Snap hints

[jtucker]

Can we show what we are snapping to when the cursor is on a snap point?

[MEB]

That's already implemented through a color coded system. When the point you are snapping to turns:

- red it means its snapping to the horizontal axis

- green it means its snapping to the vertical axis

- yellow it means its snapping to both vertical and horizontal axis

- purple it means its snapping to the node you are hovering to 

 

Probably more coming as Ben develops the snapping system.

[Ben]

Thought I had got that well covered..? What do you think is missing?

[retrograde]

Hi guys, where is the colour coded system documented?

[Raskolnikov]

That's already implemented through a color coded system. When the point you are snapping to turns:

 

After using AF some weeks i have now discovered (thanks to MEB) that there are snap points that turns into colors....

 

 

 

I think when the snap point it's on the same place than a "transformation node" of any element, should be turned that node's color into the one who's announcing, not leaving that "blue donut" around... because the way it's now (look at the following pic) it's confusing, at least for me.

 

[jtucker]

I was thinking that it may show "node" or "center" as text.  But I am ok with color code.

[Raskolnikov]

Colours are more easily understandable by our minds than having to read and interpretate letters.

[MEB]

Thought I had got that well covered..? What do you think is missing?

 

Nothing is missing. I wasn't referring to the color code in particular but to the whole snapping system itself. Re reading my post i see i wasn't very clear :(

[Andy Somerfield]

I think Ben was answering the OP - I agree, everything seems covered to me. I look forward to the next round of updates from Ben - our snapping is already very sharp, and will only get better over time :)

 

A

[scamper]

Maybe I have different expectations for snapping behavior, but what I find missing is that little “catch” when, say, the side of one rectangle meets the side of another rectangle. I’ve turned on every conceivable snapping option (is that part of the problem?), yet when I drag a rectangle, it just passes by the other one as if it weren’t there. If I take the time to pause then I do see fuzzy (anti-aliased!) colored lines appear, but they’re often “off” by a few pixels due to their inherent blurriness (yes, operating at 100% magnification), and there is no physical snap that assures me that two edges are truly coincident.

Am I missing something, or is physical (magnetized) snapping still to come?

[MEB]

Hi scamper,

Go to the Snapping Manager (View -> Snapping Manager...) and check Snap to object bounding boxes. You can also check Include bounding box mid points if you need them. Additionally, if you need everything snapped to the pixel check Snap to units and select Pixels as unit.

 

This should "fix" all those problems.

[Ben]

You also need to make snapping candidates by temporarily hovering over the object you want to small to until it flashes momentarily. After that you can snap your other objects to it.

[Ben]

I believe we also have a tutorial video about snapping.

[MEB]

Yes, there's a tutorial about snapping here.

 

[scamper]

Okay, I definitely wasn't seeing the behavior shown in that video. So I decided to do some investigation. The short story is I have the answer: "Snap to Units" must be off! With it on, AD will favor pixels (or whatever your unit of measure is) over anything else, and you won't see reliable snapping to objects at all. Turn it off and you'll get exactly the snapping behavior I was looking for!

Edited October 4, 2014 by scamper

[Ben]

Yes, if you snap to pixels you will mostly be closer to a pixel than anything else. If you zoomed in a lot you would then be able to snap to other objects. All depends on zoom level.