Martin Vermeer wrote:
On Mon, Apr 03, 2006 at 09:47:25AM +0200, Helge Hafting wrote:
Juergen Spitzmueller wrote:
Helge Hafting wrote:
You are thinking about a dialog providing <length> of <something>
Where <length> can be 1cm, 4pt, big, med, small, or fill,
and <something> can be space, dots, or rule?
This certainly seems more useful. I'll have to read up on latex to
see if all the permutations are supported. I haven't heard of a
"5cm dotfill" but believe it can be done by putting a sized parbox
around the dotfill.
I don't think such a thing exists. I was merely thinking about \hfill. But
as you say, it's probably easy to define a customizable dotfill.
\makebox[5cm][s]{\dotfill}
This trick works for every kind of fill except blank space, where
I use hspace for the fixed lengths.
Think carefully before re-inventing the wheel... we have Box, which can
be used as fixed-width horizontal space (just don't draw a frame, and
require an inner box, i.e. a parbox, IIRC).
If you implement a \dotfill inset -- or add one as a variant of the
existing insethfill -- and place it on the menu under "special
characters", you can insert one into Box and be done. Same with arrows
etc.
Well, putting the various "fills" on the insert menu was what
I originally proposed. Then I was told to make a dialog where
one may specify lengths,
and the type of fill (space, dotfill, arrowfill. . .)
Now, latex only supports lengths for space, so the others
have to use a box and fill it.
Of course the user _can_ insert a box of the right kind and
put a dotfill in it. That's what I have been doing, (using an ERT dotfill).
There is some clutter, as the GUI needs to show the box itself.
Perhaps borderless box could be made less intrusive.
So, what do you find most useful?
* One inset with a dialog, that allows all kinds of types
(space, arrow, dots), as well as all kinds of lengths, where
"fill" merely is a special case?
* A horizontal space inset with dialog, that support every kind
of horizontal space, but space only. And some fill insets for
dotfill, arrowfill and so on. These don't need any dialog. There
are no settings, and a user who inserted the wrong fill
can backspace and reinsert the correct one.
I can see that the latter has some merit. It matches latex more closely,
which should certainly make conversions easier.
Some of the fills will likely be used mostly as "fill" (no explicit length)
anyway. Surely a underbracefill will usually be found inside a box
under some text. Also, spacing is special in that quite a few
very short lengths of spacing is useful. But none of the short lengths
are useful for a brace, arrow or dotfill. So this approach don't have so
many "stupid" cases, even if the user will have to use the occational
extra box.
Helge Hafting
