Hi Friends,
I'm just having my 1st look at the new version 0.47.
First I want to say thanks to all the developers. And especially I think Diederik/Dvlierop had a lot to do with improving the snapping capabilities and interface. I know it's been available in the "wip" version (dev versions) for a long time, but this is my 1st look at it. It's infinitely more user friendly, imho, which I think will especially be helpful for novice users. And I love being able to snap node handles So, many, many happy thanks!

The 1st thing I noticed when I opened the new version, was some new tool icons that are simply represented by a little arrowhead button, which produces a tiny menu with the tools whose icons won't fit. In Inkscape Prefs, I found options for making the icons Larger, Small or Smaller, and they appear to be Small. But I'm unable to change the sizes -- not on the main toolbox, the 1st or 2nd tool controls bars -- either larger or smaller. I wouldn't worry if I couldn't make them larger, but it seems reasonable that I should be able to make them smaller.

My best guess is that there is some sort of incompatibility with my 800 x 600 screen resolution. I remember learning, back when 0.46 came out, that mine is an unusual screen res among graphic designers and artists. Well, I'm neither, and haven't had any opportunity to change my screen res, as I need it to help compensate for some visual issues. (My 1st cataract surgery is scheduled for January, though, so this may all become moot within the next 6 months.) Anyway, I just wanted to mention the issue, to make sure it's known, and to ask if there is any way to get all the tools showing in the Inkscape window, without changing my screen res.

And also related to my screen resolution, the addition of the snapping toolbar to the Inkscape window has reduced my precious little workspace. And to be clear, this is not a complaint by any means, just an observation! Because it still represents a reduction in workspace, at any resolution . So I wonder if something like the following might be worth adding to the wishlist at Launchpad?

Would it be possible to put the new snapping toolbar behind a little arrowhead button, like how my toolbar currently looks? In such an arrangement the new tool control bar could be eliminated, and a little arrowhead or snap button would be located on the original tool control bar, and open the menu of snapping options. I guess I would prefer the menu to show the little icons, rather than text. But maybe that's not possible, maybe that's why the new toolbar was created? Anyway, I thought it wouldn't hurt to ask.

And along the same thought, I wonder this -- if it turns out that the littlel arrowhead buttom can't be eliminated for me, would it be possible to have the tool icons on the little menu, rather than the text?

Thanks as always for the best Inkscape support on the internet!

Hi Brynn!
I like to have the most screen size too so I turn off most of the toolbars and menubars from the view dropdown menu. In addition you can turn off rulers and scrollbars for even more room; if you need either of these, (rulers are necessary to pull out guides!) there are KB shortcuts to display and hide them.
The info bar at the bottom is too informational to lose for me, but you might want toturn that off, too, and the palette can be turned off.

and finally, the entire toolbox can be turned off and all the tools accessed through one letter key shortcuts! pretty cool except for the star tool which requires shift +8 (*) and the eraser which requires shift +e (the'c' shortcut given in the docs is already in use for the calli tool) they are all very easy to remember - try it it will speed up your workflow.

Thanks druban.
Sorry it took me so long to reply (I get spacey sometimes )

So, is the ability to hide all these various bars, boxes and menus new to 0.47? Or has it been there before and I just never noticed?

Anyway, thanks for your help. I will see what I can do to hide some stuff.
All best

Hi again,
I just wanted to mention the part of my original message about being unable to change the toolbox icon size, since no one has replied to that part. Can everyone else change the icon size? Is it reasonable to assume it's incompatibility with the 800 x 600 screen resolution that I use? Or is it a problem with 0.47?

Thanks again

hi brynn
if you open 'inkscape preferences' and under 'interface' where you havethe dropdown menus for tool icon size you have the size options 'small' and 'smaller' in addition to normal .i have 'small' selected and they are tiny but quite visible i can't believe that you would actually need 'smaller' and definitely not anything even smaller than that!
....Ooops i see where in yr original post it says this doesn't work for you.
Did you try changing the text file where inkscape saves its prefs?

Did you try changing the text file where inkscape saves its prefs?

Changing it in what way?
Changing Small to Smaller?
I'll try to find it, brb.

edit-
Ok, I found this file (Windows XP Home xp3)
C:\Documents and Settings\Owner\Application Data\Inkscape\preferences.xml
But it's not readily apparent how to edit, or exactly what should be edited.

So I guess I'm in need of a hint for finding and changing the proper file.
Thanks again.

Well Brynn since no one else is volunteering I'll try but I am not a proficient xml editor, you should know.

But it's not readily apparent how to edit, or exactly what should be edited.

I think this summarizes the xml editing process succinctly!


In your preferences.xml file you will find this block

</group>
<group
id="toolbox"
icononly="1"
secondary="1"
small="1">
<group
id="tools"
icononly="1"
small="1" />
</group>

Only yours will naturally have different values. Before making any changes make sure you save a copy of the original prefs file somewhere safe so if things go pearshaped you can restore present conditions.Then see where you have zeros and change them to ones as in my example. open inkscape and see what you have wrought

Good luck.

Thanks druban, I'll give it a try shortly.
But 1st I want to understand what I'm doing.
Ok, I've found that "passage" in my file, but it looks pretty much the same as yours:

<group id="toolbox" icononly="1" secondary="1" small="1">
<group id="tools" icononly="1" small="1" />
</group>

There are no zeros, as you can see. So I'm not sure what to do.
Somehow my reasoning would suggest changing "small" to "smaller", but I really have no idea what is needed, as I have a very, very limited understanding of XML.

