Hello, I've been doing a lot of work with the help patches, and I've noticed the following idiom: a column of msg boxes lined up neatly above an object.
Each message box is connected to the object box below.

So you get one straight vertical line down the inlet of the msg boxes to the object. This obscures the individual connections, of course, but has the benefit of organizing the msg boxes logically and making it easy to scan the text in each one.

Now here's the problem: if you use this idiom, the wires overlap with the leftmost pixel of the first character in the message, making the first word or number a little hard to read.

First question: does anyone have objections to this idiom being used in general in Pd? If not, then would it be possible to move the text in message boxes over one or two pixels to improve readability?

Thanks, Jonathan

I prefer to line them up on a 45 degree line. See tcpclient-help for example. That way you can see the whole message box. Another idea would be to make sure the lines are always drawn _behind_ the boxes.

Martin

Jonathan Wilkes wrote:

Hello, I've been doing a lot of work with the help patches, and I've noticed the following idiom: a column of msg boxes lined up neatly above an object.
Each message box is connected to the object box below.

So you get one straight vertical line down the inlet of the msg boxes to the object. This obscures the individual connections, of course, but has the benefit of organizing the msg boxes logically and making it easy to scan the text in each one.

Now here's the problem: if you use this idiom, the wires overlap with the leftmost pixel of the first character in the message, making the first word or number a little hard to read.

First question: does anyone have objections to this idiom being used in general in Pd? If not, then would it be possible to move the text in message boxes over one or two pixels to improve readability?

Thanks, Jonathan

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Another idea would be to make sure the lines are always drawn _behind_
the boxes.

but then you wouldn't know if there's one line connected from the top box
to the bottom, or the same line activating all boxes.

the only clear solution would be patch cables with corners a la max. the
one I use sometimes is putting everything vertical, and then jump the
bottom element to the left. not 45deg cables, but enough so everything is
clear.

João