How about Live Vector Plugins

**JokeArtist** · 10 June 2009, 05:55 PM

When live plugins were announced some time ago I thought it might be vector ... is there any way that xara can do the same thing they did for bitmaps with vectors ... i think illustrator has it.

Any possibility and then vector users will moan less because we'll have 3 parties developing or even try and have illsutrator vector plugin compatibility that would be sweet as!

**Odat** · 10 June 2009, 06:08 PM

Sounds like an interesting idea. Do you have any examples of what these plugins could do? I've never used AI, just Xara and a really old version of CorelDraw.

**Improv** · 10 June 2009, 06:18 PM

Originally Posted by JokeArtist

When live plugins were announced some time ago I thought it might be vector ... is there any way that xara can do the same thing they did for bitmaps with vectors ... i think illustrator has it.

Any possibility and then vector users will moan less because we'll have 3 parties developing or even try and have illsutrator vector plugin compatibility that would be sweet as!

I just googled Photoshop plugins vector and got this:

http://www.google.ca/search?client=f...=Google+Search

It seems that there are already vector plugins for photoshop, which as we know can usually work in XXtreme. I haven't had time to look at any of them yet though...

**covoxer** · 10 June 2009, 06:55 PM

Yes, Illustrator has a PostScript plug-ins support.
They are vector plug-ins because, unlike Photoshop plug-ins, they operate with vector data.

Implementing support of Illustrator plug-ins in Xtreme is hard and the result would be much restricted. Those plug-ins work with PostScrip data. So to use them, we have to convert Xtreme graphics to PostScript, feed it to plug-in and then convert the result back from PostScript to Xtreme internal format.
As you know, such conversion is limited to the common features of PostScript and XAR. So, converting to PS, we'll lost all effects not available in PS (they will be rasterized), and then the resulting PS may contain features not supported by our converter. As of today, only Adobe has full implementation of the PS, so it doesn't look realistic that we could create PS to XAR converter that supports all PS features.
Even at limited level, it would require tremendous amount of work.
It was much easier with Photoshop plug-ins since they work with plain, uncompressed bitmap data. There's no simpler graphic format than this to implement.

Creating our own vector plug-ins interface is possible. But with current market position, it is very unlikely that it would gain any 3rd party developers support. We already have a raster plug-in interface published, but as far as I know, no 3rd party raster plug-ins for Xtreme exist.

**PixelDust** · 10 June 2009, 10:20 PM

Originally Posted by Odat

Sounds like an interesting idea. Do you have any examples of what these plugins could do? I've never used AI, just Xara and a really old version of CorelDraw.

Here are a couple I've run across - I've never tried them, though:

Path Styler Pro - makes beveled shapes - both Photoshop and Illustrator

KPT Vector Effects (now discontinued) - Here's a link to an old review.

Artlandia SymmetryWorks - Makes seamless vector patterns. (This would be a great feature to have natively in Xara Xtreme

)

**steve.ledger** · 10 June 2009, 10:29 PM

Originally Posted by PixelDust

Artlandia SymmetryWorks - Makes seamless vector patterns. (This would be a great feature to have natively in Xara Xtreme

)

Yes very nice, but did you see the price!!!

**PixelDust** · 10 June 2009, 10:35 PM

Originally Posted by sledger

Yes very nice, but did you see the price!!!

Yep, I did!

It's nice, but not that nice!

Heck, I'd be happy to just be able to make vector patterns in Xara in addition to the bitmap ones. Time to visit the "Dear Xara" forum...

**Ross Macintosh** · 10 June 2009, 11:20 PM

Without thinking about it much I'm thinking it might be useful to have a vector hatch plugin that could create vector-based fill patterns -- even things as simple as a parametric parallel line hatch where the spacing, angle etc could be specified. Besides parallel there could be various crosshatches, stipples etc. (This kind of basic vector hatch capability has been in autocad back since the dos days).

Another interesting vector plugin might be a spiral generator or a vector fractal generator...

**HayTay** · 10 June 2009, 11:30 PM

Originally Posted by Ross Macintosh

Another interesting vector plugin might be a spiral generator...

Great minds think alike! Please chime in over in Eric's (bcire68) Vector Spirals thread, Ross. Anyone else with some constructive Spiral thoughts are also encouraged to take a look and comment.

Thanks,
Harry

**Odat** · 10 June 2009, 11:49 PM

Those are some good examples. I was thinking the idea was generally centered around something like the existing LE tool, but which would create vector results instead of a bitmap one. Something that didn't occur to me earlier was a plugin that could create one of those Contone Dot Imagey Things (sorry to get all technical on you there).

Also various vector fills would be neat idea indeed.

I like the spiral idea, too. Create a shape apply the plugin, and get a spiral that spirals from the center of the shape to it's bounding box using a given number of "loop". Resize the shape, automatically recalculate the spiral? cool!