The text tool- Version 0.3 + Version 0.4.2.1
@@ -38,6 +38,7 @@
Xournal can be downloaded at +http://xournal.sourceforge.net/ or http://math.mit.edu/~auroux/software/xournal/
@@ -53,6 +54,7 @@ Xournal can be downloaded at
The text tool+ To insert a new text item, click at the location where the text is to be + inserted on the page, then type it in or paste it using the contextual + menu (note: no wrapping is performed). To modify a text item, click inside + it. The font and point size can be modified using the "Text Font" command + in the Tools menu (or the toolbar button). The color is the same as that + currently selected for the pen (and can be modified using the toolbar + buttons). +
++ Text items can contain arbitrary Unicode characters, provided that a + suitable font is installed on your system. However, languages written + in a direction other than left-to-right might not be handled properly. + If a journal contains some items in a font that is unavailable on your + system, another one will be substituted. (Also, text items will be + lost if the document is opened in a version of Xournal prior to 0.4). + Finally, note that the printing and PDF export features only accept + TrueType and Type 1 scalable fonts (do not use any bitmap fonts), and + that the typesetting of the text may be slightly different in the + printout. +
The rulerThe ruler is not a tool by itself, but rather a special operating mode @@ -132,17 +156,44 @@ the Tools menu): line segments instead of curvy strokes. For simplicity, selecting the ruler when not in pen or highlighter mode automatically selects the pen.
+ +
The shape recognizer+ The shape recognizer is also a special + operating mode of the pen and highlighter tools. When it is enabled, + Xournal attempts to recognize geometric shapes as they are drawn, and + if successful will replace the drawn strokes accordingly. The shapes + that can be recognized are: line segments, circles, rectangles, arrows, + triangles and quadrilaterals. Polygonal shapes can be drawn in a single + stroke or in a sequence of consecutive strokes. +
++ The recognizer is set to be as unobtrusive as possible, and should not + interfere too much with handwriting. (It differs in this and other ways + from another shape recognizer written for Xournal by Lukasz Kaiser). + As a result, it may only recognize shapes if you draw them carefully and + deliberately. Specific tips for better recognition: (1) for circles, + a closed curve that isn't quite round works better + than a rounder curve that doesn't close; (2) for arrows, it is better + to lift the pen before drawing the tip of the arrow, and make sure + the tip consists of two straight line segments; + (3) for very elongated rectangles, + recognition tends to be better if you lift the pen between consecutive + sides. +
Default tools
- Each drawing tool (pen, eraser, highlighter) has a default setting
- (color, thickness, ...) associated to it.
- The "Default Pen", "Default Eraser", and "Default Highlighter" entries of
+ Each tool (pen, eraser, highlighter, text) has a default setting
+ (color, thickness, ... for the drawing tools, font and size for the
+ text tool) associated to it.
+ The "Default Pen", "Default Eraser", "Default Highlighter", and
+ "Default Text" entries of
the Tools menu select the appropriate tool and reset its settings to
the defaults. The toolbar also includes a "Default" button which
- resets the currently selected drawing tool to its default settings,
+ resets the currently selected tool to its default settings,
and a "Default Pen" button.
The "Set As Default" entry of the Tools menu takes the current settings
- of the currently selected drawing tool and makes them the new default.
+ of the currently selected tool and makes them the new default.
@@ -190,6 +241,11 @@ the Tools menu):
cursor above the top of the page so that the entire block being moved
becomes invisible results in the items being moved to the previous page.
+
Hand tool+ This tool lets you browse the journal; dragging the cursor scrolls the + view. +
All operations performed on the currently open journal (drawing, erasing, @@ -464,7 +520,8 @@ file is much more compact than those produced via gnome-print, and its pages have the same size as in Xournal. Highlighter strokes are rendered in a partially transparent manner (note however that applications such as xpdf and ghostview do not always handle -PDF transparency properly). +PDF transparency properly). Text items are rendered by embedding +TrueType subsets or Type 1 fonts into the PDF document as appropriate.
Xournal also includes a PDF file parser compatible with PDF format @@ -477,6 +534,30 @@ file, the backgrounds are converted to (compressed) bitmaps and a new PDF file is generated from scratch.
+Starting with version 0.3.2, Xournal's configuration settings can be +saved to a file (~user/.xournal/config) by using the "Save +Preferences" command in the Options menu. The settings saved in the +configuration file include in particular: +
@@ -499,6 +580,82 @@ Bug reports and suggestions can also be submitted on Xournal's
+Version 0.4.2.1 (Mar 27, 2008): +
+Version 0.4.2 (Mar 25, 2008): +
+Version 0.4.1 (Sep 15, 2007): +
+Version 0.4.0.1 (September 3, 2007): +
+Version 0.4 (August 15, 2007): +
+Version 0.3.3 (January 31, 2007): +
+Version 0.3.2 (November 25, 2006): +
+Version 0.3.1 (August 3, 2006): +
Version 0.3 (July 23, 2006):
Version 0.1 (January 2, 2006): initial release.
--Features yet to be implemented: -
Xournal stores its data in gzipped XML-like files. The gzipped data consists of a succession of XML tags describing the document. By convention, the -first few lines contain a header in the following format: +file header and trailer look like this:
<?xml version="1.0" standalone="no"?> +<xournal version="..."> <title>Xournal document - see http://math.mit.edu/~auroux/software/xournal/</title> -<xournal version="..."/> +... sequence of pages ... +</xournal>The <title> and <xournal> tags may only appear within the file header (not within the pages of the document). The version attribute of the <xournal> tag indicates which version of Xournal was used to create the document; it is currently ignored, but may be used in a later release if the file format changes in an incompatible manner. +(Following a suggestion of Matteo Abrate, starting with version 0.4 the +<xournal> tag is the document's root tag, and encloses all other tags).
