Node Handles Should Snap To Node Handles

In Illustrator, when I want to butt two curves together seamlessly I make sure the abutting edges have matching nodes along their border and then select one set of overlapping nodes at a time. Two sets of handles appear; one belonging to the source node and one belonging to the target node. I just snap the target's handles to the source's handles which guarantees the curve segments align perfectly.

Handles in Xara don't snap to other handles. I see that I can type values in for each handle's position but that's far more tedious than just dragging and snapping.

Has this been an issue for anyone else? Is it worth bringing up to Xara?


Piyono

They should snap together. Make sure your "Magnet" is activated.

Enable Snap to Objects by either:

1. Clicking the orange magnet icon on the Infobar (enabled is in the down postion)
2. Right click on the page and select Snap to Objects
3. Select Snap to Objects from the Window drop down menu.

You can align the endpoints with the magnet tool, but not the bezier control points.

The bezier control points will not snap to other bezier control points, but will snap to objects and a grid.

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Originally Posted by ss-kalm

The bezier control points will not snap to other bezier control points, but will snap to objects and a grid.

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That's what I'm *saying*.
What's more, I can't find a way to drag an object by one of its nodes. I can use the Shape Editor tool to single out a node but then I have to select all the nodes on the object to move them in unison. Coming from a background in Corel and Illustrator this is *maddening*.

It looks like node editing is only just the tip of the iceberg, too. From using XX4 over the last few days I'm finding little workflow impediments that really slow me down or grind my work to a hair-pulling halt. There are good points, too, of course, but frankly, slow(er) screen redraw speed, lack of real-time gradient/bevel/shadow/contour transparency editing and large(r) file size have never kept me from working quickly and accurately in my other apps. Lack of fundamental object interaction behaviour and shape editing tools, on the other hand— those slow me down. At the end of the day I need tools that do what I need without getting in the way; I can't bill for hours I spend working around lack of basic functionality.

Xara Xtreme is promising but it's not replacing Illustrator in my tool kit any time soon.


Piyono

Interesting. I came froma similar background and had no such issues at all. Mind you, that was 10 years ago, which begs the question as to why I should have to adapt to suit what other people are used to.
You really just need to be patient enough to learn how to do things in Xara. Its just different, not any worse. e.g. If you want to move a whole object, press F2, move it, then press F4 to get back to editing. Hardly a workflow killer, assuming that you have to do something like CTRL-Drag in Corel or AI.

Piyono

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What's more, I can't find a way to drag an object by one of its nodes. I can use the Shape Editor tool to single out a node but then I have to select all the nodes on the object to move them in unison. Coming from a background in Corel and Illustrator this is *maddening*.

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Xtreme is Xtreme and Illy is Illy. They are different beasts so don't expect them to be the same. What would be the point if they were?

Re your specific question above, I can't understand what you're trying to say. If you select a single node of an object why would you expect/want the whole object to move? You either select the object and the whole object moves or you select a node/nodes and those selected node/nodes move. Perhaps you could explain your problem in a more detailed manner?

Bones and Egg:

I've been using Draw for roughly 20 years and Illy for nearly 13. Let it suffice to say that I fly in these programs. Knowing them as well as I do I am familiar with their respective strengths and weaknesses with regard to the work I do, and I will use one or the other (or sometimes both) depending on the task at hand.

I fully realize that XX has no aspirations to be either of these two applications and it clearly has a lot to offer on its own terms. I'd dabbled with it in the past but this was my first time actually trying to use it for serious vector work. I decided to give it a shot so I put a solid seven or eight hours (cumulative, over the course of a day and a half) into a few design sketches, including many trips to the help file and online video tutorial page.

The interface is pretty standard so the learning curve was quite gentle; I got the gist of it pretty quickly. What's more, I also — as I'm sure most of us 'power users' do — learned a good number of basic keyboard shortcuts and tool modifier keys.

Basically I'm trying to say that before I wrote in to vent I had a pretty good handle on what the program does well and where it falls short.

