morph and comment

[BradBradleySL]

I need to morph a group of objects together, anyone know of a way of doing this? And a commment for everyone, get Star Draw, its great, I tried using Adobe Streamline to vectorize a detail .bmp, and forget it, doesn't do it, but Star Draw got it right on my first attempt, that is so far(next to KoolMoves) one of my greatest finds, thanks Johnie.

Brad

[Bob Hartzell]

I am probably 4-6 days away from having groups. I was totally deluded last week when I thought I had all the code in place.

Something that will be quite popular, I predict, in the next version is a statistics screen with file size in sound kb, jpeg kb, and vectors kb.

What is the url for Star Draw again? I would like to include it in the help. Some of what Johnie has done could be moved into the help so we don't have to keep answering the same questions over and over. If you feel up to it, Johnie, maybe you could cut/paste/edit some of your posts for inclusion in the help if that is OK by you.

[johnie]

The URl before oct 13'th

http://www.sun.com

after Oct 13'th both the source code and binary will be at:

http://www.openoffice.org

I have no problem with adding what I have done to the help files.

In fact I am working on 2 more tutorials, I just don't know when I'll be done with them.

[BradBradleySL]

I know how time is don't have enough of it in my opinion. Hoping to get something accomplished tonight.

Brad

[flashopper]

Is there any way to get StarDraw without the cumbersome 80MB download? Thanks for any info...

[BradBradleySL]

Not until Oct. 13

then you will go to

http://www.openoffice.org/

Brad

[johnie]

If it won't let you just get Star-Draw alone the first thing I am going to do is make it so that you can and make it work with the Gimp using POW and the GNU-C++ Libriaries.

Star Office being GPLed would allow me to do this. In fact the GPL would allow Bob to take the code for its 3-d shapes and vectorization routines and put them into KoolMoves if I read and understand the liscense correctly.

I believe that the way that is getting GPLed allows people to use portions of the code without the other stipulations that come with normal GPLed software (The software source code must be available for free- a fee may be charged for physical deliverance of the code- and people are allowed to create derivitives of the program for free.). That is If I read it right. I'm not a lawyer.


That would be really cool.

[johnie]

Until OCT 13'th you can custom install just Star Draw. To be more exact you can install the whole package and then Un-Install the apps you don't need.

You see the reason that it is 80 Megs is becuase it includes a Word Processor, an E-mail Utility, Planner, Spreadsheat, Database creation tool, HTML Editor, Desktop Environment, Suns version of Visual Basic, a Web Browser, and the Kitchen sink.

You can get a CD for along with better documentation for $50.

Star-Office is also included in most Linux Packaged CDs (most of these are $25 or less).

[flashopper]

So combining BradBradley and Johnie's posts, I'm hearing:

Option #1 (Johnie's): You can install just Stardraw right now from sun.com until 10/13, but to do so you have to download the 80mb package, then do a custom install or delete. Question here: do you have to install everything, then delete the things you don't want, or can you initially just choose to install StarDraw by itself?

Option#2 (Brad's): You can wait until 10/13, then you can go to openoffice.com and just download StarDraw by itself? Is this correct?

Thanks for any clarification!...

[johnie]

I would assume that around Oct 13'th that you should be able to download Star Draw by itself becuse the GNU-Linux comunity has embraced the GIMP-an Image manipulation program- and the Star Office Package comes with its own Image Manipulation program. At the present time their is no Drawing Package out of Beta (Gyve is still in Beta) and is GPLed (Midnight Express that comes with the KDE is not GPLed) that is as powerful as Star Draw. I would assume then that the case would be that they would segregate the packages.

If they don't segregate it then under the GPL liscence I am going to segregate the package myself and redistribute it.

Until Oct 13'th- the day the source code is realesed and the whole thing is GPLed (Gnu Public Liscense- Copylefted) you must download The entire Star Office Package and either custom install Star Impress or Star Draw (I forgot which one was valid) or install the whole enchillada and then De-Install the Apps you do not want.

The App is 80 megs becuase it was designed to be a replacement for MS Office and it Duplicates almost all of its apps.

A side note to this is that all of the Star Office apps are 95% interoperable with MS Office. That means that you can write something in MS Word, Excell, Power Point, ETC and Star Office can read it- On the other hand Star Office allows you to save as MS Office Extensions. Sun acquired and is GPLing Star Office to hurt Microsoft. The CD version of the App is only $50 compared to $500-$800 to purchase MS Office.

[flashopper]

So Johnie, it sounds like you can customize the 80mb install to just install StarDraw? You have experience with this? Just making sure, I don't want to go through the whole install and then take almost all of it off again. Thanks for any insight...

[johnie]

Yes,

But the other route is easier.

[johnie]

It will make you download the whole thing anyways. You should also note that it will also install a Java work environment on your machine.

[CoolMoves]

Johnie (or anyone else) one quick question. I am starting to use Adobe Photoshop 4.0

Is there any reason why I should switch to Star office? I tried it but it didn't look to be as good as Photoshop, but at version 4.0 I might be missing a feature that Star office covers. What do you think ?

[johnie]

Photo Shop is a Image Manipulation program where as Star Draw is a drawing program.

The difference is that Drawing programs typically deal in vectors while Image Manipulation Programs deal in raster.

Paint Shop Pro, The GIMP, and Photo Shop are all very good Image manipulation programs whereas Star Draw, Trajectory Pro, Corel Draw, The Gyve, and Illustrator are drawing progroms and deal with vectors.

The SWF and SVG format deals in vector lines and shapes as does KoolMoves internal files.

The deal with Star Draw is that it will vectorize your Raster graphics and export as vector WMF (the vector import supported by Kool Moves) while Photo Shop will not. Photo Shop will only export flat-or bitmap WMF which KoolMoves will reject if you try to import them as vector drawings.

You could create Raster graphics and import as BMP.

The difference- Listen up here this is crucial-

Between Vector and Raster art is that vector art is scalable. Although raster (Simplified explanation: bitmap art- BMP, PICT, JPEG, MNG, PNG, GIF- a square map is subdivided into dots per inch and each dot is filled with a specific color) art is more detialed in general than vector art it will only look good at the resolution it was created at. Vector art on the other hand will scale to any size without distortion becuase the shapes and lines are stored as mathmatical functions instead of a bitmap (Note: Vector art until recently had a pen and ink feel to it).

So the short answer is that you shouldn't compare Star Draw with Photo Shop. In fact I would use Photo shop and Star Draw together. In fact Image manipulation program that comes with Star Office, Star Image, the comparable app is very bad. I think somewhere I said that before and recomended to aquire Paint Shop Pro, The Gimp (I highly recommend the linux version-the Windows port has some stability issues*save often*), or Photo Shop depending on your budget.

[Edited by johnie on 10-04-2000 at 07:06 PM]

[johnie]

One more thing:

Star office is free by download or $50 on CD-

How much does Photo Shop csost?