How active is Intaglio Development?

Legacy Intaglio
1

I’ve just been through the various options for vector illustration on the Mac other than Illustrator, and Intaglio seems to be very impressive (I was surprised by how good EasyDraw was, but the aesthetics of the app were just too gaudy for me to use!).

I’m about to buy it, but I have one remaining question - how active is development? It’s hard to tell from the site, and there are mentions of version of OSX from years ago which doesn’t bode well.

Can anyone give me any hints about this?

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2

On May 10, 2009, at 2:19 PM, Robin Barooah wrote:

I’ve just been through the various options for vector illustration
on the Mac other than Illustrator, and Intaglio seems to be very
impressive (I was surprised by how good EasyDraw was, but the
aesthetics of the app were just too gaudy for me to use!).

I’m about to buy it, but I have one remaining question - how active
is development? It’s hard to tell from the site, and there are
mentions of version of OSX from years ago which doesn’t bode well.

Can anyone give me any hints about this?

There are four sides to this.

  1. Featuritis which leads straight to applications of which 90%
    people use at most 10% so that the 90% have to put up with the 90%
    which for them is not only useless but cumbersome.

  2. Whether or not, whenever the developers realize that some feature
    would really be of use to more than 10%, they actually implement it.
    Having used Intaglio almost from the beginning, I will vouch for the
    fact that they do.

  3. The “breathless activity syndrome”. In order to appear to be
    really on top of whatever they are doing, developers tend to put out,
    rather more often than not, Version m.n.j.k+1 a few weeks, sometimes
    a few days, after having put out version m.n.j.k I am happy to say
    that Intaglio does not suffer from the breathless activity syndrome.
    New versions may be rare but whenever a new version comes out, it is
    always for a very good reason.

  4. Last but not least, the developers of Intaglio are very receptive
    to suggestions subject to—I imagine—1. above.

So, the question your post raises is: what are you, or likely soon to
be, missing in the current Intaglio? If there isn’t any, I would say
you are most likely to be quite happy with the current version of
Intaglio for a long while.

Regards
–Schremmer

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3

Well, I’m glad you have confidence in the developers. I agree that adding features to software for the sake of it produces bad results, and that’s not what I’m asking about

The cost of purchase of something like intaglio is irrelevant compared to the investment of time and understanding in using the tool.

There are bugs in the existing version, and Apple will continue to develop their systems necessitating maintenance and adaptation even if there are no new features needed. On top of that, there are competitors who will draw resources away from the developers if the product is seen as stale. I want to know that the tool I am investing time in is supported by a viable company. It’s a bad sign if this is hard to ascertain since it means that others will be deterred also, most of them long before they think of asking a question, and you aren’t going to be there to convince them of the attentions of the developers.

I think intaglio is the best product in it’s class but it took me hours of effort to determine that. This is also not a good sign.

An example of a feature that’s missing that I would like to see? Boolean operations should work seamlessly on bitmap objects. No additional UI or ‘design weight’ would be needed to make this work but it would add a great deal of power to the application.

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4

On May 10, 2009, at 4:33 PM, Robin Barooah wrote:

Well, I’m glad you have confidence in the developers.

It is not a matter of confidence. As I mentioned, I have used
Intaglio for many years. I have also made requests for features. I
had to make a case for them but, once the developers were convince,
they were implemented fairly rapidly.

I agree that adding features to software for the sake of it
produces bad results, and that’s not what I’m asking about

The cost of purchase of something like intaglio is irrelevant
compared to the investment of time and understanding in using the
tool.

Absolutely true.

There are bugs in the existing version

Of course. But then MS Word lost me a whole chapter of a book because
their “long document” had a bug. I have yet to lose something with
Intaglio.

, and Apple will continue to develop their systems necessitating
maintenance and adaptation even if there are no new features needed.

So far, as far as I know, Intaglio has kept up with Apple.

On top of that, there are competitors who will draw resources
away from the developers if the product is seen as stale.

I don’t understand what stale means. If a software does the job I
bought it for and the software keeps up with the OS, I don’t see it
as stale.

I want to know that the tool I am investing time in is supported by
a viable company.

How do you define “viable”?

It’s a bad sign if this is hard to ascertain

How hard was it to ascertain the viability of, say, General Motors?

since it means that others will be deterred also, most of them long
before they think of asking a question, and you aren’t going to be
there to convince them of the attentions of the developers.

I don’t see where you are going here.

I think intaglio is the best product in it’s class but it took me
hours of effort to determine that.

How does one determine how anything is a good product in less than
hours?

This is also not a good sign.

I don’t see what this has to do with anything. These days, I use
LaTeX heavily and it took me months of use to begin to be just a bit
proficient at it and to experience its power. What does it prove
other than the fact that the learning curve of LaTeX is regrettably
steep?

An example of a feature that’s missing that I would like to see?
Boolean operations should work seamlessly on bitmap objects. No
additional UI or ‘design weight’ would be needed to make this work
but it would add a great deal of power to the application.

