Re: Proposal: <star> element

On Mon, Apr 14, 2014 at 11:47 AM, Tab Atkins Jr. <jackalmage@gmail.com>wrote:

> On Mon, Apr 14, 2014 at 11:41 AM, Rik Cabanier <cabanier@gmail.com> wrote:
> > On Mon, Apr 14, 2014 at 10:59 AM, Tab Atkins Jr. <jackalmage@gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >> Private discussion with Philip has convinced me that adding a <star>
> >> element (or a <polar> element, or any other particular instance of
> >> something that's star-like and possibly does more) is probably not
> >> worth it.  Stars happen, but they're not really common.
> >
> > I thought so too, but searching for "SVG images" brings up a lot of
> artwork
> > that uses stars (and triangles which are also stars)
> > In addition, applications such as Illustrator and Inkscape offer them as
> > primitives alongside circles and rectangles and it's easy to find js
> > libraries that support them (ie http://paperjs.org/reference/path/).
>
> I could be convinced by arguments like this, though the definition of
> what a "star" is is obviously a bit loose (as evidenced by the
> multiple substantially different attempts to provide them).


Yes, a kitchen-sink approach that can do everything (like with Dr Olaf
proposed) is likely not the way to go.
I thought we had agreed on a simple star command that just had number of
points + inner + outer radius + optional rounded corners in Rigi-Kaltbad.
Unfortunately, the minutes are not reflecting this (
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-svg-wg/2012JulSep/0209.html)


> >> Plus, the
> >> bearing command, which I think *does* justify itself, makes generating
> >> stars fairly easy.
> >
> >
> > I don't see much value in the bearing command. Do you have any examples
> of
> > drawing applications or popular js libraries that offer this?
> > It is also more invasive as it impacts the already complex path command
> > string. See http://www.w3.org/TR/SVG2/paths.html#PathDataLinetoCommandsfor
> > all the commands that are impacted.
>
> The bearing command is useless for a drawing application.


That is true.


>  It makes
> hand-authoring far easier, particularly when performing some actions
> that are symmetrical about some axis.  Rather than doing trig to
> create a pentagon, you can just do some simple middle-school geometry:
>
> <path d="h10 b108 h10 b108 h10 b108 h10 z">
>

I completely agree it would be much easier.
However, I can find no JS libraries or graphics frameworks that support
this.