Re: Dia "project" support

[Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>]

On Tue, 12 Aug 2003, ml wrote:

> Date: Tue, 12 Aug 2003 09:13:40 +0200
> From: ml <ml@knorke.in-berlin.de>
> Reply-To: dia-list@gnome.org
> To: dia-list@gnome.org
> Subject: Dia "project" support
>
> Hi,
>
> are there any plans to enhance dia to support diagrams that
> are belonging together?  I.e. having a kind of "project"
> tree and allowing hyperlinks from objects to other diagrams?

Linking is definately something many of us would like to see, but getting
it done is another matter entirely, patches are always welcome.

> If dia were a bonobo component it could be embedded into an
> existing framework (anjuta?).

For a second there I thought you were suggesting embedding other
components into Dia which would be very difficult give Dia's efforts to
remain cross platform GTK.

Previous versions of Dia were able to be used as Bonobo components
although this functionality got cut away as part of the port to GTK2 but
there is nothing stopping someone from helping to add it back.

In most cases I think Bonobo is overkill, most programs just need a
preview (a placeholder raster graphic) and a way to invoke the original
program (with the source document) make changes and have them propogate
back when you are done.

In most cases trying to embed the program controls and widgets in another
program, or do anything much more than what is essentially a preview is
really awkward.

I think a big reason that higher level object embedding has not caught on
so much in open source software is that when there are no nasty licensing
issues doing things at the library level is more efficient.

But dont let me stop you from working on Bonobo support for Dia, I am just
try to get you to consider that there might be an easier possibility.

Sincerely

Alan Horkan
http://advogato.org/person/AlanHorkan/