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Scribus => Beginner Talk => Topic started by: BluewaterBound on March 14, 2025, 08:54:35 PM

Title: Dragging page around and zooming in
Post by: BluewaterBound on March 14, 2025, 08:54:35 PM
Hi all

I worked with InDesign and before that QuarkXpress for many years, though I stopped both about 15 years ago ... so please forgive me if I forget my old quick-key commands.

One of my very favourite tools in InDesign (or was it Quark?) was the ability to hold down the option key on a Mac, click on the page, and then drag the whole page around.

I used that in conjunction with another quick key (can't remember it) where I held down one or more control/option-type keys and clicked on a part of the page and would immediately zoom in to the right magnification for reading or inspecting objects.

In short, I would drag a page around a bit, then zoom in, then zoom back to a kind of 'pasteboard view'. It made navigation super-quick, which is why I used those two features all the time.

If anyone knows what I'm talking about and knows a Scribus equivalent, I'd be very grateful for the quick-keys.

Many thanks

Title: Re: Dragging page around and zooming in
Post by: AdmFubar on March 15, 2025, 05:08:36 AM
Having a key combo to move the contents of a window around kind of fell by the wayside. Better mice these day use the scroll wheel for such actions. I take it you use a standard apple mouse?
If so you may want to invest in a mouse with more options.
I have a logitech 705, the scroll wheel has besides the scroll up and down has a left and right scroll, plus a click if I push down on it.  Not certain that macs support this type of actions via the mouse. I would think they have such support for it.

You can add key combos for the zoom action, via the preferences. It is the third selection on the left in the preferences window. (file/preferences) Scroll or collapse the menu entries in the list will you find "View". You can add the needed key combo to a zoom level.

Hope this helps.
Title: Re: Dragging page around and zooming in
Post by: Nermander on March 15, 2025, 09:01:36 AM
I am wondering it "drag panning" (as I would call the feature) is not something the OS could support? (It would correspond to dragging the scroll bars I assume).
Title: Re: Dragging page around and zooming in
Post by: a.l.e on March 15, 2025, 09:32:59 AM
hi

the feature with the "automatic" zooming in and out sounds interesting.
even if i believe it's more useful for vector drawing rather than for page layout.

for page layout, i would prefer the way scribus zooms in.
press the "z" key and draw a rectangle area: that will be the new view area it zooms into.
(but i admit that i never use it: i always do ctrl-mousewheel (or control-move two fingers on my laptop))

what i think is missing: going back to the previous view area.
maybe there should be some sort of parallel undo for the zoom.

since the zoom tool is always sticky (or at least it is per default), one way to do that, would be to hijack the ctrl-(shift-)z while the zoom tool is active and get it to wander through the history of the zoom levels.
(the zoom tool being the magnifier in the toolbar, which is activated with the "z" key mentioned above.)

and if we're already at that, we could get scribus to recognize the "return" key while the zoom tool is active: pressing it, would zoom to the currently selected item(s). if any.
you'd get the other feature you mention, too.

i'm not sure i would think about it, when i mostly would need it (and i would keep fighting with my two fingers moving around gently on the trackpad and missing the right zoom level), but i think that the feature might not be too hard to implement.

on the other side, panning (aka "moving around the page") is already possible in scribus:


i don't think that we need more of it : - )
Title: Re: Dragging page around and zooming in
Post by: BluewaterBound on March 18, 2025, 07:50:45 PM
Quote from: AdmFubar on March 15, 2025, 05:08:36 AMHaving a key combo to move the contents of a window around kind of fell by the wayside. Better mice these day use the scroll wheel for such actions. I take it you use a standard apple mouse?
If so you may want to invest in a mouse with more options.
I have a logitech 705, the scroll wheel has besides the scroll up and down has a left and right scroll, plus a click if I push down on it.  Not certain that macs support this type of actions via the mouse. I would think they have such support for it.

You can add key combos for the zoom action, via the preferences. It is the third selection on the left in the preferences window. (file/preferences) Scroll or collapse the menu entries in the list will you find "View". You can add the needed key combo to a zoom level.

Hope this helps.

Very helpful - thankyou!
Title: Re: Dragging page around and zooming in
Post by: BluewaterBound on March 18, 2025, 07:53:58 PM
the 'z key' tip alone is very useful - thanks!
Title: Re: Dragging page around and zooming in
Post by: a.l.e on March 19, 2025, 08:03:42 PM
more notes...

what about capturing the (shift-)tab key, while the tools are active?