<<< your input on next version of swish please >>>

[Magic Mark]

Forms that could email the data, so as not to need CGI etc etc

BTW cant wait for it
Mark

[Labyrinth]

My Wish List

1. "Text" deletes automatically when I start typing what I want to appear so I don't end up with a "textHelp" button due to forgetting to remove the word 'text' myself.

2. A more accurate help file. It was rather frustrating to read all about 'Start Drag, Stop Drag etc then not be able to find the corresponding actions in the program. Only to be told after a query that the Help File is ahead of the program.

3. Ability to lock panels in place (User Preferences) so that I can't accidentally pick it up and then have to re-organise the layout.

4. Ability to set my own defaults, (User Preferences) which the program remembers the next time I open it up.
For example... grid size I change every time I start the program as I don't like the 20, 20 sizing.

5. It would be good if the movie outline was visible from all areas. When I go into a sprite I have no idea where my movie outline is so on occasions have unknowingly placed objects outside the movies height/width.

6. Automatic Update when I move actions around in the frames which are linked to by other sprites. Okay I know I should use labels... but we newbies have a lot to learn about the program and an automatic update would just make it one less thing we have to remember ourselves!

7. There's been a lot of other good suggestions such as shape tweening and the library and probably even more but at 14 pages long I haven't read every posting yet.

Hope I haven't repeated to many thing already mentioned by others.

On the whole I like the program a lot. Probably would still not be doing Flash Animations if I hadn't been introduced to SWiSH.

The support, is fantastic.
The tutorials and Help Forum are a great resource.

Keep up the excellent standard!

[bill_fact]

Hi,

There have been many suggestions, most of which would be great. I don't think this has been suggested, but if it has, sorry in advance.

I know that you can create your own effects, and save them.

What I would like is to be able to create new directories (folders), in the EFFECTS directory. This would let me keep the ones that I use the most, separate from the rest.

Thanks for a wonderful product! I have been teaching people how to use computers since the early 80's and I have never found anything that is this easy to learn how to use.

Bill

[LikesBls]

Most actions or tasks that you ask swish to do are no problem and the basics are easily learned.
However the placement for commands to run scenes in succession is confusing for some reason. If there could be a totorial specific for this problem it would have saved me hrs and hrs. Under surtain situations some scenes don't play.

[Frets]

Rare situations where no actions are assigned to a scene.

Without this function though file sizes would be huge and there would be more frames then needed for scenes.
making for very bulky unstable movies.

[l2oBiN_Ho0D]

Not sure if this has been said before, it prbably has.

A OUTLINE ACTIONS WINDOW IS DEFINITIVELY NEEDED!
sorry I cant stress it out any more. Big projects become a nightmare! And god forbit you are trying to decifer someone elses big project.... please please please include this! ITS ESSENTIAL!

[Dead Rabbit]

First, a huge thanks to Roger O and the entire Swish team. I had a need for Flash and no time to learn it, and your team provided an affordable solution that literally changed my life.
[Ok, Tearful "Lifetime Movie Channel" moment over with - on to my
(S)wish list...]

Fixes:

1. I think you got the point about the Place effect popup.
2. As far as program freezes, 512MB of Ram and a ram scrubber (MemTurbo: $19.95) fixed that on my system. Is there a memory leak somewhere?
3. I think you've had enough abuse from everyone else - fill in 3-10 from their posts.

Wishes:

1. Object libraries. The ability to save sprites and/or objects in a library that you can select from. (I keep mine in a .swi called (duh) Library.swi)

2. I hope you got the message about sound manipulation. I need to sychronize sound on every movie, and only MS Producer (an add-in for Powerpoint) claims the ability to do so. Focus here and gain an even bigger following in the Multimedia world.

3. Some sort of "Master Layer" or "Scene Mask" - the ability to place an object (i.e. Control buttons) on every scene without copy/paste on each individual scene in the movie. I usually find that I've made an error in the button AFTER I place it on each scene in each movie.

4. Shape tweening. We know it's not easy to program the interface, but it would be a great feature.

Lastly, please, Please, PUH-LEASE(!) don't remove the ability to drag the panels off of the Swish window to the desktop. I use 3 monitors on my system and really, really find having the timeline and movie outline on a separate monitor extremely useful when working with large numbers of objects.

Thanks!

(And thanks for fielding all of the abuse from the group)

[Xcel]

I want to edit my Sprites on top of the main scene. It is very irritating to have to edit a Sprite in its own environment without the benefit of seeing the scene.

What if I need to align a button or shape or whatever with something in a scene? I never undestood the concept of editing Sprites by themselves. It serves no purpose that I can see. Or maybe I just have not found a use for it yet.

When I work on a movie.... that Sprite is part of the movie and therefore should be edited where I can see the rest of the movie. I shouldn't have to guess where it will be when I change back to viewing the scene.

[xclinicx]

Hey, a few things that would be lovely to see in the next version or two of SWiSH. I'll just list them for you as follows:

1) To actually be able to copy and paste button actions. (tell target, goto frame). It becomes tedious at time, having re-create the very similar button functions.

2) To be able to select "effects" from different objects vertically, copy and paste them vertically in the timeline. As of now I can only select effects horizontally and only from one object.

3) Inserting. Inserting multiple seconds rather a single second. Also the ability to insert X amount of frames.

