Features Missed


	In this section, I'll be talking about the features that somehow missed the release. In other words, features we have wanted/needed but were either ignored or were not integrated for other reasons. Below are some features I'd like to see as well as other users' requests. You can submit others by sending me feedback in the Feedback area. Features that are new additions will have New after them. Features that were added to FreeHand MX are listed at the top. If you want to send Macromedia your wishes, suggestions or comments, use this e-mail address: wish-freehand@macromedia.com I've tried to prioritize them by effectiveness in ones daily usage of FreeHand. Everyone has different wants or needs, but these were ordered for a broader audience that may find these features invaluable. Believe me the process was very difficult and if you'd like to voice your opinion on the list priority, let me know.

	Features added in FreeHand MX Stroked Placement Feature Ever draw a shape to an exact size and give it a very thick stroke? Notice how the shape no longer looks like that exact same size anymore? In Fireworks you can set the Stroke Placement to be Inset, Offset, or Centered over the objects path. Would be great to see this in FreeHand as well. See my sample page to see how it would work. So where is it? In FreeHand MX, you can mimic this behavior using the multiple attributes feature. Simply move the fill over the stroke in the inspector and vice versa to make the stroke over or under the fill. Blended Shapes retaining Object Information I wish that when blending "standard" shapes, (Objects that contain center point information; ellipses, rectangles) that the shapes would retain their Object properties instead of being converted into a path. For example, blending two rectangles that have rounded corners (created via the inspector). Since these rectangles were converted to Paths during the Blend, they can't be scaled and have the rounded corners stay at the fixed radius size. So where is it? In FreeHand MX, primitive shape like ellipses, rectangles now retain their center point information. Better yet, you can still edit other primitive attributes like corner radius on rectangles etc. All-in-One Inspector Palette submitted by Timothy Zulewski Wouldn't it be great if FreeHand had a context-sensitive panel, much like GoLive CyberStudio's. Imagine clicking on an object (or text, linked graphic, etc.) and having the panel tell you the object's name, fill, stroke, style, rotation angle and scale (for linked graphics), etc. all in one nice context-aware panel. Given the slamming that Macromedia has gotten about FreeHand's interface from most major publications, I think this would be a great feature to add to the next version. So where is it? In FreeHand MX, it's pretty darned close with the new Object Properties panel. Snap To Buttons submitted by Mark Gillham My drawing style is very dependent on snap to grid/guide/point. I'd love to have buttons/indicators for those three states more prominent than in a main menu. I can't always tell/remember what they're set at, so I have to stop and look in the menu: what a drag! I'd love to have buttons on the lower left window frame: one click toggles state, and button icon indicates the state. So where is it? There are buttons to turn on/off the Snap-to states. These are also indicators to see if it is turned on/off. Features Missed Hierarchical Layers Cascading layers or grouping would be a fantastic addition to FreeHand. I imagine it working similar to the List view on Macintosh and the Window's Explorer mode. Also being able to create separators and multiple Guide layers would be cool too. See my sample page to see how it would work. Markus Norsted has also created a nice virtual mockup of his vision of how Layer grouping could work. reason for omission: None yet. Setting Objects' Center Points See the sample page that explains how this feature could really be helpful. reason for omission: None yet. Mixing Spot Colors Many print designers would love to have the ability to mix spot colors. Sure there are convoluted workarounds, but there is not visual way of seeing two spot colors mixed on the page. Maybe as an alternative, the ability to show "true" overprinting instead of just a bunch of O's. reason for omission: None yet. Transparent Texture Fills There are workarounds described here in the Tips Archive, but having a toggle button in the Fill Inspector to make these fills transparent would be great. reason for omission: None yet. Shade Palette submitted by Mark Gillham Hey, here's a killer for all you color nuts. a "shade" palette. huh? what for? check it out: the tint palette is great for setting up linked colors but I need more. Say you've got a sphere in your illustration, so you set a color to the sphere, and a tint of the same (named) color for the "shine" of the sphere. Now you need a shadow on the bottom of the sphere, so you create a shade of the color (by adding black) and now you've got a realistic sphere. Change the hue of the original color and the hue of the shine changes with it. But the "shade" color needs to be updated manually. I need a shade palette, just like the tint palette, that would offer a range of shades of a color. That shade, when chosen from a named color, would be linked to the color just as a tint is now. You change the color of your sphere, voila! the tint AND the