Everybody knows how good this software is. I mustn't write it.
I think it is better to leave suggestions like this in one thread. Don't you? If some will have to time to uprgrade xournal, there are some points where could be community interested in.
There were few suggestions before:
* Notebooks / Sections / Pages - Means to make possibility to place journals in sections, pages, classes... etc. See Gournal (http://www.adebenham.com/gournal/) or MS OneNote.
* Selection? Click and drag? - I think he means to select word (continual ink) by just click. I don't know if it will be improvement. I don't need it.
* Export / Import - I were on Windows and i still have few friends using MS Journal. I think, there is need to (im/ex)port that .jnt files. I've found few words about it but i don't have so much time and knowledge to make converter. See http://www.gottabemobile.com/Ink+Blogging+Using+Journal+And+Silverlight.aspx and mainly http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms700671.aspx.
* Highlight selected lines - I think it is better to see what exactly you have selected. May be it's colour could be inverted or just double-lined like it is in MS Journal.
* Rope - Few times I recognized as need to select something with lasso (rope).
* Customizable pen - I many times need to set another then just thick, very thick, ... size.
* Customizable toolbar - A lot of people don't use all of that tools... Don't need any more words.
Thank you so much for your answer. Thank you so much for Xournal.
Milan Jaros.
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Thanks. Let me point out two other places where suggestions live:
- there's a tracker section called "feature requests", which is better than this forum thread for such discussions (one separate item for each feature, and items can be "closed" when the feature is implemented - doesn't happen often since people have more ideas than I have time to implement them). I honestly think this is a better place for making new suggestions, though it's not necessarily a bad idea to have a recap of the main outstanding suggestions here once in a while.
- the suggestions that I've understood / taken into account as worthy of future work usually make it into the "TODO" file in the src/ directory of the xournal distribution.
Now, specific comments about some of the suggestions you list:
* notebooks / sections / pages: I still don't quite understand the "notebook" concept and why it should be part of xournal rather than of the OS (which already has "directories" and "files"). I do agree that having a sidebar to navigate quickly among pages and possibly sections once there's such a concept would be good, so at least that much is on the to-do list.
* jnt export/import: the microsoft jnt format is still completely closed. The links you posted are interesting and useful, but the DLL used for conversion is windows-only, and I assume no source code for it is available: some heavy reverse engineering would still be needed. Of course one could try to use the Microsoft DLL write some Windows software that converts between jnt and xoj. (I'm afraid I'm not competent to do that). The to-do list does include reverse-engineering the jnt format and writing a converter.
* lasso: yes. It's been on the list of things to do for a long time (if you look at the source code, there's already icons and menu entries, hidden because I never found time to
implement it, but it will come).
* customizable toolbar: already partially done. The problem is that, to my knowledge, GTK+
doesn't provide a standard mechanism for toolbar customization. I can imagine a dialog box that would list all possible interface items and allow the user to select/deselect them. In the meantime, what already works is that you can specify in the config file (.xournal/config; the "shorten_menus=yes/no" and "shorten_menu_items=..." lines) which interface items (menu entries, toolbar items, etc.) to hide.
* SVG: it's way too general a format to be able to import it. The to-do list includes being able to export to SVG, and importing the subset of SVG used by jarnal.
Denis
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Hey man,
i cannot await xournal++ to come. Xournal really rocks! It s very good software and it is so needed.
I found a script that converts jnt to pdf (under Windows). I hope this will ease the change from windows journal to xournal for a lot of people. The script isn t perfect but you are free to improve it.
And yes, SVG (or zipped svg, which means the jarnal-file format) would be the best choice for saving notes. In my opinion it should even become the default file format.
Keep up the good work on xournal ;)
If you would like to refer to this comment somewhere else in this project, copy and paste the following link:
Thanks for your enthusiasm and interest! As to the script you mention: it may be of some interest to windows users, however all it does is automate the process of opening a file in MS Journal and printing it to PDF. So it won't help non-windows users import jnt files… Thanks anyway!
Denis
If you would like to refer to this comment somewhere else in this project, copy and paste the following link:
Everybody knows how good this software is. I mustn't write it.
I think it is better to leave suggestions like this in one thread. Don't you? If some will have to time to uprgrade xournal, there are some points where could be community interested in.