4) When inside a menu sprite filled with specific sprites that are menus, (i.e. Background and text ("Company Profile"), the text is the button, the button and the background are a sprite of their own. There are several of these individual sprites because it is a menu and all these separate sprites are within another (parent) sprite.
It would be nice (no pressure) for SWiSH to recognize when I am converting each separate text label into a button, (WHILE WITHIN THE SPRITE) in such a way as a call or something, asking if I "...would like to convert all of the text-objects within the present tree (Sprite) into buttons. Neat eh? : )

5) Enhanced image tools, image etc. (SWiSH is a really competitive application development kit so it's only going up!)

6) Gradiency with line objects : )

7) Ability to select multiple text objects and change their properties all at one time.

[Ozzworld]

WEB FORMS!!!! PLEEEEEASSSSSEEEE! lol

I would LOVE to be able to put my notpad away!

Ozzie

[OldAndUgly]

It would be nice if Swish could retain the name of the fonts used when the swi is saved. That way the fonts can be easily identified later even if the fonts are no longer installed in the fonts directory.

You are doing a great job ... Thanks

George Crofton

[marsman]

It would be helpful if swish could show you how long a file would take to load. Flash has one after going into the control test movie you can choose modem speed. It will then show you the preload, total time of the movie and show you streaming.

This would imporve this product a lot I think! Web pages are all about how fast they load, takes too long customers leave.

Marsman

[Xcel]

Lastly, please, Please, PUH-LEASE(!) don't remove the ability to drag the panels off of the Swish window to the desktop. I use 3 monitors on my system and really, really find having the timeline and movie outline on a separate monitor extremely useful when working with large numbers of objects.

Yes...we must keep this. I use two monitors. Panels on one and everything else on the other.

I find programs that dont allow you to drag panels onto different monitors as unuseable. Sometimes I will just not buy a program for this reason.

[sauvage]

i'm not an advanced user; so i'm afraid i'm not qualified to offer many negative or positive points about swish. but i can say what i would like to see in the next version. they are as follows --

1 guide [(at least a vertical guide) like you find in most high-end graphics and advanced word-processing software, so that one can align objects with greater ease]
2 feather [because you have only linear and radial gradients, this will enable one to create soft edges for irregularly-shaped objects]
3 freeform gradient [probably an impossibility, or it will jack up the cost of swish to stratospheric level; but this option would help make for more interesting graphics without increasing their size in term of bytes]
4 tweening
5 drag and drop

what i hope i won't see in the next version(s) --
1] unsupported features on certain panels and in the help section

[Great Dane]

Hi, Swish is great and the new version will hopefully improve the ability of the software to bring "new" people into the world of web design.

WANT:

Import facility for windows wma and wmv files.

Transparency just like Flashants "Iceprojector".

LOSE:

The tool tip that keeps popping up when you work in the "Outline box" you can't actually see what you are doing most of the time.

When is version 3 out? Do you need someone to test it? LOL

GD

[roger_onslow]

Originally posted by sauvage

1 guide [(at least a vertical guide) like you find in most high-end graphics and advanced word-processing software, so that one can align objects with greater ease]

Use object snapping .. then objects will align with each other

2 feather [because you have only linear and radial gradients, this will enable one to create soft edges for irregularly-shaped objects]

SWF is not a bitmap format .. you cannot feather with it. What can be done is making multiple copies of the shape, each slightly inflated but with color/alpha set to make it look softer.

3 freeform gradient [probably an impossibility, or it will jack up the cost of swish to stratospheric level; but this option would help make for more interesting graphics without increasing their size in term of bytes]

Again, that is not supported byt the SWF format so we cannot do it.

[roger_onslow]

Originally posted by marsman
It would be helpful if swish could show you how long a file would take to load. Flash has one after going into the control test movie you can choose modem speed. It will then show you the preload, total time of the movie and show you streaming.

This would imporve this product a lot I think! Web pages are all about how fast they load, takes too long customers leave.

Next version does give more info in the file report .. but not on download times. The calcs are easy to do .. its a simple factor on the file size. its certainly a good idea ... if there's time, I'll include time for (say) 28.8K and 56K modem speeds. If not, then apply the appropriate factor to the exported file size. Of course, if the SWF is compressed, then it will be smaller, so have to use the compressed output file size.

[Xcel]

On the downside ~personally~ is the drawing tools. Do they really get used that much? Not that they're not good, but the average Swish user is unlikely to be an artist or into drawing. S/he is likely to be into video. So ...

Sorry to disagree but the drawing tools are more likely to be used than video. Drawing is the bread and butter of Flash. That is how we create vectors. We really need more advanced drawing tools. Some 3d or shadow options would be nice. I have to use bitmaps for 3d right now and I would rather have some vector tools for 3d.

I never once needed video...nor see any use for video in the future. I have yet to see a Swish movie with any video in it.

Just my 2 cents. People obviously use Swish for different things.

[Xcel]

SVG import? It seems SVG is the major vector format.

Or maybe I am behind the times on this one?

SVG is the only vector format my favorite graphics program exports to.

But really it seems SVG is THE vector format of the times. No?

[roger_onslow]

Last time I look, SVG was still trying to make it as an accepted vector format. Few programs exported it and the player for it was large and didn't have good penetration into the market.

Of course, things can change quickly.