As usual, OGP keeps getting better all the time. Here is a wish list that would make an awesome tool better (IMHO).
Cascading Master Canvases
When creating structure and information architecture diagram, I create different sets of master canvases that reflect the various sections of the work being represented. For example, there might be wireframes for websites and the different canvases will represent the different sections of the website.
However, there are many items that are common in my templates, such as the headers, footers and the page description section on the right. It would be a huge timesaver, if a master canvas could be a child of another master canvas so that when changes are made to the parent, they are reflected in all the other master canvases that have the same components without having to delete/copy/paste and realign.
If it's too difficult to implement cascading Master Canvases, perhaps an alternative would be to support multiple layers, which would make delete/copy/paste easier and less error prone as one would be able to drag the layer from one Master Canvas layer to another.
Document Settings
This is a great and welcome addition to the documents. Being able to set the creation date and use that as a variable is something I've wanted for sometime. There are some other things I'd like to see here:
1) Document Title - this would be similar to the Document Name, except that it would allow you to specify a name that would be independent of the actual document name. Why would we want this? For one, often document names contain additional information that one doesn't want to display. For example, appended dates and initials such as: "MyGreatDocument-NC-20070314.graffle" when what I want to display using a variable is "My Great Document".
2) Document/Print Scale - Often I need a larger canvas then the default 755x580. A typical size I use is 1200x920, which gives me space for the wireframes and the extra information that goes with the page. When I do this, I use the "Fit" on the Canvas Size, which sets my print scale to 63%. For clarity, I'd love to be able to set the Print Scale (or Document Size/Scale) to 100% but at the new size I have specified.
3) Custom Variables - this would be another great addition to OGP - a simple model of creating a variable name and a value, which can then be placed into the document as needed.
Copy / Paste
This is a little (BIG) "pet peeve" of mine. Often when I copy something and paste it in another layer or canvas, the paste is not made in the same location (X & Y position) the original was copied from and often seems centered on the current location of the mouse.
This is unintuitive and frustrating and either the paste operation should be smart enough to know when to paste the object with the exact coordinates it was copied from (e.g. it's not the original layer, canvas or document) or a new paste option should be added to the Edit menu (cmd-opt-v) that will "Paste In Exactly the Same Place" the object was copied from (see Cascading Master Canvas comment....).
This is especially painful when you have selection of objects in the pasteboard and makes me have to resort to grouping them all together, noting the X and Y position, copy, switch canvas, paste and manually enter the X & Y in the geometry panel.
Automatic Curvy Lines
There are 3 types of connection lines in OG. Straight, Ortho and Curved - but when I have Curved selected and connect two objects, I get a straight line. Yes, yes, I know that I can click as I'm drawing the line to insert a midpoint before connecting. This forces the user to add points to the line to give it some curves (such as a mind map).
OG should be able to automatically create at least one midpoint and give it some curvature without the user having to do additional work. A preference setting that allows the user to set the number of automatic midpoints for curved lines would be icing on the cake.
Non-connection Lines with Bezier Curves
I'm sure that this has been asked for many, many times. Much like the Pen Tool, a regular "dumb" Line tool that won't always try to connect would be a welcome addition to the palette. It's pretty common for us to sometimes use a thin box as a line because of this, but it's not ideal for a number of reasons.
Smart Export
One thing that would be a huge (and I mean huge) addition to OG for all my production artists... The ability to export all the selected objects as separate files. For example, the initial design work for something is done and that consists of various objects, including buttons and what not. Every item (with grouped objects counting as one item) could be exported in a batch to the selected format, for example, PNG.
How awesome would it be to layout the design for a page, then export the elements for that design as separate objects. Likewise, the html export will export with an html wrapper but a single graphic rather then all the parts.
The export of these page design objects has been an issue that affects the workflow as the designs are usually recreated entirely in photoshop after the fact, when there should be no need to do that and at a minimum, the exported objects should be able to be placed into something like photoshop with ease so that they can be reused.
