Cyrille, thank you for the reply and the explanations! See my comments below
On Wed, May 25, 2011 at 10:34 PM, Cyrille Artho <[email protected]> wrote: > Dear Xu, > I think this is a useful feature, but it would be best implemented as an > enhancement to an existing open source PDF viewer (such as xpdf or Okular). > LyX users are not the only ones who would sometimes like to copy parts of a > PDF (especially vector figures in a PDF). Maybe some existing free PDF apps > already have this feature? On Mac OS, "Preview" has the "crop" feature, > which extracts vector graphics correctly. > -Interesting, I didn't know that the Mac OS Preview has a crop feature that correctly extracts vector graphics. > > If implemented within LyX, the user interface for including images would > need some changes. Currently, image attributes are changed by clicking on it > and changing numeric values in the dialog box. Cropping a PDF would require > the ability to manipulate it directly, at least to a basic degree. Such > direct manipulation would then suggest also adding WYSIWYG-like controls to > the image itself, which would appear as arrows upon selection. (The arrows > would allow scaling and rotation.) > > The problem with that is that the scale on screen does not reflect the size > in print. Lyx therefore uses the WYSIWYM model for writing documents, which > does not mesh so well with simple/direct manipulation controls outlined > above. > > As a user, I think I would prefer to be able to crop a PDF from within my > PDF viewer of choice. Specifically, a good PDF viewer gives me better ways > to zoom/pan around the image, allowing a more precise selection of the > contents I want. If popular open source PDF viewers, such as Okular, do not > have that feature yet, then it would definitely be welcome there. > This is a good point. And I think you've almost convinced me that it is an operation that should be left to a graphics editor. However, I want to point out that what I am suggesting is not editing. Although a crop achieves the same thing that I would like to do, this can be done without editing, using LaTeX directly (as mentioned above with the bounding box or viewport). In this way, the operation is not a direct graphic-edit. The manipulation would not have to be WYSIWYG in terms of size, but just in terms of the ratios. And I think this is more of a WYSIWYM approach. > > What do other developers think? Would it be worth to (re-)implement this > inside LyX? > > >> The user could select a pdf, select a page, and then that page would be >> visible in LyX. The user could then draw a rectangle on that pdf page >> that would outline the part of that pdf page that he would like to >> insert into his lyx document. I think the LaTeX code is not that >> complicated. It would just use the bounding box or viewport option of >> the includegraphics command. Also, I do not think this falls under the >> category of "stop requesting that LyX includes a graphics editor" >> because it would not even need to access or edit the image, except to >> display the pdf page. >> >> Why do I think this would be a good feature? >> I see too often documents (both papers and especially beamer >> presentations) that would like to put in a table from another pdf, but >> they do so by taking a screen shot, which ends up looking quite ugly >> because its a bitmap. >> >> -- > Regards, > Cyrille Artho - http://artho.com/ > It seemed the world was divided into good and bad people. The good ones > slept > better... while the bad ones seemed to enjoy the waking hours much more. > -- Woody Allen, "Side Effects" > > -- > Regards, > Cyrille Artho - http://artho.com/ > It seemed the world was divided into good and bad people. The good ones > slept > better... while the bad ones seemed to enjoy the waking hours much more. > -- Woody Allen, "Side Effects" >