The rest of the file is a sequence of pages, specified by a @@ -661,15 +814,15 @@ page of the PDF file. After the line specifying the background, the remainder of a <page> section is occupied by one or more layer sections
<layer> ... </layer>-describing the various strokes within a layer. Every page must +describing the various items within a layer. Every page must contain at least one layer; a layer may be empty. The successive layers are listed in their stacking order, from bottom to top.
-A layer consist of a collection of items, listed in the order in which +A layer consists of a collection of items, listed in the order in which they should be drawn (from bottom-most to top-most). -As of the current version, the only legal contents within a layer are +Up to version 0.3.3, the only legal contents within a layer are strokes. The format of a stroke is:
<stroke tool="..." color="..." width="..."> ... list of coordinates ... @@ -680,11 +833,21 @@ The tool attribute can take the values "pen", "highlighter", or or whiteout eraser); a value of "highlighter" indicates that the stroke should be painted in a partially transparent manner (Xournal uses an alpha coefficient of 0.5). + +The color attribute can take one of the standard values "black", "blue", "red", "green", "gray", "lightblue", "lightgreen", "magenta", "orange", "yellow", "white", or can specify a hexadecimal RGBA value in -the format "#rrggbbaa". The width attribute is a floating-point -number and specifies the width of the stroke in points (1/72 in). +the format "#rrggbbaa". +
++The width attribute is a floating-point +number (or a sequence of floating-point numbers starting with version 0.4.2), +and specifies the width of the stroke in points (1/72 in). (For a +variable-width stroke, the width attribute contains a +whitespace-separated succession of floating-point values: first the +nominal brush width, and then the width of each successive segment forming +the stroke.)
The list of coordinates is simply a succession of floating-point values, @@ -703,6 +866,25 @@ appropriate (otherwise the eraser tool will not interact properly with the stroke). The default precision used by Xournal for the x,y coordinates is 0.01 unit (1/7200 in).
+Starting with version 0.4, layers also contain text items. +The format of a text item is: +
<text font="..." size="..." x="..." y="..." color="...">... text ...</text> ++The font attribute contains the font name, for example "Serif Bold +Italic"; if the font is not available, another font will be substituted. +The size attribute specifies the font size in points. The x +and y attributes specify the coordinates of the top-left corner +of the text box in page coordinates (measured in points from the top-left +corner of the page). Finally, the color attribute contains either +the name of a standard color or a hexadecimal RGBA value (see above). + ++The contents of the text are encoded in UTF-8, with the characters +'&', '<', '>' replaced by &, <, +>. Whitespace and linefeeds are preserved (in particular, +no extraneous whitespace should be inserted between the enclosing tags +and the text itself). +
Installation issues
@@ -713,7 +895,7 @@ modern Linux distributions such as Fedora Core 3 or later, or RHEL 4 or later):
@@ -764,6 +947,7 @@ make ./configure --prefix=$HOME make make install +make home-desktop-install
Configure error message:
@@ -846,6 +1030,20 @@ installation instructions specific to your model: for example, the
use USB instead; the BottomX and BottomY values correspond to the physical
resolution of the tablet and will vary from one model to another.
+For historical reasons, most X servers do not allow the input device +designated as the "core pointer" in the X server's configuration file +to be used as an XInput extension device. Thus, your tablet input devices +should not be designated as the core pointer device. Instead, they +should be configured with the "SendCoreEvents" option, which enables them +to simultaneously generate XInput extension events and move the cursor on +the screen. Since high-resolution coordinates cannot be obtained for the +core pointer device, it is disabled in Xournal by default. +Starting with version 0.3.3, +it is possible to have core events processed alongside with extension +events (uncheck "Discard Core Events" in the Options menu); however, in +some rare cases this may lead to a loss of resolution on all devices. +
If the mouse pointer does not follow accurately the position of the stylus, @@ -871,9 +1069,9 @@ linuxwacom driver, the tablet calibration information is often not updated properly when using xsetwacom).
-Important: due to issues with the linuxwacom driver, it is important -to either upgrade your driver to a patched -version, or restrict your choice of settings as follows: +Important: due to issues with old versions of the linuxwacom +driver (< 0.7.6), it is important to upgrade your driver, +or restrict your choice of settings as follows:
-This is due to misfeatures in the linuxwacom driver. Typically, this -will happen in all of the following cases: +This is typically due to misfeatures in the linuxwacom driver in versions +prior to 0.7.6, and will happen in all of the following cases:
I have also had a report that one of the workarounds used by Xournal to bypass a calibration bug in GTK+ can actually entirely prevent strokes from being drawn. If you are being unsuccessful at drawing in Xournal -with XInput enabled, try recompiling after changing the first line of -src/main.c to -
#define ENABLE_XINPUT_BUGFIX 0+with XInput enabled, try recompiling after commenting out the line +
#define ENABLE_XINPUT_BUGFIX+near the beginning of src/xournal.h. If this modification does improve things for you, and if you have a bit of spare time to help investigate the causes of this problem, please contact me.
-You need an X server that supports the RANDR extension, and a -patched version of the linuxwacom -driver to support on-the-fly rotation. +You need an X server that supports the RANDR extension, and a sufficiently +recent (0.7.6 or later) +version of the linuxwacom driver to support on-the-fly rotation.
To set the tablet in portrait mode: @@ -932,18 +1131,5 @@ otherwise the tablet calibration in Xournal may (and most likely will) become incorrect. Exit Xournal and restart it after the display has been rotated.
- --This patch fixes rotation and calibration issues with the linuxwacom driver -version 0.7.0. -