Object Alignment Dialog: Pass Keystrokes To Host, Please!

[flowheimer]

Hi, folks,

First time listener, first time caller, here.
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This is a little thing but it's also a little annoying:

When I've mis-aligned a group of objects my instinct is to hit Ctrl+Z and try again but the Object Alignment dialog doesn't appear to be passing keyboard commands back to Xara so I have to first click somewhere in the main window, undo and then re-select the Object Alignment dialog.

Not a huge deal but I've just started playing with Xara and thought I'd document quirks as I discover them, as part of my learning curve.

[OT]
Since this is my first post I'll mention that I'm a frustrated Illustrator user and have been a latent Xara fan for years. I installed a demo or two here and there but only recently tried completing a (simple) project in it to get my feet wet. It's not Illustrator (thank goodness), and I don't expect it to be, but in the last few days I've started realizing that while Illy may well be a prime contender for heart failure there are areas in which it excels. I think everyone can learn from everyone else's successes as well as failures. Steal Illustrator's good features!

*ahem*
[/OT]

fH

[gwpriester]

Welcome to TalkGraphics

I know exactly what you are talking about and it can be annoying. I just hit the Undo arrow on the Infobar.

The reason for this is the alignment is still live. If you have a group of objects that you have applied an alignment to, the group is still selected. So if you press the Tab key for example, it just moves to the next alignment option.

I appreciate your frustration with Illustrator. It is a very complex application that started life as principally menu driven, and it has taken a lot of time for it to become more interactive. Xara has been interactive, for example applying a gradient fill by dragging on the screen rather than entering numbers in a dialog.

But rather than expecting Illustrator's good features, learn to use Designer's good features. If you look at the Xara.com user's Gallery, or the Xara Xone Featured Artist galleries, you will see some pretty fantastic art created exclusively with Xara's modest set of tools. Still waters run deep, etc. there is a tremendous amount of power and logic in the tools that Xara has and once you get the rhythm and flow of the program there is no looking back.

[flowheimer]

I really have to spend more time with the program. Most of the work I do (well, used to do) for print requires file interchangeability and 95% of my printing world uses Adobe. I used to have all the time in the world and I'd play with software for weeks on end but these days, I'm either too tired or else I want to spend my energy in other ways. Still, I'm squeezing a few hours in here and there.

[gwpriester]

Yeah, I hear you. I take more naps these days than I used to.

I still do a lot of commercial print work and some magazine advertising. I export to PDF or TIFF and I have been very happy with the results.

From time to time I encounter some Neanderthal who insists on a Quark file prepared on a Mac. I respond that I am sending them a PDF file created in Windows and get over it. They always get over it and the PDF files output just fine.