[Ipe-discuss] define a constant preamble and author

[Norbert Zeh]

Having read this, I just remembered how powerful and at the same time
limited I find the whole stylesheet approach to formatting settings
across a document.  My main problem is that the default stylesheet that
is used on start-up is hardwired in the source code, and often one would
like to change one's default settings.  In fact, Ubuntu's version of Ipe
has done exactly this by patching the source code and, as a result, I
could not easily open documents on my Windows machine that were created
without a special stylesheet on Ubuntu, and vice versa.  So here's just
an idea for a feature request in Ipe 7 (I don't know what Otfried's
plans are):

* Do not hardwire any style settings into Ipe and define everything in
loadable stylesheets.  The same way there is a file containing
information where to find fonts, a default stylesheet can be installed,
for example, in /usr/share/ipe, and this is the one normally loaded.  A
user should be able to change which file contains his/her default
stylesheet by specifying a different file in the Preferences.

* Moreover, when I use a stylesheet, I often have no interest in any of
the formatting options that were available in the standard stylesheet.
Yet, they clutter my formatting menus.  So (a) the default stylesheet
should really define everything from scratch, and the set of settings
hardwired in should be empty and (b) when defining stylesheets for a
document, it should be possible to specify whether these settings are in
addition to the default stylesheet or whether the stylesheet is to
completely replace the default styles for this document.

Having said all this, I always feel bad about making any requests of
this type, as it's Otfried who is sinking all this time into making Ipe
as great as it is.  So, Otfried, just think about it and decide whether
it's worth your time.

Cheers,
Norbert

Johan Ingvast wrote:
> Hi
> you can easliy include a preamble in a stylesheet. Consult the manual
> for details.
> /johan
> 
> by liu wrote:
>> hi all:
>> I have been using ipe recently and it is a fantanstic program!
>> Currently i am working on a series of illustrate figs, each of them
>> share the common preamble and author information,but everytime i
>> create a new fig, these have to be typed again (or copy from
>> elsewhere), is there any way to make a default author information and
>> preamble s.t. could be setup in the preference menu?
>> Thanks!
>> savor.
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> 
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