Hi all.

The color well in the lower-left corner and the swatches at the bottom control fill by default. How do you toggle those to control outline color? Clicking on the outline well doesn't do it.

Thanks for any insight!

This is version 1.3 on Mac.

Have a look at the last comment for this question.

Thanks for that. I sure wish there were a ToolTip for this on the color wells. I would never hover over a color swatch, even if I were going to use one (which in this case I wasn't).

The ToolTip that does exist says "drag to adjust." I did this, and didn't see any effect. Worse, the arrow cursor changed to a "+/-" one that remained permanently stuck in this state whenever I rolled over the wells from then on... making it hard to click on one or the other. This problem survived even a middle-click to "remove." Are the lack of effect and the stuck cursor bugs, or some obscure feature?

Thanks!

http://tavmjong.free.fr/INKSCAPE/MANUAL/html/Attributes-Fill-Stroke.html#Attributes-Color-StyleIndicator-Gestures

Thank you I learn something new every time :)

Not really psyched about this particular feature. How is this better than simply raising a color picker when you click on the color well? A picker shows you exactly what you're doing, whereas this creates an invisible line of demarcation and doesn't show you a color or brightness spectrum. And, by default, it appears to do nothing (screen grab attached).

Also: How do you cancel this mode? Once tried, you seem to forever get that +/- cursor over the color wells. I can't find any way to get rid of it.

The gestures is just one of many ways to assign colors in Inkscape. One uses the modifier keys to adjust hue, saturation, lightness and transparency.

The menu at the end of the palette has configuration settings for rows and sizes, plus more.

And, of course, one can keep the Fill/Stroke dialog visible while working.

Thanks. Why is this good, though? You still have to roll all the way down there to a tiny color well in the corner and drag your cursor in it, then drag back onto the canvas and flail around with no reference... and maybe you noticed the belated ToolTip telling you about the modifier keys, but maybe not. The Stroke and Fill tab is every bit as close, and far more explanatory and direct for adjusting color.

Meanwhile, the Fill and Stroke color wells do nothing when clicked on (hence this post).

I'm just mystified as to the perceived benefit. And also, again: How do you get rid of this +/- cursor?

They are indicators showing what is assigned to objects, not for assigning colors.

http://tavmjong.free.fr/INKSCAPE/MANUAL/html/Anatomy.html#styleindicator

But why aren't they for assigning colors? I can't recall any other app where they don't do both. Why have them do nothing when clicked?

It is an indicator of color(s) currently assigned to the selected objects. If you select another object, the newly selected object's colors will be displayed.

If you would like to assign the newly selected object the previous object's colors, that option is in the right-click-menu.

Double clicking the style indicator will open the fill/stroke dialog for more controls.

Thank you, but that's just repeating the problem. There's no reason the color wells can't select and indicate the color. That's how they work in essentially every other art application, with no drawbacks vs. the ineffectiveness here.

Feature requests are made through the bug tracker: https://inkscape.org/forums/beyond/how-to-report-bugs-or-request-new-features/

In the meantime, I highly recommend the tutorials written for Full Circle magazine. https://www.peppertop.com/blog/?p=1563

Feel free to help the the Inkscape Project, which is built entirely by volunteer developers: 

• https://inkscape.org/support-us/donate/
• https://inkscape.org/contribute/

Thanks for the references! I am a developer and will try to pitch in as well.

Let me go back to #1 above.

stokestack

The color well in the lower-left corner and the swatches at the bottom control fill by default. How do you toggle those to control outline color? Clicking on the outline well doesn't do it.

At the bottom of the screen, Inkscape's status bar is one of its outstanding features, unmatched by any other application (in my opinion). When you hover over a tile in the colour palette, the status bar reports "Colour: Green (#008000); Click to set fill, Shift+click to set stroke".

The larger tiles to the left are default or preferred colours that can be applied to fill or stroke.

By "outline well", do you mean the [Stroke: colour_block] setting? This indicates the stroke colour of the selected object and clicking it will open the Stroke tab of the Fill and Stroke dialog where you can select stroke styles and colours. Similarly, clicking the [Fill: colour_block] will open the Fill tab.

Personally I consider this an efficient workflow, though it's quite different to most raster painting programs.