I've just tried an experiment. Thinking that all the other changes I've made with Inkscape Prefs have taken effect immediately, without closing and reopening the program, I assumed changes I made should affect the preferences.xml file, also without closing and reopening. But changing the icon size from Small to anything else did not affect the preferences.xml file, which I thought was part of the problem.

But this time, I changed the Toolbox icon size from Small to Smaller (in Inks Prefs), then closed Inkscape and reopened. Then when I looked at the preferences.xml file, I see this:

<group id="toolbox" icononly="1" secondary="1" small="1">
<group id="tools" icononly="1" small="2" />
</group>

Following the same procedure, I changed the Control bar icon size from Small to Large, and got this in the preferences.xml file:

<group id="toolbox" icononly="1" secondary="1" small="0">
<group id="tools" icononly="1" small="2" />
</group>

But changing the Secondary toolbar icon size from Small to Smaller results in this:

<group id="toolbox" icononly="1" secondary="2" small="0">
<group id="tools" icononly="1" small="2" />
</group>

I think this points to a very confusing lack of consistency in the naming of the features we are discussing -- tools, toolbox, control bar, secondary toolbar, blah. Although it could be my lack of experience with XML that's the root of my confusion.

Anyway, the results in my Inkscape window are this:
The 2 control bars (I have the new snap control bar hidden currently) that run along the top of the canvas did get bigger, BUT only after closing and reopening Inkscape (while every other setting I've changed with Inkscape Prefs takes effect immediately, except where a footnote indicates a restart is necessary). But nothing got smaller.

Still unsure what exactly the secondary toolbar is, and wondering if the problem could be that icons can be made Large or Small, but not Smaller, I set the Secondary toolbar icon size to Large. The value in the preferences.xml file changed to "0". But nothing got larger in the Inkscape window. Maybe the new snap control bar IS the secondary toolbar? So either there is an even larger problem with consistency in naming of features, or there is a separate problem with the secondary toolbar icon size.

So to summarize, I can make icons either Large or Small, but not Smaller. And now that I have so much more info about this problem, I'm beginning to doubt that the problem could be with my 800 x 600 screen resolution. Because I would think making things bigger should cause more of a problem than making things smaller.

I have still yet to try editing the preferences.xml file. But since it seems that I can edit it with the Inkscape Preferences dialog, I'm not holding out much hope that editing it elsewhere will work. ......unless.....I don't know, maybe a restart of the computer might be needed to make the change in icon size take effect????? But if you still think it might be worth a try, should I use Notepad to edit? Or otherwhise, how should I edit?

Sorry this message became so long, but I think the info is important. And again, thank you very much for your help

Hi Brynn. i set my Inkscape prefs to smaller and the xml file showed the parameters changing from 1to 2 but the icons didnot change. I think this means that the smallest icons were not made and loaded whenthe installer was compiled but that the functionality is there for the future. for now i guess there's only 2 sizes to choose from sorry

<group
id="toolbox"
icononly="1"
secondary="2"
small="2">
<group2
id="tools"
icononly="1"
small="2" />
</group>

One more crazy idea for you to try: go to your display control panel, appearance tab, advanced button, from the drop down menu choose active title and start making the bar narrower. This affects the windows taskbar and icons as well as the window title. make it real small (just temporarily) then open Inkscape (your toolbar is still set to small, right?) and see if the icons have scaled at all....

Well, I can't say I understand why settings would be made for smaller icons, without the smaller icons actually being made. But I guess it doesn't surprise me; it seems the open source process can be warped sometimes . That's not a complaint, just an observation from a poorly informed user

That IS a good idea about changing some display settings, because I would not be surprised at all if some of them are affecting the size of some of the bars, menus, and possibly icons in the Inkscape window. However, I need the display options to stay where they are (as I mentioned earlier, to make it easier for me to see things through the cataracts). And based on my experience with those display settings, I'd rather not have to change them just when I'm using Inkscape, and then change them back when finished. They can be confusing, plus there are so very, very many of them (for example, changing the titlebar size alone would be fairly simple, but the text font and size are separate settings, and also must be adjusted). Also, I wouldn't be able to guess which ones affect Inkscape, and would have to test every single one, to get the bars and icons smaller. It would just not be worth the trouble.

And my goal in posting this topic was only partly to get the Inkscape window optimized for my use. I also thought there might be a bug with the "smaller" icon size. But if there are not "smaller" sized icons in the first place, then there certainly isn't a bug

One more quick question -- do you know if it's possible to change the order of the toolbox icons? If it's possible, I'm thinking I could move the 2 I use the least to the bottom, where they would be hidden behind the little arrowhead. I've never heard of such an option, but can't hurt to ask

Anyway, thanks for all your help druban, I really appreciate it

Hi guys. Just before this topic gets forgotten I'd like to point out that I use 1024 x 768 as screen res and also have trouble using the tools options. For example when I use calligraphic tool, there's an option called "mass" that I see on my office's 1280 x 1024 screen but i can't see at home's 1024 x 768.

The sliding controls look cool but they're quite wide, too. Any way to reduce them? changing icons to "smaller" didn't help.

So, to summarize - what's the minimum screen res to be sure to be able to reach every one of Inkscape's user interface elements?
And, for guys like me who cannot use those screen res but are stuck to 1024x768 or 800x600, is there any way to set those values (e.g. "mass" in calligraphic) without having it on screen?

Thanks
Cristian

Cris wrote:And, for guys like me who cannot use those screen res but are stuck to 1024x768 or 800x600, is there any way to set those values (e.g. "mass" in calligraphic) without having it on screen?

There should be a little black triangle at the end of the toolbar, and clicking it will let you access the options that didn't fit on the screen.