Re: Status of connectors for SVG2

Hello world,

Tavmjong Bah wrote:
> On Wed, 2014-07-09 at 22:05 +0200, Juergen Roethig wrote:
>>
>> I was just missing something like a "connector" in SVG, and thus I 
>> checked whether there had been some porposals for that, before. I found 
>> one in [http://dev.w3.org/SVG/modules/connector/SVGConnector.html], but 
>> obviously this is not part of the current editor's draft of SVG 2, and 
>> it's rather old, although some newer proposal might be available in 
>> [http://tavmjong.free.fr/SVG/CONNECTORS/index.xhtml] (although the 
>> latter is not that "official" as the former). So, what's the official 
>> state of and/or opinion about something like a "connector" for/in SVG[2]?
> 
> Connectors are being worked on as a separate module. There is support
> for connectors within the working group but it is not a priority at the
> moment (basically a lack of resources).
> 
> The minutes from the last time we discussed connectors are at:
> 
>  http://www.w3.org/2013/09/12-svg-minutes.html

Thanks a lot for the information about the connectors' state! As far as 
I understood from reading, the "big" problems are the definition of the 
points ("ports") within a graphical object (<g>, <symbol>, whatever, 
...), their relationship to that object (e.g. automatic positioning), as 
well as the routing of the connectors.

My approach would be somewhat simpler: Make a new <point> element, with 
coordinates "x" and "y" as well as an "id" attribute (with a value of 
"point_id"), which might be used inside or outside of another graphical 
object (inside as a "port" for the object, and outside as a simple means 
for reference), and which will not be rendered (similar to "<symbol>"), 
and enhance the syntax of the "points" attribute (of "<polyline>" and 
"<polygon>"), and of the "d" attribute (of "<path>"), to allow a 
"pointref(point_id)" (or similar) to be used instead of a pair of 
coordinates, where applicable. Thus, I would not need a "<connector>" 
element, and the routing and design of the connector would be up to the 
author. And the "pointref" might be used everywhere within the path, 
even as a control point of a bezier curve, and not just as the start 
point or end point of a "connector" for which the shape would still have 
to be defined.

Of course, the "<line>" element would also be a candidate to use such a 
"pointref", but in that case, a new attribute for <line> would be needed 
(or two new attributes, one for each endpoint 1 and 2, similar to 
"x1"/"y1" and "x2"/"y2"). I might be able to live without that ;-)

Well, in that case, the implementation cost for the "connectors" should 
not be that huge ... basically, it's a new element "<point>" and a new 
form of giving point coordinates (as a "pointref") within "points" and 
"d" attributes.

One might create a simple prototype for that by using XSL transformation 
to the "connector-enhanced" svg file ... maybe I will do that as an 
example, if time permits.

Any opinions?

Regards,

Juergen Roethig

Received on Thursday, 10 July 2014 13:45:55 UTC