Of course, I can’t speak to that. Maybe the developer will. But that
would seem to have little to do with how alive Intaglio is as a company.

May I suggest that, in final analysis, you buy what you want and then
you live with it as long as you can.

Regards
–Schremmer

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5

Forgive me if I am wrong, but Intaglio doesn’t deal with bitmaps
because it is a vector based application.

At the moment boolean operations work seamlessly on vector based
operations. If you want to edit bitmaps, shouldn’t you be using
an image editor for that?

I can recommend Intaglio highly. Very highly in fact, and use it a
lot, finding it one of the easiest, most accessible vector based tools
available
at any price. Having said that, I would also recommend VectorDesigner
too.

Acorn is a good basic image editor if you need an alternative to
Photoshop. :slight_smile:

Tom

On 10 May 2009, at 21:33, Robin Barooah wrote:

Boolean operations should work seamlessly on bitmap objects

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6

Robin hi
On 10 May 2009, at 19:19, Robin Barooah wrote:

I’ve just been through the various options for vector illustration
on the Mac other than Illustrator, and Intaglio seems to be very
impressive (I was surprised by how good EasyDraw was, but the
aesthetics of the app were just too gaudy for me to use!).

I’m about to buy it, but I have one remaining question - how active
is development? It’s hard to tell from the site, and there are
mentions of version of OSX from years ago which doesn’t bode well.

Can anyone give me any hints about this?
I bought Intaglio about a year ago and use it almost every day.
Excellent product. The longer I use it the better I think it is.

Re bloatware. This is one of the great things about intaglio - it is
bloat free and that makes it a pleasure and easy to use.
I’m an enthusiast.

Re active development, on the one occasion that an error was
discovered it got fixed.
The community here is good. Nicely quiet most of the time and when a
technical question does occur it gets answered.

I see no reason to migrate to google anything.
In my opinion the current mailing list works well.

very best wishes
Julius

http://juliuspaintings.co.uk

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7

On May 10, 2009, at 6:10 PM, julius wrote:

Robin hi
On 10 May 2009, at 19:19, Robin Barooah wrote:

I’ve just been through the various options for vector illustration
on the Mac other than Illustrator, and Intaglio seems to be very
impressive (I was surprised by how good EasyDraw was, but the
aesthetics of the app were just too gaudy for me to use!).

I’m about to buy it, but I have one remaining question - how
active is development? It’s hard to tell from the site, and there
are mentions of version of OSX from years ago which doesn’t bode
well.

Can anyone give me any hints about this?
I bought Intaglio about a year ago and use it almost every day.
Excellent product. The longer I use it the better I think it is.

Re bloatware. This is one of the great things about intaglio - it
is bloat free and that makes it a pleasure and easy to use.
I’m an enthusiast.

Re active development, on the one occasion that an error was
discovered it got fixed.
The community here is good. Nicely quiet most of the time and when
a technical question does occur it gets answered.

I see no reason to migrate to google anything.
In my opinion the current mailing list works well.

very best wishes
Julius

Well said.
(Re. bloatware, I started with Canvas circa 1988.)
Regards
–schremmer

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8

On 10 May 2009, 9:23 pm, ttrw wrote:

Forgive me if I am wrong, but Intaglio doesn’t deal with bitmaps
because it is a vector based application.

At the moment boolean operations work seamlessly on vector based
operations. If you want to edit bitmaps, shouldn’t you be using
an image editor for that?

I can recommend Intaglio highly. Very highly in fact, and use it a
lot, finding it one of the easiest, most accessible vector based tools
available
at any price. Having said that, I would also recommend VectorDesigner
too.

Acorn is a good basic image editor if you need an alternative to
Photoshop. :slight_smile:

Tom

On 10 May 2009, at 21:33, Robin Barooah wrote:

Boolean operations should work seamlessly on bitmap objects

I am not talking about editing the bitmaps - I’m talking about being able to cut up the ‘canvas’ on which the bitmap is painted - which starts out as a rectangle.

This is a feature of other vector editors - e.g. Xara X, and is particularly nice precisely because it uses the existing tools and doesn’t require any new menu items or buttons. It’s a vector feature that you can’t duplicate practically using a bitmap editor.

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9

Do you mean you want the bitmap to appear within a drawn shape—like Paste Inside? If so:

Draw the shape and position it over the bitmap.
Select both objects and Group.
In the Group palette, click the ‘Standard’ button. The bitmap appears within (masked by) the drawn shape.

If you mean you want to slice the bitmap into two different images:

Make a copy of the bitmap and draw a box on top. One of the edges will define where the slice is to be.

Mask one side of the picture as detailed above.

On the second picture, repeat the procedure, but on the other side of the picture.

Another way is to convert the bitmap to a pattern. The pattern ‘tiles’ to fill the box.

Use the Point Selection tool to drag points to where the slice is to be. Make a copy of the bitmap and repeat the procedure on the other half of the picture.

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10

IanB: Thanks for those tips. The pattern approach looks closest to what I want.

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