Keyboard shortcut - Lock current layer

[pRototype]

This is a new entry on the wishlist from me.

I simply want to be able to use a keyboard shortcut to lock current layer.

Reason is that I often find myself switching active layer, and I only want to edit a layer at a time, espechially when the layers below is pretty filled of all kind of objects. Aiming the mouse pointer to the lock-icon make me spend a lot more time on a draw job than I would do if I could do this more effective.

Thanks

[Jessica (jess+launchpad)]

Here's a patch that adds Lock and Hide toggle verbs, which you can then assign to keys.

Added two verbs:
- LayerToggleLock
- LayerToggleHide

Tested with 0.48.3.1, which is currently the highest version in the gentoo repos. Was a lot less complicated than I thought it would be, only had to modify verbs.cpp and verbs.h

~jessica

[jazzynico (jazzynico)]

Patch tested successfully on Windows XP, Inkscape trunk revision 11129. Thanks, Jessica!

Now we need to associate the actions to shortcuts, and the list is already a bit crowded...
I'd use Ctrl+Alt+H (hide) and Ctrl+Alt+L (lock), but the first one is already used by org.inkscape.typography.previousglyphlayer. If we consider that core Inkscape shortcuts have priority over extensions, we can also modify the previousglyphlayer shortcut...

[jazzynico (jazzynico)]

Patch committed in the trunk, revision 11131.

Ctrl+Alt shortcuts may not be a very good choice due to windows managers interactions (Ctrl+Alt+L locks screen on Ubuntu...).
I'll try to find better free shortcuts.

[su_v (suv-lp)]

Since translators complained that such verbs without GUI hook are difficult to translate [1], attaching a proposal to reorg and extend the 'Layer' menu (adding the two toggle commands, and grouping 'Duplicate current layer' with 'Delete current layer' further down).

[1] <http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.graphics.inkscape.devel/38674/focus=38676>

[su_v (suv-lp)]

Patch to add stub ('unbound') entries for the new verbs in 'share/keys/default.xml' (to make them discoverable for users which prefer to use custom key-mapping).

[su_v (suv-lp)]

The shortcut as currently implemented IMHO has one big caveat users need to be made aware off: if the current drawing level is inside a group, the parent group instead of the parent layer is actually locked/hidden. If the user then leaves the group (e.g. by clicking on a different object outside the group, it is difficult to unlock (or unhide) that specific group.

The only indication that this going to happens is the "Layer" selector in the status bar which displays the current drawing level (i.e. the id of the group which is going to be (un)locked or (un)hidden).

Related reports (the issue is not new):
Bug #863974 "elements no longer available for selection"
Bug #845844 "Groups not selectable - turned insensitive (locked) without using object properties dialog"
Bug #304251 "incorrect locking/unlocking -- unlocking the layer locks the group which was choosen to be active"

[su_v (suv-lp)]

Updated patch for shortcut stubs (to keep 'inkscape.xml' and 'default-xml' in sync).

[jazzynico (jazzynico)]

Both the menu skeleton and shortcuts changes look good. Thanks ~suv!
Any idea for suitable shortcuts?

[su_v (suv-lp)]

> Any idea for suitable shortcuts?

Not really - maybe leave it up to the users for now?

Personally, I use these bindings in '~/.config/inkscape/keys/default.xml' - they are rather cryptic, but ok for testing (and for my own needs):

  <bind key="L" modifiers="Alt,Shift" action="LayerToggleHide" display="true" /> <!-- L -->
  <bind key="l" modifiers="Alt,Ctrl" action="LayerToggleLock" display="true" /> <!-- l -->

(on my system 'Alt+Ctrl' is not reserved by the window manager (quartz-wm), and if conflicts arise with other OS X system shortcuts, I usually tend to change those instead)

[jazzynico (jazzynico)]

New menu and stub committed in the trunk, revision 11528.

[su_v (suv-lp)]

If of concern to others, the issue mentioned in comment #6 should be tracked in a separate report.

Closing this one as 'Fix committed', milestone 0.91.