annotation text parameters and smoother free drawing

[Shallow-Seek]

Description

1. more refined font parameters such as size color choices for annotation text, and be able to restore the the parameters set in the last use or specify them in the config.

2. smoother free drawing for stylus. The current drawing is jerky when using a drawing tablet to write annotation on Satty.

[RobertMueller2]

1. more refined font parameters such as size choices for annotation text, and be able to store the the parameter choice or able to specify it in the config.

At this point in time, you can use the s/m/l buttons and the annotation size factor. The latter can be specified via config and command line. Both may receive a slider or so in #178. Font style can be specified via config.

Anything beyond that would be a bigger change, which also needs to get a useful user interface.

2. smoother free drawing for stylus. The current drawing is jerky when using a drawing tablet to write annotation on Satty.

Have you tried different values for --brush-smooth-history-size? Can't comment on this otherwise as I don't have a tablet to test on.

[Shallow-Seek]

The latter can be specified via config and command line.

Thank you! And after the post I figured I don't really need the color memory since the palette can be defined in config and preferred color is one click away.

Have you tried different values for --brush-smooth-history-size? Can't comment on this otherwise as I don't have a tablet to test on.

--brush-smooth-history-size turns out to decide how closely the writing will follow the stylus or mouse. Any value except 0 will make the writing too laggy to write properly.
Probably an option like --brush-smooth-strength will help. Here is the comparison of writing in satty(left) and another app(right).

[RobertMueller2]

OK, thanks for the clarification and illustration, that makes sense.

[RobertMueller2]

I ordered a Wacom Intuos, and I'm trying to understand how it works with Satty and if we could improve the overall experience. (No promises on the if or a timeline, or how long it may even take to tackle any prerequisites that may arise.)

If you don't mind, could you share a bit more info about the environment, if you use any special config, what your workflow is (e.g. how do you switch tools etc)

My first take on this is that the brush-history-size as such would be the way to go (0 means disable any smoothing) and I'm not 100% convinced we need a strength control, but we need to de-lag the history when it's enabled, which has been a "v2" remark in #94 when it was implemented.

Also, I just realised, I have a stylus on my chromebook so I could just have used that. 🤦‍♂️

[Shallow-Seek]

I ordered a Wacom Intuos, and I'm trying to understand how it works with Satty and if we could improve the overall experience. (No promises on the if or a timeline, or how long it may even take to tackle any prerequisites that may arise.)

If you don't mind, could you share a bit more info about the environment, if you use any special config, what your workflow is (e.g. how do you switch tools etc)

My first take on this is that the brush-history-size as such would be the way to go (0 means disable any smoothing) and I'm not 100% convinced we need a strength control, but we need to de-lag the history when it's enabled, which has been a "v2" remark in #94 when it was implemented.

Also, I just realised, I have a stylus on my chromebook so I could just have used that. 🤦‍♂️

Thanks!
I am on 6.19.6-arch1-1 and niri 25.11 without xwayland.

My satty_cli 0.20.1 config has only

[general]
annotation-size-factor = 0.5
resize = { mode="smart" }
[font]
family = "Cantarell"
style = "Regular"

I use Sunshine on Linux to stream a display to a tablet/ipad/phone to write on Satty.

The brush_history_size seems to decide how sensitive the drawing trajectory will follow the pointer of the stylus/mouse. When I set it to 1, I found the trajectory will reach the place of the pointer of the mouse. When I set it to 9, the trajectory loses a lot of movement information, say you wiggle your writing up and down, the trajectory will remain flat. 0 gives the most sensitive writing experience but also spikes. I kind of get used to the writing on Satty after writing on it for a while and write slowly to avoid the spikes.

[RobertMueller2]

Does #592 improve the usage for you, by chance? It's not merged yet, but I think that should happen soon.