Some tools such as the “on bissector” or “on perpendicular” are not using the pen preset for lineweight or linetype.
I think this behavior has been added because the perpendicular lines are very likely to be “construction lines” so it’s kind of using a default “construction” pen preset.
But I personally think that it is misleading to overwrite the pen preset for this particular reason : if the user wants a pen style more suitable for a construction line he always has the possibility to do it manually.
I personally draft patterns without tracing any line at all, I then add the visible pattern lines afterward, and I find quite annoying the fact that I have to manually change the style of those lines thare are not following the pen preset.
What do you think? Should the lineweight and linetype of every tool follow the pen preset?
P.S : see there for the corresponding Github issue
Even if I don’t like it very much , I can understand if the major part of the users is happy with the current behavior.
In that case, maybe I can add a checkbox in the preferences to disable this “automatic construction line pen preset” ?
At least we should add a tooltip explaining that the preset only apply to some tools and not all so that people don’t think that this behavior is a bug, as I thought at first.
Hummm… This was something that I specifically requested, if I remember correctlly, especially with regard to the Point - Intersect XY where, most often, a person would like lines of some sort when designing a pattern.
I normally make my construction lines a dotted line with a weight of 0.35 and often a lighter colour, so that it can be seen, but not very visible. The main lines, I normally use a solid line, a darker colour and a line weight of 1.2 to make them more visible.
And added to this, I make use of the groups to hide the construction lines and the lines for the final pattern pieces have their own groups.
I think that it’s very easy to choose the No pen option at the time of using the tool, if you don’t want a line.
This is not a bug. It’s there to force a line to show.
If you find this annoying, I suggest you grab an early copy of Seamly just after the fork. There was no default pen at all.
That being said… Not sure why you don’t want to show the construction lines by using a no pen? That’s one reason for groups were you can put construction lines in a group and hide them. Plus I don’t know why you want to then draw extra lines for the pattern outline? The only reason to draw Line tools is in cases where you need to connect 2 unrelated points to generate the Line_ variables to use in formulas or when you messed up and find it’s easier to just a add a line.
Yes…my thought exactly. I should note though the over ride of the default pen attributes is not to just “Show” the line, but in the case of the “Point - On Line” to NOT show the pen… where you get that line over line if you don’t use No Pen. So the Pref would be something like “Always use default pen” - where if it’s not checked if uses the current behavior.
Yes I do recall that, and agreed… IMO - As someone with 50+ years of drafting experience - I can’t see trying to draft anything - garment or otherwise - without seeing the construction lines, where there’s just a bunch of points without any reference to the draft.
But I will add a Preferences option to satisfy either behavior.
Thank you very much, @Douglas. I find the lines are helpful when assisting someone, as well. And I sometimes make patterns for other people, who may want to make changes. If there are lines, then it makes it easier for them to edit the patterns.
Agreed. It’s like a road map. And yes… having dealt with debugging other’s patterns you’re usully trying to figure out what a user did or had in mind. When (construction) lines are visible it’s easier to tell what tool a point is without having to open the tool Properties.
I think that it’s not clear from a user’s perspective that this is not a bug. Since there’s nothing in the software right now that explains this exception.
I was doing thinks like this at first, but then I realized that most of the construction lines are not really necessary when the pattern is not drafted by hand, and that by not drawing them everything is cleaner and easier to draft. Another reason is that it annoyed me when part of lines where superposing after drafting a lot of aligned points.
i do not necessary use the line tool, most of the time I display manually the few lines that I need going into the point’s properties. Since most of the visible lines are splines, at least in my patterns, there are not so many of them.
This is one of the reasons why I thought this pen preset was kind of problematic and why it felt like a bug to me: there are so many exceptions, and these exceptions are pretty common tools (XY, along line, normal…), at some point I was just wondering “is this pen preset really working?”
Since most of the construction points are close to / onto visible lines or specific places (hip, waist, knees, elbows…) I think that it’s pretty readable
My no-line method will certainly show its limits when I’ll do more customisation to my patterns. For the moment I’m mainly following book’s methods, so as long as I keep the point numbering consistant with the book it should be ok even with no lines
But I’m 100% taking into account your wise remarks, I’ll think twice before drafting my next pattern aha.
But even this being said I think that it is a good thing that now this pen preset can be used for every tool, it feels more logical to me.
And some people could just want to use another type of line for their construction lines, to keep the same convention as a book, for instance: in some of them dashed lines are used for some (usually bottom/back?) pieces, in that case it could be great to draft another type of lines instead for construction lines.
Narrow line weight, color, amd Groups. You can hide individual Point names if they annoy you too… although I’m not a fan of that as it harder to find a point if it’s hidden. You can though Zoom to point and it will toggle the visibility back on.
Not a problem… I was looking at the code to see what was up, and figured while I already had some of the tool files open it was an easy thing to add.
Well that’s where your addition of being able to set the base name helps… as with the A,B, C… it can be tedius trying to match some pattern systems. Where I’ve always had a probem is with Croonbergs Blue or Red book patterns, as the system increments names A-Z, then 1-99 for point names. It’s tedius to edit every point name, and then there’s the issue if you use multiple blocks and the app names block 2 B, block 3 C, etc…
I think we all have been there, where as one learns the nature of the tool history, and the quirks of the app, the patterns get better.
, I can understand if the major part of the users is happy with the current behavior.
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