There were few suggestions before:
* Notebooks / Sections / Pages - Means to make possibility to place journals in sections, pages, classes... etc. See Gournal (http://www.adebenham.com/gournal/) or MS OneNote.
* Selection? Click and drag? - I think he means to select word (continual ink) by just click. I don't know if it will be improvement. I don't need it.
* Export / Import - I were on Windows and i still have few friends using MS Journal. I think, there is need to (im/ex)port that .jnt files. I've found few words about it but i don't have so much time and knowledge to make converter. See http://www.gottabemobile.com/Ink+Blogging+Using+Journal+And+Silverlight.aspx and mainly http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms700671.aspx.
* Highlight selected lines - I think it is better to see what exactly you have selected. May be it's colour could be inverted or just double-lined like it is in MS Journal.
* Rope - Few times I recognized as need to select something with lasso (rope).
* Customizable pen - I many times need to set another then just thick, very thick, ... size.
* Customizable toolbar - A lot of people don't use all of that tools... Don't need any more words.
Thank you so much for your answer. Thank you so much for Xournal.
Milan Jaros.
I would also add the possibility to import little bitmaps in foreground.
Sometimes I find useful to insert symbols when annotating PDFs.
ciao
I agree.
Next thing. I was thinking about .xoj format. Maybe it could implement .svg... Don't know.
Thanks. Let me point out two other places where suggestions live:
- there's a tracker section called "feature requests", which is better than this forum thread for such discussions (one separate item for each feature, and items can be "closed" when the feature is implemented - doesn't happen often since people have more ideas than I have time to implement them). I honestly think this is a better place for making new suggestions, though it's not necessarily a bad idea to have a recap of the main outstanding suggestions here once in a while.
- the suggestions that I've understood / taken into account as worthy of future work usually make it into the "TODO" file in the src/ directory of the xournal distribution.
Now, specific comments about some of the suggestions you list:
* notebooks / sections / pages: I still don't quite understand the "notebook" concept and why it should be part of xournal rather than of the OS (which already has "directories" and "files"). I do agree that having a sidebar to navigate quickly among pages and possibly sections once there's such a concept would be good, so at least that much is on the to-do list.
* jnt export/import: the microsoft jnt format is still completely closed. The links you posted are interesting and useful, but the DLL used for conversion is windows-only, and I assume no source code for it is available: some heavy reverse engineering would still be needed. Of course one could try to use the Microsoft DLL write some Windows software that converts between jnt and xoj. (I'm afraid I'm not competent to do that). The to-do list does include reverse-engineering the jnt format and writing a converter.
* lasso: yes. It's been on the list of things to do for a long time (if you look at the source code, there's already icons and menu entries, hidden because I never found time to
implement it, but it will come).
* customizable toolbar: already partially done. The problem is that, to my knowledge, GTK+
doesn't provide a standard mechanism for toolbar customization. I can imagine a dialog box that would list all possible interface items and allow the user to select/deselect them. In the meantime, what already works is that you can specify in the config file (.xournal/config; the "shorten_menus=yes/no" and "shorten_menu_items=..." lines) which interface items (menu entries, toolbar items, etc.) to hide.
* SVG: it's way too general a format to be able to import it. The to-do list includes being able to export to SVG, and importing the subset of SVG used by jarnal.
Denis
Thank you for your response. I'm so sorry that I did not read 2Do. Next time I will use Tracker, I didn't because I am just poor little noob.
Hey man,
i cannot await xournal++ to come. Xournal really rocks! It s very good software and it is so needed.
I found a script that converts jnt to pdf (under Windows). I hope this will ease the change from windows journal to xournal for a lot of people. The script isn t perfect but you are free to improve it.
http://forum.ubuntuusers.de/topic/ms-journal-dateien-unter-linux-oeffnen-wie/#post-3742637
And yes, SVG (or zipped svg, which means the jarnal-file format) would be the best choice for saving notes. In my opinion it should even become the default file format.
Keep up the good work on xournal ;)
Thanks for your enthusiasm and interest! As to the script you mention: it may be of some interest to windows users, however all it does is automate the process of opening a file in MS Journal and printing it to PDF. So it won't help non-windows users import jnt files… Thanks anyway!
Denis