Cascading Master Canvases
When creating structure and information architecture diagram, I create different sets of master canvases that reflect the various sections of the work being represented. For example, there might be wireframes for websites and the different canvases will represent the different sections of the website.
However, there are many items that are common in my templates, such as the headers, footers and the page description section on the right. It would be a huge timesaver, if a master canvas could be a child of another master canvas so that when changes are made to the parent, they are reflected in all the other master canvases that have the same components without having to delete/copy/paste and realign.
If it's too difficult to implement cascading Master Canvases, perhaps an alternative would be to support multiple layers, which would make delete/copy/paste easier and less error prone as one would be able to drag the layer from one Master Canvas layer to another.
Document Settings
This is a great and welcome addition to the documents. Being able to set the creation date and use that as a variable is something I've wanted for sometime. There are some other things I'd like to see here:
1) Document Title - this would be similar to the Document Name, except that it would allow you to specify a name that would be independent of the actual document name. Why would we want this? For one, often document names contain additional information that one doesn't want to display. For example, appended dates and initials such as: "MyGreatDocument-NC-20070314.graffle" when what I want to display using a variable is "My Great Document".
2) Document/Print Scale - Often I need a larger canvas then the default 755x580. A typical size I use is 1200x920, which gives me space for the wireframes and the extra information that goes with the page. When I do this, I use the "Fit" on the Canvas Size, which sets my print scale to 63%. For clarity, I'd love to be able to set the Print Scale (or Document Size/Scale) to 100% but at the new size I have specified.
3) Custom Variables - this would be another great addition to OGP - a simple model of creating a variable name and a value, which can then be placed into the document as needed.
Copy / Paste
This is a little (BIG) "pet peeve" of mine. Often when I copy something and paste it in another layer or canvas, the paste is not made in the same location (X & Y position) the original was copied from and often seems centered on the current location of the mouse.
This is unintuitive and frustrating and either the paste operation should be smart enough to know when to paste the object with the exact coordinates it was copied from (e.g. it's not the original layer, canvas or document) or a new paste option should be added to the Edit menu (cmd-opt-v) that will "Paste In Exactly the Same Place" the object was copied from (see Cascading Master Canvas comment....).
This is especially painful when you have selection of objects in the pasteboard and makes me have to resort to grouping them all together, noting the X and Y position, copy, switch canvas, paste and manually enter the X & Y in the geometry panel.
Automatic Curvy Lines
There are 3 types of connection lines in OG. Straight, Ortho and Curved - but when I have Curved selected and connect two objects, I get a straight line. Yes, yes, I know that I can click as I'm drawing the line to insert a midpoint before connecting. This forces the user to add points to the line to give it some curves (such as a mind map).
OG should be able to automatically create at least one midpoint and give it some curvature without the user having to do additional work. A preference setting that allows the user to set the number of automatic midpoints for curved lines would be icing on the cake.
Non-connection Lines with Bezier Curves
I'm sure that this has been asked for many, many times. Much like the Pen Tool, a regular "dumb" Line tool that won't always try to connect would be a welcome addition to the palette. It's pretty common for us to sometimes use a thin box as a line because of this, but it's not ideal for a number of reasons.
Smart Export
One thing that would be a huge (and I mean huge) addition to OG for all my production artists... The ability to export all the selected objects as separate files. For example, the initial design work for something is done and that consists of various objects, including buttons and what not. Every item (with grouped objects counting as one item) could be exported in a batch to the selected format, for example, PNG.
How awesome would it be to layout the design for a page, then export the elements for that design as separate objects. Likewise, the html export will export with an html wrapper but a single graphic rather then all the parts.
The export of these page design objects has been an issue that affects the workflow as the designs are usually recreated entirely in photoshop after the fact, when there should be no need to do that and at a minimum, the exported objects should be able to be placed into something like photoshop with ease so that they can be reused.
Linear Mode
