GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 163902
Add more tool objects, like "Insert Table"
Last modified: 2019-03-20 11:16:41 UTC
I suggest to add following basic objects (to line, circle, rectangle...) - box with text (extra properies: text font and aligment, corner radius) - simple table (extra properties: cells, rows, in each of them user can enter text) - MultiZigzagline (extra: number of control poins - user can define several points, not just one, to control how line will go around other objects creating more complicated zig-zag)
Patches are always welcome. If you are just making a request then it may be a long time before a developer decides to add the feature. > box with text There are plans to overhaul the text interface, and the new widgets are likely to behave differently. > simple tables I'd be interested to know more about how you might expect these to behave and if possible provide examples (links, screenshots, descriptions) of how this is done in other applications. > MultiZigzagline I hope you realize that by right clicking (if the menubar is on) or middle clicking on a ZigZagLine you can add more segments to it.
About tables - it would work same as Table in OpenOffice for example, except 1) in first version it would be simple, only number of rows and number of columns - regular grid table (no joined or splited cells). Later join/split, setting borders, different fonts etc, can be added. 2) it would ofcourse be an normal object - with can be dragged anywhere into diagram. About the ZigZagLine... the middle click works, but is is not obvious, perhaps inform about it. In example XFig has it done nicely - a visible bar "what to do now, like: Mouse buttons: L-OK M-add segment R-cancel". For beginer meany futures are quite "hidden", perhaps additional access to them (like in main menu) and adding "tip of the day" would be useful
In OpenOffice Draw the inserted Table I found was a full blown spreadsheet, which could be quite a difficult thing to Add to Dia. It might possible to do a simpler table of some kind though. (I deliberately make the comparision to OpenOffice.org Draw rather than OpenOffice.org Writer because it is more likely that Dia would have to add a table as a complex embedded object). As this seems to be the main feature you want I've adjusted the summary to include "Insert Table". I agree with you that Middle click is not obvious, it is not something I've ever liked about Dia adn I would go so far as to say it is a broken design (my laptop only had two buttons). If you enable the menubar, right click is used instead of middle click which I find better but still less than ideal. Ideally I'd like to see a context toolbar like Inkscape to help bring more information forward to the users. Something like adding nodes to the line on shift+click or ctrl+click might be useful but it would still be difficult to discover. The bar you describe in Xfig is essentially just a status bar positioned at the top of the screen rather than at the bottom. More detailed status bar messages would probably be a good idea and patches are certainly welcome. I've nothing against "Tip of the Day" if the tips are actually useful but some people find it clunky and obtrusive. It is usually better to improve the features so that tips are less necessary or to try and provide context sensitive help (press F1 and get taken to the relevant page of the manual not just the start) but if someone came up with a standard GTK "tip of the day" widget or provided the necessary to add this functionality I'm sure we'd make use of it but I wouldn't count on the developers rushing to add it. Hope that helps. (Patches are always welcome)
Moving to New.
I agree with Alan that patches are welcome. I have been wanting a simple table-like object too, but not really looked for more than a single row of boxes with texts. Very useful in describing data structure layout, stack layout, heap layout, that kind of stuff. It mainly requires the LIST_PROP type to be finished.
In bug #534118 I've got a request for a much simpler version of this (just a grid, no internal support for contents). Just wanted to mention it here so that it'd be linked up.
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