Re: newbie questions

[Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>]

On 28 May 2003, Andrew Hall wrote:

> Date: 28 May 2003 14:38:01 -0400
> From: Andrew Hall <ahall@coxnews.com>
> Reply-To: dia-list@gnome.org
> To: dia-list@gnome.org
> Subject: newbie questions
>
> Greetings,
>
> I have a few newbie questions if anyone has the time.

Sure,
but to be honest I dont have the time but I like to encourage people to
use Dia (and help make it better for all of us, I'm selfish like that) so
I'll do my best to help.

> 1.  When I add new image, and double click it to define an image file to
> use, the dialog presented to select an image, keeps dumping me into my
> home dir.  I must manually go to /usr/X11R6/share/gnome/dia/shapes to be
> able to select an image.  Any way to get the dialog to remember that
> location?  Any other way to add an image?

You are going about this the wrong way, please bear with me if my
explanation is too pedantic.

Assuming you are running Dia 0.91 (not that it makes a huge difference)
there is the toolbox window and the document window.

You can click on the buttons on the toolbox to select a shape you want to
draw such as a Rectangle, Elipse, Polygon, Line and so on.

If you want to use the predefined shapes you will need to look just
below the buttons on the toolbox.  In 0.91 there is a label Assorted, and
below that is displayed a sheet full of basic geometric shapes.  In 0.90
if i remember correctly Chrongram is the first displayed sheet.  The sheet
contains more buttons, each being a predefined shape.  Click on on of the
buttons and then go to the document window and use the mouse to draw a
copy of one of those shapes.



Click on the word "Assorted" and you will see that this item is in fact a
menu.  The menu list all the avialable sheets and there are a good variety
of shapes available.

Here is a fairly nice screenshot of Dia which has been changed to use the
Network sheet (i dont know what language that is but i could probably
figure it)
http://linux.nctu.edu.tw/web/moto/screenshots/images/dia-zh.jpg

> 1.1  What is the difference between a .shape and a .png?  If I select
> any .shape I receive a broken image message.

Dia is a Vector Graphics program, programs such as xfig, sketch,
sodipodi, Adobe Illustrator are also vector graphics programs.
Vector graphics specify points and lines (.svg, .ai), as opposed to Raster
graphics programs such as the Gimp, Ms paint which specify the colour and
location of each and every pixel.

The insert image tool is for embedding Raster Graphics such as PNG or JPEG
files in your Dia Drawings.

The .shape files are definitions of reusable shapes, the toolbox window
provides a nice and relatively easy way of using this predefined shapes.

> 1.2  Any images for vendor specific hardware?  I see a cisco directory,
> but the images in there are not very life like.  Any images for vixel,
> network applicance, sun etc, etc.

The images are tiny and only really intended as icons, the Shapes if you
use them properly are better.

We dont have extensive lists of Hardware diagrams.
An interesting approach i saw with Dell equipment was to sign up to the
Dell Image archive and use the product photos in your diagrams.

If and when we hook up libwmf for WMF support we should have a better way
to import these kinds of graphics from other programs.

> 2.  Help does want not work.  I get the following error:

Cant help you with this.

Hope that helps.  If it doesn't then ask again and I'll try and come up
with a better answer.

Sincerely

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