Between Dia and InkScape, Dia is certainly the more convenient for manufacturing flow charts. Dia seems to have come a long way, and is relatively stable as far as I can tell. It never lags or causes slowdown, either, unlike InkScape sometimes. However, I feel there are some features missing that should really be implemented.
Since Dia seems centered around the idea of flow charts, I think it would be frugal for it to make beautifying them a little more convenient. I'm talking of setting relationships between certain objects in the editor. Dia already has a fair amount of that, but it seems lacking at times. For instance, say I create two bubbles, side by side horizontally, and link them with an arrow. If I drag from one center point to the other, it will look great however I position it, because Dia is just nice like that. But for now, I leave them horizontal, and I add label text. The label text looks hideous. I'm not blaming anyone for that; it just does. But, no harm done; I double click and manipulate a few settings. This is a pain, but it looks at least centered and in the right place when I'm done. But then I drag the right bubble under the left, and it's hideous as ever as the line bisects my label. Dia is still young; I figure it's likely that there are plans to do something about all this. My personal suggestion is to take something from InkScape and allow mouseover to highlight objects. Then implement some mousewheel tricks to increase padding. Give text a bounding box that the object to which it is connected cannot cross (Only for edges, of course, or it will be a bad day for text centered in an object). ANd speaking of, I personally suggest that text be centered when placed in the center of an object, and aligned in the opposite direction of that by which it is bound to an object. For instance, if I connect it to the bottom-left corner of a circle initially, the align point should be on the top left of the text box. That would alleviate a number of ugliness problems. That's a lot of work as it is, but I've one more suggestion after that. Dia implements a tool you call "Zigzagline." That line has no bind points on it. This makes me sad. I was thinking one at each fold and each midpoint between folds would be really nice... Anyway. I've not gone without noticing all the features like those that are already implemented. I mentioned how nicely Dia handles arrows when placed at center points of objects; how it automatically uses an imaginary point nearest the object on the opposite side of the line. That's brilliant. I notice that dragging an orange handle on Zigzag lines makes them permanent and preserves their form. Very useful. It's those little things that make projects like this infinitely more usable. Because honestly, if I had to configure all that directional crap in that properties dialog, I would tear my hair out. And I imagine your developers have felt the same way implementing the mechanism that chooses directions now. So. Best of luck with your project; just thought I'd give my thoughts. Kudos on your current progress. -Josh _______________________________________________ dia-list mailing list [email protected] http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/dia-list FAQ at http://live.gnome.org/Dia/Faq Main page at http://live.gnome.org/Dia
