[etoys-dev] Inkscape envy

[K. K. Subramaniam]

On Friday 28 Aug 2009 3:47:47 am Jerome Peace wrote:
> The thing people who play with morphic will find interesting are the basic
> objects that inkscape supports and the way they use handles to support the
> various features. Compare our rectangles, ellipses and stars to theirs.
> Notice that they also have ways to manipulate paths and add a special
> object for spirals.
Inkscape is essentially a shape algebra tool with art elements as basic units 
(point, line, color, space) and artistic principles built into tools (add, 
subtract, balance, value, proportion) etc. The part I like about it is that it 
blends both analytical (spin controls for x, y, width, height) and gestaltic 
(tools in the left panel) approaches very well.

It is useful for higher age groups (i.e. those who are ready to learn of 
permutations and combinations, say 12+).

What it lacks is support for constraints (e.g. line x should be perpendicular 
to y). Metapost (program) and MPLib (library) handle this very well. A MPLib 
plugin would be ideal to stretch Squeaks for higher age groups.

Subbu