I have observed that in the areas of object interaction and manipulation, and in node editing, Xara Xtreme lags CorelDRAW and Adobe Illustrator— neither of which handles these tasks in the same manner, but either of which easily outpaces XX.

Here are a few more things I've found using XX:

• Nothing snaps to path intersections.
• No inferred tangents.
• Using the mouse, an object can be rotated only from its rotation handles, not from an arbitrary point along its curve.
• Snap points are not clearly identified (am I snapping to a curve? a node? a guideline?)
• Guidelines can't be angled.

These are things I take for granted, and I expect them to be there as much as I expect power windows in a well-appointed car. I don't care that one manufacturer puts the controls on the door and another puts them in the center console; as long as the feature is *there* I'll learn how to use it.

Anyway, before this gets out of hand I want to stress that I think XX is *excellent* software and that I've *really enjoyed* using it! There's no question that what it does well it does FAR better than Illy or Draw. I'm only picking on its flaws because I expect more from software that holds itself to such a high standard. If it wasn't any good I certainly would not have used it for long enough to nit-pick its shortcomings.

Whether or not I buy it when the trial ends remains to be seen but it certainly is worth the price of admission.


Piyono

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Originally Posted by Egg Bramhill

You either select the object and the whole object moves or you select a node/nodes and those selected node/nodes move. Perhaps you could explain your problem in a more detailed manner?

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Actually, I think I figured it out.
My problem was that I wanted to move the WHOLE object, but I wanted to drag it holding on to a particular node so that I could accurately snap it to a particular node on another object.

With the selector tool individual object nodes are not visible. I thought that meant that individual nodes are not target-able but it turns out they are— only the program doesn't indicate that you you've selected one! I just figured out that if you click a path within the snap distance of a node your mouse will automatically jump to that node when you begin to drag the object, allowing you to position it accurately.

So one issue was cleared up, but another issue is reinforced: Snap points are not clearly indicated and identified.

Workable. Annoying, but workable.

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Originally Posted by Piyono

I have observed that in the areas of object interaction and manipulation, and in node editing, Xara Xtreme lags CorelDRAW and Adobe Illustrator— neither of which handles these tasks in the same manner, but either of which easily outpaces XX.

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I haven't used CD or AI for as many years as yourself, but I do have to use it at times, to be honest I find that comment somewhat at odds with my own and many others experiences. Interesting that you find Xtreme 'lagging' in areas it is known for it's speed and ease :confused:

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Originally Posted by Piyono

• Guidelines can't be angled.

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(From Xtreme help)
Any object placed on the guides layer becomes a guide object. These can be any object type including lines at any angle, irregular shapes, and quickshapes. You can create, scale, and delete objects on the guides layer as usual, but they always appear as thin dotted red outlines; any applied line width or fill color is ignored. This information is retained, and if you later move the object from the guides layer to a normal layer, line thickness, and colors are shown again.

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Originally Posted by Piyono

• Using the mouse, an object can be rotated only from its rotation handles, not from an arbitrary point along its curve.

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The centre of rotation can be placed anywhere - just drag it to a required location

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With the selector tool individual object nodes are not visible.

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You can turn their visibility on and off from the 'show object edit handles' button in the selector tool infobar. I usually keep them on.

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the program doesn't indicate that you you've selected one!

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Works for me.

I usually do what you're talking about by selecting the path, going to the path tool and quickly scrubbing a box over the whole object. All the nodes become selected and you can drag/snap the shape by any node you choose. Peasy.

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Originally Posted by BobInce

You can turn their visibility on and off from the 'show object edit handles' button in the selector tool infobar. I usually keep them on.



Works for me.

I usually do what you're talking about by selecting the path, going to the path tool and quickly scrubbing a box over the whole object. All the nodes become selected and you can drag/snap the shape by any node you choose. Peasy.

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BobInce, I know about that button.
I must not have been clear: editing a single node is exactly what I DON'T want to do.
I want to drag the WHOLE OBJECT using my selected node as the anchor point. Anyway, the point is moot because I found out how to do it. Thanks, though.


