Beta Release Wishlist

[Alecaddd]

Setting up expectations for a Beta release

Here's a list of must-have features that will be implemented during the ongoing alpha cycle. This list is a Work in Progress and it can change based on availability and technical challenges.

General UI

• [x] Create missing symbolic icons.
• [x] Allow swapping the order of the Options Panel and Layers Panel. #365
• [x] Implement a Global Color Picker. #432

Canvas

• [x] Click and drag on an empty canvas area to select multiple shapes. #684
• [x] Click and hold Shift to add items to the selection. #661
• [ ] Zooming with keyboard should always use currently selected items as pivot point.
• [x] Zooming with mouse wheel should use cursor location as pivot point. #417
• [ ] Selecting an item from the Layers Panel should move the Canvas to visually center it.
• [x] Optional "smart guides" when shapes align to adjacent shapes. #507
• [x] Show/Hide pixel grid. #499
• [ ] Show/Hide rulers.
• [x] Hold Shift to resize shapes from center. #523

Artboards

• [x] Control background color of artboards from the standard Fill Color panel. #400
• [x] Child shapes should be masked if outside the artboard edges. #400
• [x] Shapes should snap to Artboard's edges. #509

Shapes

• [x] Copy/Paste of shapes.
• [ ] Copy/Paste of shape properties
• [x] Duplicate shape.
• [ ] Implement the Line shape.
• [x] Implement the Curve/Pen tool.
• [x] Shapes snapping to adjacent shapes. #507

File Format

• [ ] Implement built-in version control, creating a new commit at every save.
• [ ] Create a screenshot of the canvas for every commit.
• [ ] Implement visual navigation of previous versions.
• [ ] Create a preview widget when opening Akira files.

Export

• [ ] Export in SVG.
• [ ] Export in PDF.
• [ ] Export in TIFF.

Text Tool

• [ ] Implement double click to edit text.
• [ ] Implement simple font picker.
• [ ] Implement bold, italic, and underline options.
• [ ] Implement uppercase, lowercase, and capitalized options.
• [ ] Implement letter spacing and line height options.
• [ ] Control fill color from the standard Fill Color panel.

Colors Panel

• [x] Implement adding and removing multiple colors for both borders and fills. #505
• [ ] Implement gradients.
• [ ] Implement textures/images as fill.
• [ ] Implement document library of recently used colors.

Borders Panel

• [ ] Implement uneven border radii. #267
• [ ] Implement inside, outside, center border option.

Others

• [x] Implement alignment of single shapes. #675
• [ ] Implement sorting of multiple shapes.
• [x] Implement Undo/Redo history. #699
• [x] Implement layer groups.
• [ ] Implement Export of Artboards and multiple selected items.
• [ ] Implement Image cropping.

[jj10133]

Hi I would love to do these features above, just want to make sure that which ones are you working on currently?

[Alecaddd]

You can check which open draft PRs we have, but overall I add the PR number alongside the feature if someone is currently working on it. So far, the core team is focused on finishing the Alpha release, so nothing is in the queue

[jj10133]

Thanks a lot, I would like to ask if we have a discord server or slack as means to communicate with the contributors

[Alecaddd]

We have a discord channel for Patreon supporters. We don't have a public dev channel yet, but we'll probably open one after the alpha release

[yasharya2901]

Hey Alex, last I checked Akira didn't had a working undo button. I think it's a must-have feature for a beta release.

[leofurtado]

My suggestions for the beta or future releases: Outline view, guide lines (show/hide), grid (show/hide/isometric).

[Alecaddd]

My suggestions for the beta or future releases: Outline view, guide lines (show/hide), grid (show/hide/isometric).

Thanks for the suggestion. Show/Hide pixel grid is something we can add to the list.

The outline view, guide lines, and isometric grid will probably be implemented after v1

[jj10133]

I have question on copy/paste,

1. Invoking copy, does the item already add to selected items list by the GDK handle by mouse click automatically?
2. Did try the paste action, however I get the selected items list, does not work properly, i'm not sure because i don't know vala but whenever I have created more than 1 item and paste that item it does not take that item, it takes the first appended item.
3. Did traverse through the list(selected items) to get item which is selected but it didn't work.

Please help me out, i'm new to vala and this project

[Alecaddd]

@nishp77 Are working on that implementation? If you can share a PR or the forked repo where you're editing the code it would be easier for us to review and help you.

[ghost]

@Alecaddd I think setting the Image border radius is a must have feature

[iclonethefirst]

As far as I'm aware the convention is that you press alt (Adobe Apps) or ctrl (Affinity Suite) instead of shift to to resize shapes from center. (#523)

shift was used for proportional scaling, but after 20 years they figured that you resize more proportional than disproportionate. Therefore proportional scaling is now the default and disproportionate scaling is done by holding shift.

I would go for the new approach and add in later the legacy support for the old way. So everyone can work like they are used to, but at the same time Akira embraces the new and more logical approach.

[Alecaddd]

As far as I'm aware the convention is that you press alt (Adobe Apps) or ctrl (Affinity Suite) instead of shift to to resize shapes from center.

I'm okay with changing the shortcut to Shift for proportional scaling and Ctrl for resizing from center.

I don't think I want to have proportional scaling locked in by default, but I guess that might be useful so adding a pref to allow users to set this workflow is absolutely doable.

Also in the future we're planning to add full keyboard shortcut customization, so every user can adapt things to their workflow, but indeed we should guarantee common and known defaults.

[LucileDT]

I want to propose a feature: on Akira first start, displaying a prompt asking the user if they worked with a specific software before, and depending on their choice, setup keyboard shortcuts to be similar to the selected software (I saw that in League of Legends back in 2014 if I remember well, it is very comfortable to have our settings automatically setup, without having to take hours to rebind our keys).

@Alecaddd do you want me to create discussions about those demands?

[Alecaddd]

@LucileDT sure, go ahead and open a discussion. It would be interesting to see some mock-ups and start discussing possible implementation. I think I won't be adding that feature in the beta release tho, but maybe after that.

[xeruf]

Where was Duplicate and Copy/Paste Shapes implemented? Does not seem to be in the latest release.

[Alecaddd]

The flatpak hasn't been released yet because the save/load files needs to be updated. The feature was implemented on the main branch so if you compile from source you can see it.

[ghost]

Create a new commit for each save is a very bad idea, and probably not a good milestone for 0.1.0 to implement whole Version Control.

Do you believe we could reduce the amount of tasks in this milestone so it's feasible for contributors to finish it? @albfan

[ghost]

I want to propose a feature: on Akira first start, displaying a prompt asking the user if they worked with a specific software before, and depending on their choice, setup keyboard shortcuts to be similar to the selected software (I saw that in League of Legends back in 2014 if I remember well, it is very comfortable to have our settings automatically setup, without having to take hours to rebind our keys).

@Alecaddd do you want me to create discussions about those demands?

@LucileDT Similarly this is a honestly very good idea but not for 0.1.0 I think

Current progress for 0.1.0 is great, one idea is to release 0.1.0 with current progress, if you think it's stable enough for a release. Then in 0.1.1 work in the most essential features that the program needs. Such as SVG export support.