Dashed Lines limitations

[gwpriester]

How hard can it be to A) Offer more dashed line options, or better still, B) User-defined dashed line creation?

At line sizes like 1px it is very hard to tell the difference.

[Acorn]

How hard can it be to A) Offer more dashed line options, or better still, B) User-defined dashed line creation? At line sizes like 1px it is very hard to tell the difference.

We already have Option B) - Scatter Brushes.

What we do not have is Dot patterns.

Acorn

[gwpriester]

Unless I am missing something, Scatter Brush has limitations. I am not asking for a work-around, I've used Xara for enough years to know how to accomplish what I need. I am asking for a vector dashed line option that has more options that works out of the box.

[Acorn]

I wouldn't have called Scatter Brushes a workaround. You can tweak the pitch of the line and you can alter the Line width.
With a Scatter Brush and a fairly simple pattern, you can then change the Line to Shapes and Ungroup to gain a vector solution.

I find that there may be a workaround:

• Set Scale Line Width off.
• Resize the shape until you hit symmetry.
• Set Scale Line width on.
• Restore the Shape to its original size.
• Change the Line width to its original size.

Xara's built-in Dashed Lines, however, do not product vector objects - they force your shape to be rendered as a Bitmap.
Native CSS properties don't support the customization of border-style and this is only applied to regular (box) shapes. There is a trick with an SVG image inside background-image property.
Irregular shapes that are SVG can have vector strokes applied.

Acorn

[Egg Bramhill]

Further when you create scatter brushes you can name shapes. So if you create a brush using coloured rectangles mixed with non filled rectangles you can individually select the rectangle that are colour filled and give them a name 'Filled' or 'My-filled' for example. Give the rectangles a name 'non-filled' for example. nb I'm not talking named colours here but names via the little luggage label icon ;-)

You can then create a brush giving whatever dash pattern you wish by using filled shapes then non filled shapes to add the gaps, then use it on a shape like your star, adjust spacing, I like to use 99% so there's an overlap, then you can Convert Line to Shape - Ungroup - Use the name gallery to select all the shapes named 'non-filled' and delete them. Now select all shapes named 'My-filled' and Arrange / Combine Shapes / Add Shapes (Ctrl + 1) which gives you a simple vector shape with a dash pattern.

[Acorn]

@Egg, thank you.
For demo purposes, if you add 0px Line width to the Named Sapes, you can see the relationship from the Bitmap to the pattern.

I follow everything you've done but I am having issues with the render.
If I change the browser width or its zoom, the page disappears off left.

Playing with the Scroll Vertical transition makes no difference.
I've not found why it slides in from the left either.
The page size is A0.

Is it me, you or the latest update?

Acorn

[handrawn]

neat egg - but the minute brushes were mentioned in this context i could see a problem and you have demostrated it here:



xara brushes and [acute] corners can be problematic - the line gallery dashes don't do this

plus changing brushes for different sized shapes can be time consuming, although very flexible if you can avoid the corner issue - but you could build up a library over time...

[Egg Bramhill]

@ Acorn: I never intended the attached xar to be viewed in a browser.Why it slides in from the left is unknown to me. I use an A0 as my default template.

@ HD: Thanks, I'm aware of issues re sharp bends but on the other hand it's quite simple to redraw them once converted to vector shapes:

[handrawn]

aye it is

it would be even simpler though to have dashed lines in the first place, ideally that you could define by simply entering the variables numerically; brushes remain more work than it should take, especially if you have a lot of them to do

gary called it a work-around, a point of view i can sympathise empathise with, although if you use brushes a lot it's just one more job they can do of course

[Acorn]

I was going to suggest switching to an Art Brush and set Repeat along stroke.
This avoids any Mitre effects.

Sadly, the resultant will be a Bitmap.

The sad bit is Plus v24.3 now errors with 'Internal program error 6846.k.pp.sh' on opening Document Brushes and other actions thereafter.
I don't think Xara tightened up this release as there seem to be a lot of jangly bits interfering with smooth operation.

UPDATE:
Internal program error 6846.k.pp.sh is arising as I created a Brush called 'DashDot' and then deleted it and the design it was on. I even closed the program.
The name remained with no brush and so Xara keeps hitting the buffers over it.
I had to select the name and delete it again. Error has gone away.
UPDATED UPDATE:
The brush name has reappeared again and is seriously screwing with my day.

Acorn