Piyono

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Originally Posted by ss-kalm

The centre of rotation can be placed anywhere - just drag it to a required location

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I know that. I was referring to the fact that *regardless* of where the center of rotation is, the object can only be rotated by using the bent arrow handles.

Illustrator has the Rotate Tool which allows me to grab the object from *anywhere* and rotate it. The benefit being that I can select a particular point on the object and by rotating, snap this particular point to the path or point (or inferred tangent) of my choosing with great precision.

Piyono

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Originally Posted by sledger

I haven't used CD or AI for as many years as yourself, but I do have to use it at times, to be honest I find that comment somewhat at odds with my own and many others experiences. Interesting that you find Xtreme 'lagging' in areas it is known for it's speed and ease :confused:

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Illustrator is definitely more complicated than XX and surely has a steeper learning curve, the trade-off being that it offers the designer a greater degree of precision and control. Such is this designer's experience, at least.

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Originally Posted by sledger

(From Xtreme help)
Any object placed on the guides layer becomes a guide object...

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I know. It's great, and sometimes I want objects as guides. Of course, sometimes I want rotating guidelines. Guidelines are infinitely long. This can be very useful in some situations.

Piyono

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Originally Posted by Piyono

I've been using Draw for roughly 20 years and Illy for nearly 13.

I fully realize that XX has no aspirations to be either of these two applications and it clearly has a lot to offer on its own terms. I'd dabbled with it in the past but this was my first time actually trying to use it for serious vector work. I decided to give it a shot so I put a solid seven or eight hours (cumulative, over the course of a day and a half) into a few design sketches, including many trips to the help file and online video tutorial page.

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20 and 13 years experience with CD and Illy compared with 8 hours with Xtreme ? :rolleyes:

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Originally Posted by Piyono

Basically I'm trying to say that before I wrote in to vent I had a pretty good handle on what the program does well and where it falls short.

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Fair go - I'm not so sure 8 hours of usage is qualification enough to whinge about Xtreme yet.

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Originally Posted by sledger

20 and 13 years experience with CD and Illy compared with 8 hours with Xtreme ? :rolleyes:

Fair go - I'm not so sure 8 hours of usage is qualification enough to whinge about Xtreme yet.

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Touché.

To my credit, though, while I've never used Xtreme this extensively before, I have noodled with it in the past — an hour here and an hour there. In total I'd say I probably have more like 16 hours of time invested in it. :D


Again, I have a good sense of the 'feel' of the program and I think it feels great. If I didn't I wouldn't have kept trying it, and I certainly would not have spent any energy posting about my experiences in this forum.

Here's looking forward to more frustration-fueled discussion!
:)


Piyono

At this stage, I would say that is my level with current versions of Corel and AI [stopped using Corel and AI daily at v7], which is why I would always assume that I didn't know what I was doing rather than those applications couldn't do what I wanted.
Yes, Xara's snapping is not very good [sometimes I can't get it to work at all] but it just means that over the years I have not relied on it. e.g. If I want to perfectly align objects or nodes, I do it by entering precise values into the X/Y position fields, etc. Most of the time its actually easier because I don't have to zoom in close ot know that it is perfectly aligned. Other times I will just zoom in and do it visually - if looks aligned then it is aligned. Other times I wll work with grids and/or guides, it just depends what I am doing. Its trading one set of actions for another. You might be more used to one but as someone who does things lots of different ways in different situations, I can assure you no one way takes any more time or effort once you are into that mindset. It really comes down to teh user being more flexibile in how they approach a task.

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Originally Posted by BONES

Its trading one set of actions for another. You might be more used to one but as someone who does things lots of different ways in different situations, I can assure you no one way takes any more time or effort once you are into that mindset. It really comes down to teh user being more flexibile in how they approach a task.

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Oh, for sure. I'm the first to admit that I'm mired in my own set of work habits, but we both agree that Xara has a ways to go with node editing.

Piyono

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I want to drag the WHOLE OBJECT using my selected node as the anchor point.

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I know — that's exactly what I was talking about. I don't know in what way I could rephrase it better!