Happy 20th Birthday to Inkscape | Hacker News Reader

Happy 20th Birthday to Inkscape

inkscape.gitlab.io

280 pointshaubry34 comments

Inkscape is fantastic. When I needed to quote a diagram in a paper, I could just import the quoted article's PDF into inkscape and just take the diagram. A quiet super powwr, frankly. Also when screwing around with d3.js, I could create elaborate SVGs in inkscape, name the nodes I cared about, and alter them programmatically in d3. Great tool

Inkscape is getting a little old in the tooth. I've used it on Linux, Windows, and Mac. Even though the features and updates are much less frequent than in the old Sodipodi days, I still haven't found the a tool that works better for my needs.

I use it to generate images and graphics for my books. I wrote an extension that lets me create a layer where I create rectangles with ids that will correspond to PNG filenames. When I run the extension it makes the layer invisible and exports each rectangle.

Maybe there were other reasons for the fork, but most visible to me in the fork from Sodipodi was that each document needed it's own toolbars in Inkscape. And that made me really sad for a long time, because it was clear Inkscape was otherwise "winning," way more active. It just felt like such a wrongheaded move having 4-5 copies of toolbars open, each tied to a specific document. No other illustrator software works like that, and imo for a good reason.

Inkscape has been awesome, both as an editor for SVGs that leverages whatever SVG can support, and as a tool in automated processes. While I haven't used it much when I vectorized a lot of things on Wikimedia Commons (because handwriting the files was easier for some enough geometric shapes), I've been using it for a few years now as part of the pipeline to build a card game [1]. With the exception of the CMYK conversion at the end, I've managed to build everything with open source software and Inkscape has been invaluable.

[1] https://fallacygame.com/

Inkscape is extremely useful for me in combination with a laser cutter.

Do you have good resource/tutorial for learning how to use a laser cutter?

Our local makerspace has a cutter and I've been intrigued about how to use it.

I've got experience in 3D modelling (beginner Fusion360 user) but have never worked with designing for a cutter.

Do you have experience with 3D printers or CNC machines ? Essentially , a laser engraver/cutter just needs a 2D drawing like an SVG or DXF and it turns on the laser once it moves the laser head.

Tons of maker vids on YouTube.

Lasers are 2D, so arguably simpler.

Draw up a design, then assign toolpaths to:

- cut all the way through

- engrave making a light--dark mark

- Design what you want

- Save as SVG

- Import into LightBurn

- Set your speeds and strengths

- Export to laser cutter

That’s very simplified, as designing for laser cutters has some “gotchas” (merging shapes to create connected outlines, cut vs etch, etch before cut, inside parts before outlines, etc etc), but it’s the general idea and can get you started.

I generally recommend starting with basic stuff like text in a simple shape that consists of a single cut line (keyring, nameplate on a door, Christmas bauble, etc). Etch the text, cut out the shape around it. Work your way up from there.

'Export to laser cutter' -> set speed; intensity for layers; press 'play' and sit back.

It's so easy it's deceptive.

Oh, and wear those safety glasses.

At our local makerspace the laser cutter has a microswitch attached in parallel with the laster tube, so it won't output anything if the lid isn't fully closed

That's good! But the bulk of the cheap laser cutters doesn't even have an enclosure of any kind. If you're lucky you might have some limit switches and an e-stop switch.

I had no idea it had been around so long. I only discovered it about 2 years ago when I wanted to convert some multiple-layer files from Illustrator to .STL for 3D Printing.

It was preceded by sodipodi:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodipodi

And before that Gill[1].

[1]: https://levien.com/svg/

Those old pages tend to be a study in linkrot. Amazing the web works as well as it does over short time spans but in the long run it all falls apart. Thank you for all the good stuff over the years by the way, it is much appreciated!

Also embroidery machines and fabric cutting machines:

https://inkstitch.org/

I've also lasered lots of things from Inkscape drawings. I've always found it easier to use than proper CAD but still get good results.

I don't remember this much, but a previous me wrote a guide for lasering using Inkscape for Edinburgh Hacklab. I don't think the process has changed much... https://wiki.ehlab.uk/inkscape_for_lasering

On my 2019 MBP, the thank-you frame transition is choppy in Firefox and very choppy in Safari. In my brief attempt to use the browsers' performance profilers, it looks like 40ms per paint in Firefox and 300ms per paint in Safari. Chrome is less than 2ms per paint and only drops about 20% of rendered frames.

Can anyone with more browser perf debugging experience explain why this animation is so janky, especially on non-Chrome browsers?

I love Inkscape. Along with Gimp, it covers all my non-artist needs. For work or personal.

Happy birthday to Inkscape and kudos to all those that shaped it into what it is today!

I use Inkscape pretty much every single day, and it’s in my top 5 pieces of software ever made.

I’ve used it professionally in industries dominated by Adobe crapware, and in pretty much all my hobbies, both physical and digital.

I use Inkscape to create simple yet high-quality SVG images for technical presentations/talks. It's great and it integrates somewhat easily with LaTeX too.

Is this official? I mean, where has it been shared officially like on the forum or blog?

They have a celebratory tweet [1]. Wikipedia lists the initial release as November 6, 2003 [2].

[1] https://twitter.com/inkscape/status/1721123809002917936

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inkscape

That's not the link tho. That's something else.

Where did this come from?

It really is quite nice at this point.

Is there some way to export pure base SVG, without any of that stuff in the "inkscape" namespace that carries around page size and such?

In the "Save as..." pop-up, you can set the file type to "Optimized SVG" (among other SVG output types, if I remember correctly). Picking optimized SVG pops up another dialog on save that can be used to configure the optimization passes.

I regularly use this to export small SVGs for the web.

You can select "Plain SVG" instead of "Inkscape SVG" in the file saving dialogue.

I made my doctoral defense slides with Inkscape. It was a lot of work, but it looked beautiful!

Happy birthday! And a big thanks to all Inkscape developers and contributors!

Long live FOSS <3

Pro tip: definitely go through a tutorial when you first try to use inkscape, at least if you are like me with no previous vector drawing experience

TIL about Inkscape! Nice!

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