A few questions

[Warren Nagourney]

--On Tuesday, February 5, 2002 2:58 PM +1100 Timothy Bates 
<tim at maccs.mq.edu.au> wrote:

> <warren at dirac.phys.washington.edu>
>
>> I am using OmniGraffle to replace Ashlar Vellum
> Vellum is way high end. I am not sure that graffle is in that race?
>

Agreed. I was using a very old copy of Vellum (2.7) which is one of the 
best programs which fits completely on a 3.5" floppy that I have ever seen.



> In graffle, you change the default by clicking on a tool bar button and
> then using the Info pane to set the button object to be the one you want
> by default (remove shadow in your case).
>

Thanks. Actually, I wanted to set the default of items on palettes, which I 
just discovered is done by editing the palette, setting the option, and 
saving the palette.


>
> You cut one object out of another in DreamWeaver as well, but graffle does
> not have drawing tools for such actions. This is good in that it is easy
> to use because you just drop templates on the stage, but still limiting
> (bar the custom shapes directive others have noted). I am not sure that
> this is the right app for drawing laboratory diagrams though? Unless you
> make up a "laboratory objects" pallete? And release that to the community?

I am planning to do just that -  make up a palette of things like lenses, 
mirrors, etc. and would be glad to release it to the community.

I am also looking at Conceptdraw - it does much of what I want, but the 
"feel" of the program is a little too windoze-like for my tastes. It is 
definitely less "fun" to use.



>> The "rotate" tool is very fast and nice, but is there any way to set the
>> pivot point?
> Not that I have seen: again DreamWeaver yes, but 5 times the price.
> You can of course simulate this by rotating to your desired angle, then
> translating to your desired location. Two steps in know, but again, keeps
> life simple for users who are doing diagramming rather than illustrator
> layouts.

I think that Conceptdraw might have some flexibility in the pivot point - I 
have the demo, but the online docs are very incomplete. I agree that one 
can use two steps, but unfortunately, the magnets are not active during the 
translate stage, so one might have some trouble in positioning the rotated 
object.

Thanks for the help.

Warren Nagourney


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Warren Nagourney   <warren at dirac.phys.washington.edu>  Voice: 206-543-9585
University of Washington                                      206-543-0143
Physics Dept., Box 351560, Seattle, WA 98195             Fax: 206-685-0635