RE: [XaraXtreme-dev] Moving to Cairo (was Ping)

["Charles Moir" <CharlesM@xxxxxxxx>]

> From:  Marcus Reimann
> Sent: 21 February 2007 14:25
...
> Perhaps it's a good idea to create a mechanism to switch the 
> Graphic engines (used libraries) with a option within Xara 
> Xtreme's options dialog (Menu "Utilities" -> "Options...") 
> and also a additional parameter to start Xara Xtreme with a 
> special Graphic engine from the shell?

Yes completely agree. We should have some UI to switch because even in
the CDraw case, it will be useful, for testing and debugging if nothing
else, to have the option to switch engine.

We would like to have a 'simple mode' UI switch anyway (even for the
pure CDraw case) that removed the incompatible fill types from the fill
menu and any other UI changes that should be disabled.  Because even
operating with CDraw we still have users that want to be sure they can
create pure Flash or Illustrator compatible files, and would prefer only
to have UI that was applicable to these simpler vector types.

> Perhaps Xara Xtreme needs a new internal 
> "CurrentGraphicEngine"- object with some properties about the 
> possibilties of the current used GraphicEngine (for example 
> "supportedFillTypes: Flat Fill, Linear, Circular, Elliptical, 
> ....")? Following this approach, each drawing function needs 
> to ask the CurrentGraphicEngine-object about the available 
> functions and shows only these options, which are supported 
> by the current Graphic Engine. If Cairo doesn't support 
> advanced fill types, the Fill Tool doesn't show these fill 
> types or - better - tries to simulate them (otherwise there 
> would be a lot of problems by opening a .XAR file with 
> advanced fill types).

Yep agree, that would be good. Might be easier just to have a simple
'simple fills or not simple' switch, but having a more advanced 'engine
capability' system such as this would be more flexible for sure.

Charles