Can I say how much I hate.. ?

[MarkMyWords]

What about this; no dialogue box, but one (not nine) icons on the selector options bar.

It would be similar to or the same as the 'Select origin' icon on the selector bar.

The sequence would be;

1/ You would select your objects.

2/ Then click on the icon to choose which parts of the selected objects will be aligned (top edges, bottom edges, top and centre, Bottom and centre etc. or one of the corners)

3/ Then click anywhere on the screen or on an object in the selection, this last click is where everything will be aligned to.


If you click off (just outside) an edge of the document, the parts of the objects chosen will be aligned to that edge of the document.


The centre selection of the main icon can be selected at the same time as an edge (top and centre, left and centre etc.) or when selected alone would align centres both vertically and horizontally.


Perhaps the centre selector can toggle between aligning vertical, horizontal or both centres or maybe it would be simpler to have separate icons for aligning vertical and horizontal centres?



For distribution;

1/ Select objects.

2/ Click distribution extents on the main icon (left and right edges, top and bottom edges or top left and bottom left corners etc. or even opposite corners).

3/ Click in the document or in the selection for distribution to document or selection extents.

This might work, you would only choose opposite edges or corners for distribution, not alignment, so the same icon could work for both alignment and distribution.



Would adding a spacing profile (like the one in the blend tool) to this function be going to far?

[MarkMyWords]

oops!

[MarkMyWords]

Does this make any more sense?


Damn! The last alignment in this file should be right edges and middle, DOH!

[pauland]

Hmm.. it's losing something of the simplicity and the single click (after selection) that I suggested.

[joroho]

Personally, I have no problems with the alignment box. My only suggestion for improvement would be to have something on it that reminds us which function clicking performs vs. shift-clicking and ctl-clicking.
.joroho.

[MarkMyWords]

Hmm.. it's losing something of the simplicity and the single click (after selection) that I suggested.

Well, when you think about it you have missed out a step/option in your suggestion Paul; whether to make the alignment/distribution within the selection, the document or the spread.

Granted you won't need to change this everytime, but you will still need to have the option.

I've given this some thought, nine icons and the three above options will be both messy and a tight fit in the space on the selector options bar, so you may well need another step of opening the dialogue/drop-down with these icons/options.

There is plenty of room to have the icon I'm proposing, and a spacing profile icon to boot, on the selector options bar permenantly.

I'm also proposing a system with a little more functionality (not just the spacing profile) for, pretty much, the same number of steps.

Say with the nine icon system you want all the objects to align to the left, everything will default to; the left edge of the page or the left edge of the selection, depending on which option you choose.

With the way I'm proposing, the left edges of your objects can be aligned to any point within the document that you click; the edge, inside a border, an object/group not in your selection, three-quarters of the way across the spread, whatever.

The last click will align and position the group, no need to align to one edge and then drag the group to the place you really want it.


Also if you click within the selection all the other objects will align their left edges to the left edge of the object you choose not the default left-most object.


And you will be able to distribute diagonally from corner to corner, not sure how much use that would be, but it's an option LOL!


I'm just kicking around ideas here.

Personally, I have no problems with the alignment box. My only suggestion for improvement would be to have something on it that reminds us which function clicking performs vs. shift-clicking and ctl-clicking.
.joroho.

You still need the drop-downs for distribution and what I'm proposing will have all the options in the selector bar by default - no need to open any dialogue.

[brianlj]

With the way I'm proposing, the left edges of your objects can be aligned to any point within the document that you click; the edge, inside a border, an object/group not in your selection, three-quarters of the way across the spread, whatever.

With my proposal the last click will align and position the group.

Yep. You're describing exactly the way that 'my' fly-out tool already works.

What makes me (albeit only slightly) irritated is that this tool isn't even part of a dedicated graphics package -- it's in that part of a database program which allows you to design data-input forms!

[PhilM]

This is an interesting discussion, folks!

Let me give you my perspective from inside the Xtreme dev team...

To summarise the discussion about alignment options so far:
* Pauland suggests shortcut buttons for the alignment options in a dockable panel (but I guess buttons on a normal button bar would be acceptable?)
* Amoore suggests a new feature: the ability to align to a specified object
* BrianLJ suggests shortcut buttons similar to Pauland but that they should be on something like a dropdown menu. He also suggests the new feature of aligning to an arbitrary point on the page. He further points out it should be called the "align/distribute dialog" - good point!
* MarkMyWords suggests another variation on shortcut buttons and again adds the new feature of aligning to arbitrary objects/positions. MarkMyWords also suggests another new feature: distribution using a profile curve.


The alignment dialog is a bit clunky but it does condense a lot of actions into a fairly simple dialog. Technically speaking, it lets you choose one of 189 different actions. If the suggested new features were added then the number of possible actions would be much greater but the dialog would still be able to present them concisely - so it has its uses.

However, in everyday use, there are some common alignment actions that we could provide shortcut buttons for while retaining the alignment dialog to cope with the less common cases and to satisfy those who like it or have got used to it.

The method of presenting the buttons is debatable but a simple set of buttons on a normal buttonbar would be simplest.

Align to point or object:
All the variations of this suggested new feature use a click on an alignment button and a subsequent click to indicate the anchor point/object but one of our UI guidelines is that we don't do "button-up-drags" where the next mouse click means something different than a normal mouse click. (That's one small facet of what makes Xtreme so intuitive to use.)

So we would have to find another way to designate which objects to move and which to anchor. The best way I can see to do that would be to have an "Align to this" submenu on the popup menu which would align the selection to the object you right-clicked on. The same submenu would be on the guidelines popup menu.

Distribution using a profile curve:
To do this properly, we'd have to allow for the objects to move on the drawing interactively as the profile curve is edited - in both X and Y. Makes it a bit more challenging!

Please don't construe any of this message to mean that Xara will or won't implement any of these ideas. But we are listening to everyone's suggestions and thinking about them.

Phil