of "new-branch steps" are permitted before the original history branch is deleted.

Even limiting this to only 1-2 steps would in most cases solve the problem pointed out by Felipe while still remaining totally non-intrusive.

This also increases the chance of someone stumbling across the function but, of course shouldn't prevent us from clearly documenting it.

Finally, also including selection-actions in the undo-history (like in Blender) would also enhance it very much, although that's probably a different discussion. Example: In Inkscape, select 5-20+ single path nodes, shapes or similar and then *accidentally* click on the canvas or somewhere else in the shape and poof, all nodes are unselected. As the number of selected points increases, so does also the fear of missing the next point with the resulting in having to start the selection procedure again from the start.
Another way would of course be to allow clicks inside the shape or on the canvas without de-selecting the currently selected points. Furthermore Shift+Click on a node currently toggles its selected state. However, Shift+Drag-selection does only select nodes or shapes but does not toggle between the selection states. In my daily work, I actually do this quite a lot if I'd like to select all nodes or shapes in a particular area of the canvas, then I do a Shift+Drag selection again on a few nodes inside the first selection to exclude them from the selection before I finally perform some action on the remaining selection ( - typically moving it to a different layer below to avoid having to do the detailed selection again for the next action.) But again, this is another discussion... :)

/Jimmy Volatile

On Fri, Jun 12, 2009 at 10:00 PM, Steven M. Ottens <steven@...2586...> wrote:
Hm, that is an interesting approach. I vaguely remember a program
which did register undo steps in the history, generating a linear
history, even after pressing undo a few times and doing something
else. This way undo is another action which can be undone, even after
multiple edits once actions are undone.

This is a slight deviation from the general undo, but nothing
intrusive, besides it can easily be undone once an user makes a
mistake. So I quite like the idea, but since I'm just a mere user of
inkscape I wouldn't know if it is feasible to integrate such an option.

I guess the best approach is to check if there is already a ticket on
the history approach and add comments, or create a new one and attach
the important bits of the discussion.

Steven

On Jun 12, 2009, at 9:47 PM, JimmyVolatile wrote:

> Ok. Suggestion: Always give priority to oldests history when re-doing.
>
> If the user does 10 undos and 2 re-dos he'd be at "undo-step" 8. He
> then does some operation, say, move a shape 1 pixel. He's now at
> step 1 of a new branch of actions. He presses undo 1 or more times,
> going back to the original history branching point or even beyond.
> The newest branch is at this point deleted and if the user presses
> redo again 8+ times, he'll be back at where he started before undo-
> ing.
>
> I do not know if this is a good idea but at least it is non-
> intrusive to the user....
>
> /JimmyVolatile
>
> On Fri, Jun 12, 2009 at 9:10 PM, Felipe Sanches
> <felipe.sanches@...1646.....> wrote:
> yeah, but you could accidentaly hit a key and unintentionally
> destroy work. There is no "undo my mistaken undo-history-edit"...
>
> On Fri, Jun 12, 2009 at 3:46 PM, Steven M. Ottens
> <steven@...2586...> wrote:
> although I would love some smart multi-level tree-undo structure
> which remembers at what point in history you deviated and allows you
> to go back to the branch point and gives you the choice to either
> follow the 'new' history or the 'old' history *), I've never seen
> that in practice and everyone who uses multiple undo for a while
> knows that if you go back in history and change something, you're
> 'past future' is lost.
>
> So merely giving a warning that changing something once you went back
> in history will be beneficial for a small number of people, but
> hugely annoying for the majority. In my opinion you should either
> produce a nice multi-branch undo history (with very interesting UI-
> challenges) or leave it as it is. I am aware it is a bit harsh, but
> IMHO no-one who is doing serious design work with inkscape will be
> surprised by this behavior, because there is no multi-branch-undo in
> any (vector)drawing program.
>
> Correct me if I'm wrong.
>
> Steven
>
> *) If inkscape would have it, it would be a killer feature, I'd love
> to help to do the UI-part of it, the programming part has to be done
> by different minds though
>
> On Jun 12, 2009, at 8:28 PM, Felipe Sanches wrote:
>
> > hmmm... cool!
> > but I see an issue there...
> >
> > if you select a "past revision" and edit it, every future revision
> > (relative to it) is lost.
> > It should either branch the history or warn the user that some work
> > will be definetly lost.
> >
> > Juca
> >
> > On Fri, Jun 12, 2009 at 3:03 PM, john cliff <john.cliff@...155...>
> > wrote:
> > do you mean the undo history? its in SVN under edit>undo history...
> >
> > 2009/6/12 Felipe Sanches <felipe.sanches@...155...>:
> > >
> > >>
> > >> Some time back, someone from some university developed an undo
> > system
> > >> for Inkscape. Would that be included in the final release?
> > >
> > > Probably not. I havent seen it in our svn repository, so it wont
> > be in our
> > > release.
> > > And it can't be added now in the middle of a release process.
> > >
> > > Juca
> > >
> >
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> > --------
> > > Crystal Reports - New Free Runtime and 30 Day Trial
> > > Check out the new simplified licensing option that enables
> unlimited
> > > royalty-free distribution of the report engine for externally
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> > >
> >
> >
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> > --------
> > Crystal Reports - New Free Runtime and 30 Day Trial
> > Check out the new simplified licensing option that enables unlimited
> > royalty-free distribution of the report engine for externally facing
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> > Check out the new simplified licensing option that enables unlimited
> > royalty-free distribution of the report engine for externally facing
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> > http://p.sf.net/sfu/
> > businessobjects_______________________________________________
> > Inkscape-user mailing list
> > Inkscape-user@lists.sourceforge.net
> > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/inkscape-user
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
> Crystal Reports - New Free Runtime and 30 Day Trial
> Check out the new simplified licensing option that enables unlimited
> royalty-free distribution of the report engine for externally facing
> server and web deployment.
> http://p.sf.net/sfu/businessobjects
> _______________________________________________
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> Inkscape-user@...126...ists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/inkscape-user
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
> Crystal Reports - New Free Runtime and 30 Day Trial
> Check out the new simplified licensing option that enables unlimited
> royalty-free distribution of the report engine for externally facing
> server and web deployment.
> http://p.sf.net/sfu/businessobjects
> _______________________________________________
> Inkscape-user mailing list
> Inkscape-user@...126...ists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/inkscape-user
>
>
>
>
> --
> Mvh
>
> Jarl Arntzen » +47 97082449 » Skype: jarlarntzen
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
> Crystal Reports - New Free Runtime and 30 Day Trial
> Check out the new simplified licensing option that enables unlimited
> royalty-free distribution of the report engine for externally facing
> server and web deployment.
> http://p.sf.net/sfu/
> businessobjects_______________________________________________
> Inkscape-user mailing list
> Inkscape-user@...126...ists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/inkscape-user


------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Check out the new simplified licensing option that enables unlimited
royalty-free distribution of the report engine for externally facing
server and web deployment.
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_______________________________________________
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