Struggeling with transformation point description and behaviour

[DarkClown]

First of all I have to admit that English is not my first language and that I might be struggling with my language knowledge here. But since the german translation does not properly describe what's happening I checked for the English description as well and still think some things are wrong.

Choose the framed text box and type a word. Switch to the MOVE tool and have a look at the transformation points. The frame box has got 10 transformation points. 4 at each corner, 4 at the middle of each side, a rotation point outside the frame and a resize box for the content outside the frame at the right bottom.

When I drag the bottom right corner of the frame I resize the frame with unconstrained aspect ratio. In the description below it says: "SHIFT to maintain aspect ratio" ... this seems precisely what it does. Now grabbing the transformation point outside the frame at the bottom right corner to resize the frame including the text first of all it behaves (unexpectedly) different from the bottom right corner. It instantly resizes with the original aspect ratio of the frame. Pressing shift leads to unconstrained resize of the frame incl. text. Despite this inverted behavior the text below says "SHIFT to preserve aspect ratio" what seems to be precisely the opposite of the way the tool behaves.

Frankly spoken I don't see the difference between "maintaining" and "preserving" the aspect ratio.
Secondly I don't understand why the two corners behave differently. I would expect and love to see both transformation corners in normal state resize with original aspect ratio and pressing SHIFT will lead to unconstrained resizing - in BOTH cases! This seems to be first of all wrong (behaviour vs help text below for the outside transformation point - wrong in German language as well) - secondly really irritating (since both transformation points have a different initial behaviour)

Maybe someone can help me understand this.

Cheers, Timo

 

[Alfred]

4 minutes ago, DarkClown said:

I don't see the difference between "maintaining" and "preserving" the aspect ratio

Neither do I, Timo! And I agree that the action of the outer handle should be constrained in the same way as the action of any corner handle.

[walt.farrell]

10 hours ago, Alfred said:

Neither do I, Timo! And I agree that the action of the outer handle should be constrained in the same way as the action of any corner handle.

Preferences, Tools has a preference for how the Move Tool works, and by default the behavior is based on the kind of object and (apparently) the handle you use.

You can change that preference to get a consistent behavior, if you want.

To me, it makes sense that when the behavior is set to the default (Automatic) that Shift would work differently for one of the corner handles than for the disconnected "scaling" handle.

• There is no inherent aspect ratio for a Text Frame, so using one of the attached corner handles would not maintain an aspect ratio by default, and pressing Shift would tell Affinity to maintain the current aspect ratio.
• On the other hand, when using the scaling handle, you are changing both the size of the frame, and the size of the text it contains, and the text does have an inherent aspect ratio. Therefore, the Move tool (when set to Automatic in the Preferences) would preserve the aspect ratio automatically, and pressing Shift would tell Affinity you do not want to preserve it.

However, I agree that the Status Bar text should be correct.

[DarkClown]

Indeed, Walt - thanks for that input. I wasn't aware of it. At least the tools behave consistent now - I much prefer it that way!
And the status bar is a minor detail in comparison to the far more significant behaviour of the transformation points (just my 2 cents)

Very much appreciated!
Cheers, Timo

[walt.farrell]

You're welcome, Timo.

[Pšenda]

Although the different behavior (aspect/no-aspect) of the two handles may be logical for knowledgeable users, it is completely confusing for most users, which is only helped by the incorrect description in the Status bar.

Two years ago, I proposed a behavior-dependent cursor change (no/aspec) to make it obvious to users at first glance.

 

[walt.farrell]

By the way, the discussion about the  error in the message wording in the Status Bar more properly belongs in the Bugs forum, not the Beta forum, in my opinion. It is not new behavior with the beta.

[DarkClown]

anyone feel free to shift it where it belongs ....