[scribus-dev] Editable Master Pages

[Andreas Vox]

Am 06.08.2008 um 15:53 schrieb Gregory Pittman:

>>
>> ...

>> 1. The frames that will be linked need only to be tagged as "to be  
>> linked" to the *same* frame on *next* page to which this  
>> particular MP would be applied. That way, you can set as many  
>> chain of text frames as you need.
>> 2. The frames that are un-tagged are created on each page too but  
>> are not linked.
>> 3. Plus, you can also set 2 or more frames to be linked together  
>> on a single page, but not to the next page.
>> 4. And finally, you can have a set of frames in a structure where  
>> all those frames are linked together on a single page and are also  
>> flowing in the next set of identical frames on the next page. That  
>> is, the last frame in the chain gets a tag to be linked to the  
>> next first one of the chain on the next page.
>>
>> The same can be done on facing pages. With the particularity that  
>> we could set the links to run on the full sequence of the pages,  
>> 1-2-3- or 1-3-5 and 2-4-6.
> I think you also have to think about streamlining the process. For  
> one thing, without changing the way links work, they could be  
> easier to work with. Make the linking something like making a  
> Bezier curve, where you activate linking, then left click, left  
> click, left click, then when you're done, right-click or ESC to end  
> linking and turn it off, with a message or tooltip to tell you this.

I'd rather see something like in Pagemaker: clicking on the overflow  
indicator goes into link-mode. Shift clicking will create new  
textframes as necessary.
Unlinking is available via context menu.

> As far as auto-linking, maybe there should be some semi-automated  
> naming of frames, so that you could have families of text frames  
> with similar names (think of the way that KSnapshot helps with  
> naming screengrabs by automated numbering: eg, snapshot.png >  
> snapshot1.png > snapshot2.png, and so on). This would facilitate  
> auto-linking. It might also allow for rearranging the linking  
> simply by changing names of the frames.

I think role names are a cleaner approach than some elaborated naming  
scheme.

>>
>>     e) Manually linking frames overrides the "auto-link-to"  
>> mechanism.
>>
>>
>> Agree.
>>
>> If we are to create a new dialog for managing links, I would be  
>> incline to think of a way to link two frames that are far from  
>> each other in the page range, such as "Top Story on Front page" >  
>> "continued on Back Page" and be able to set the link from this  
>> back page frame (or on any page) to the front page frame from  
>> within that dialog instead of having to run the link through all  
>> pages with the mouse. But this is a tweak!
>>
>>     f) Empty text objects from master pages are editable on normal
>>     pages and use the role/auto-link-to properties.
>>
>>
> What about the idea of having, for example, an empty text frame on  
> a MP, which in a sense "links" to an editable frame on a regular  
> layer on every page where that MP is used. The content could be  
> edited in the usual way, but you could go to the MP and change  
> position and size, which then would change the position and size of  
> the editable frame on the editable layer without changing content.

We already need a separate copy of the content for each MP textframe  
because of pagenumbers,
so it would be more natural to reuse the MP textframe, just with  
local content.

> Could/should you be able to change position/size on the regular  
> layer? Perhaps, but you'd have to decide whether this might change  
> the frame on the MP -- might be a problem, and perhaps might  
> "break" this MP link, at least on that page. I'm trying to think in  
> the terms of the complaints that people seem to have, but also  
> preserving the "integrity" of the MP.
>

AFAIU that's the core of the MP-usability question, ie. the point  
where people disagree.

My position is:
a) if we allow changing position or other properties of MP items on  
the normal page, use style inheritance to link to the original MP  
object.
b) never change the MP original when editing a normal page (not sure  
if you meant it that way,
but it sounds like it)
c) definitely allow to change content of MP objects on the normal page.

/Andreas