shade would update. This would be awesome!! reason for omission: None yet. Tile Fill Would love to be able to Paste-In bitmap images here. Anyone else agree? Still hasn't been fixed in FreeHand™ 8. reason for omission: None yet. Copy & Paste Guides A great addition to the the Guides Editor would be Copy and Paste buttons to easily copy guides across many documents. If there's an issue on different page sizes, the guides could be placed in relation to the top-Left of the page. reason for omission: None yet. Color Control Xtras I'd really like to see better options for the Color Xtras Darken, Lighten, Saturate, etc. Maybe as a slider control that shows live updates, or a dialog that lets you choose the amount of change. Right now, there is no way to determine how much the increments are changing the color, it's all guess work. Also to add to this, I think that it should let you choose to change the colors in the objects and/or the colors from the color list that are defined. It's not obvious that you have to "Name all Colors" after you apply the above modifications. One last thing, anyone else wish that these items were also selectable in either a floating palette of it's own or located in the Mixer palette? Strange place to put such useful tools. View this sample page to see how it could all look. reason for omission: None yet. Opening Older Versions of Files FreeHand 9 will not open any older files earlier than v4. This is a shame if you have just purchased FreeHand for the first time, yet have to work with older files from clients for example. The ability to open/import older files should be added back in. reason for omission: None yet. Recognition of Style Sheets and Formatting Would be great if when you import a text document with Styles and special formatting applied, FreeHand™ would recognize and add these to the Style palette for editing later. reason for omission: None yet. Some CAD features submitted by J. Odell 1. A compass tool. Something which would enable me to place a radius point, enter in a specific radius measurement and draw an arc from there. I also want to be able to specify or otherwise control the length of the arc's path. Which brings me to; 2. A flex-rule. I want to be able to measure the length of a path regardless of its shape. Right now there is no way to measure anything but the distance between two points on the screen. Don't care how far apart the points are on the screen. I need to be able to tell how far apart they are on the path. Even if the path goes around corners or is a compound curve. I also want to be able to place a point on the ruddy path and measure a given distance in a specified direction on the path to place my second point. Both of these, and several other missing features could be filled in fairly admirably by HotDoor's CADTools for Illustrator. However, Macromedia/Altsys apparently feels that if they don't choose to supply a feature that their own users have been begging them for, no one else is going to get the chance to supply them either. HotDoor was intending to develop a version of the package for FreeHand, whereupon, Macromedia/Altsys changed the specs and does not support plugin tools. reason for omission: None yet. Printing File Path in Header To add to the already present feature of printing the File Name on the page header, how about a File Path option as well. Would be very helpful when cataloging files and using this to track what disk they are on. reason for omission: None yet. Set Note feature I wish that you could see on the inspector panel if the object you have selected has been assigned a name in the "set note" feature. I know that you can look in the document report, but it would be nice to see it on the inspector, or a least in a drop down list when using find/replace. reason for omission: None yet. Crop Marks How about a feature letting you create crop marks around specified objects. I know there are 3rd party Xtras for this, but not for the Windows version, and it would be nice if it was a standard. Update: Boris Jerenec released a free Xtra called BJ Cropmarks available for Mac & Windows. reason for omission: None yet. Page Numbering submitted by Peter Hinchliffe As much as I am looking forward to FreeHand 8 (due here in Australia mid-March), I have been searching in vain for the single feature I most want included in FreeHand - that of Page Number tokens! I still haven't seen it mentioned, and I suspect it's still not there. I posted this as a request some time ago, but I guess it fell on deaf ears. With the exception of Master Pages, this single inclusion would make FreeHand a very real rival to Quark Express. After all, it has everything else, and then some! reason for omission: None yet. Windows Metafile Export on Mac submitted by David Hajime Kornhauser Another feature I wanted in 7 and now 8: direct export to WMF (Windows Metafile) format. I often have to move Freehand graphics from my Mac to Windows machines that do not print to postscript printers --so EPS files don't work well. I end up having to export to Illustrator 3 files, and then using Illustrator in Windows to save to WMF. --Hell, I wish the colors would survive these conversions as well, but that's why I'm using a Mac, eh? reason for omission: There are special ties with the Windows operating system that would be difficult to add to the Mac version of FreeHand.

Features added in FreeHand MX

Features Missed