Split into Grid

[tgk]

Hi,

I'm aware of and use the Grid Manager feature to create snappable grids for laying objects out. It works nicely, but only in the context of creating a whole-artboard grid for laying out the entire artboard.

There needs to be something that can be used for creating smaller ad hoc grids at arbitrary locations. The best example of this feature I can think of is Illustrator's Split Into Grid function: this lets you take any object and divide it up into a grid of uniform objects with a lot of control over gutters and offsets and so on. It's incredibly useful for diagramming and I think it's a must-have for Designer. The Grid Manager feature unfortunately doesn't come close.

Thanks for considering this.

[tgk]

Here's a simple example of a use case for this. Imagine you're laying out a poster for elementary school science class. You have some graphics and text in various places and you want to put a periodic table of elements near the lower right of the page. Periodic table is, basically just three rectangles subdivided into squares. So in Illustrator, I'd draw three rectangles, then Split Into Grid and then go about coloring in each one and giving it a name, using duplicate/repeat (i.e. Smart Duplicate in Designer) to move text labels.

Using Designer's Snapping Grid feature, there's no way to drag the grid around to control where it starts. Using Guides means getting your calculator out.

More artistically, use it to create a grid of large pixel-like squares that you color in separately.

It's such a common thing to have a rectangle of arbitrary size and need to divide it up into rows and columns evenly with controllable gutters and so on. Snapping Grids, being fixed to an origin, just don't help (plus you'd then have to go create each rectangle in the grid by hand which is annoying even with Smart Duplicate.)