[Scribus] Scaling grouped items

[Mardigrafe - Louis Desjardins]

Hello all,

I can't figure out if the following has drawn some attention by the cvs logs and the bug logs so I'll guess not and you tell me!

There is a nice feature in Scribus that allows the user to select multiple items and scale them at once by simply dragging any end-point. BTW this is a feature that was implemented as late as in Quark FIVE and we had to rely on the excellent extension "Scaler" (in the QX-Tools) to achieve this. Scribus has that already! But there is an issue with that feature as it is right now.

For the purpose of that test, I used 4 items : a single-column text box with some text in it, a picture box with a picture in it, a 1 pt line and a rectangle from the Shape tool.

After grouping and scaling (down or up), not all items react as expected.

1. The text-box and the text in it are scaled (but the text does not always remains as it was in the first place, going from 1 single line to 2 lines, depending on how much you scale). Half expected.
2. The picture-box is scaled but not the picture, thus the xy coordinates remain the same and we see more or less of the image, according to the new size of the picture frame. Not expected
3. The line is scaled but not its thickness. Expected (more on that below)
4. The rectangle is scaled. Expected

imho all elements should be scaled the same : the pic box is smaller, then shouldn't the image be smaller? I think yes.

The way the "Scaler" extension works lets the user decide if we want to scale the lines thickness as well. This is useful when you want your hairlines or 1 pt lines to remain visible after a vigorous downscaling!

Scribus could also let user decide if they want the image not only scaled with the pic box but distorted as well if the new xy coordinates are not in proportion of the original.

Also, it would be nice to precisely scale a group of items through the Properties palette.

Any thoughts on that? (I am sure yes!!!)

Best regards,

Louis

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