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Community => Showcase => Topic started by: mkcc on September 16, 2020, 12:24:38 AM

Title: Layers, Elements & Levels - can there be too many?
Post by: mkcc on September 16, 2020, 12:24:38 AM
Hi -
I'm new to Scribus, but have managed to create a document with 2 Master Pages, and several layers.
The layers are basically copies with a few changes on each for each 'Model' which are turned on individually and coupled with the Master pages to produce a Model script document.
There are Multiple Elements consisting of text, drawn lines, boxes and vector images on every Layer for each model. There are over 10,000 elements (at this stage).

Problem is when I need to edit to adjust the position or any attribute of any element or replace and element, Scribus seems to automatically jump to (select) one of the vector graphic images (the largest in mm size in fact) on the layer and freezes (not responding) making it worrisome that scribus will crash out (which it has done) and doesn't allow me to easily select an element by clicking it on the page without having to use the 'Outline' function (thank goodness for that function). I've learnt to do frequent periodic saves/saveas and backup saves.

I'm trying to understand how it all works.

My questions are, please:
1. What importance is the 'level' of an element within the whole file? e.g. If I have a layer (for one model) with Text at levels 20-25, drawn lines at 305-330, polygons at 2500-2522 and vector images at 7052, 8103, 8755, 10013. 
Should the elements be in sequence for better performance for
a. calling up the layer and
b. for editing of the layer?

I know that every time I need to delete an element and replace it, the level number is the next highest. Does this create a problem?
Is there a better way I should be doing this to achieve as I described in the beginning?

If the levels are what is causing my problem, Is there a way of of re-indexing the levels for each model so they are in sequence. BTW I named all my elements "Model_ElementType_Fieldname" eg. Bravo_T_STFF         Element Types are: T=Text, D=Diagram, DL=DiagramLabel, L=LineDrawn

Title: Re: Layers, Elements & Levels - can there be too many?
Post by: a.l.e on September 18, 2020, 08:51:16 AM
you seem to be doing vector graphics in scribus...

scribus is mainly a GUI tool for creating layouts and while it can manage vector graphics, it's not the best tool for that goal.

of course, scribus does not have a hard limit on the maximal number of layers or items on a page but, indeed, it's not optimized for a scenario with a huge number of them.

but it's hard to say much more without having more details about your project.