Illustrator (Desktop) Feature Requests
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4470 results found
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import autocad layers
when importing a file from autocad, regardless of which version its saved as the layers are not preserved and every object appears as a separate item under 1 layer. What a nightmare. I only purchased Illustrator to present our CAD drawings and it cant even do that properly, waste of money. User interface is logicless and not at all intuitive, totally reliant on youtube tutorial videos and web search solutions.
6 votes -
Preferences User Interface UI Scaling: Drop down menu list needs to scale too.
Drop down menu text is too small/light to tell if an item is unavailable (grayed out) I thought if I increased the UI Scaling the dropdown menu items would also appear larger.
6 votes -
Feature to export custom Keyboard Shortcuts
Those of us that frequently customize our Key commands and want to easily transfer them to other versions of Illustrator.
6 votes -
Auto spell checker underline and hidden characters should disappear in Trim View
When switching to “Trim View”, grid and lines and bleed and anything outside the artboards disappear, providing a nice preview of the document you’re working on.
However the red zigzag underline of the auto spell checker and the symbols from Show Hidden Characters are not hidden, so that the preview is still cluttered with working tools.
It should probably behave like the Preview mode in InDesign (W) and only shows the artwork.
6 votes -
Join Separate paths
If you have lots of separate, exploded lines (say from DWG/DXF import, then you should be able to use an alternative of Ctrl+J to join them back together without them trying to join end to end.
That is to say, if paths are adjacent to each other they are joined. But the ends of non adjacent paths aren't then closed up as well. Really basic idea, but somehow overlooked.
Sure, it's easy to Ctrl+J a few disparate, exploded paths. But for 20+, 50+, it's a joke.
6 votes -
Change conversion of black when going from RGB to CMYK
Please change the default behavior when converting a file from RGB color space to CMYK color space to make RGB black convert to 100% black. Currently and for years, Illustrator converts it to a rich black, with high values in each ink. It's very common to have to take artwork created in RGB and covert it to CMYK for print, and the default conversion for black is never usable. Please make it practical and have 0,0,0, RGB black convert to Cyan 0, Magenta 0, Yellow 0, Black 100.
6 votes -
Give the Colors panel a useful color picker
Illustrator has a number of different color pickers that appear depending on what particular item you click on, but the one in the color panel is the least useful and most tiring to use.
As far as I can tell, this picker is the Brightness Cube from Photoshop but without the brightness slider that’s needed to make effective use of it. If you use the sliders to adjust saturation or brightness, the change isn’t reflected in the palette square.
With this picker, you can either reduce saturation but with maximum brightness, OR you can reduce brightness but with maximum saturation. So your only choice is to select a color vaguely similar to the one you want and then fiddle with at least 2 different sliders to achieve your desired color. You can't even select a shade of gray without going through this process.
Just copy Photoshop’s color panel. If nothing else, just use Photoshop’s Hue Cube color picker, which is identical to the color picker already used in most places in Illustrator.
As it stands, I have to spend $30 on the MagicPicker plugin just to get a decent color picker in my sidebar.
Illustrator has a number of different color pickers that appear depending on what particular item you click on, but the one in the color panel is the least useful and most tiring to use.
As far as I can tell, this picker is the Brightness Cube from Photoshop but without the brightness slider that’s needed to make effective use of it. If you use the sliders to adjust saturation or brightness, the change isn’t reflected in the palette square.
With this picker, you can either reduce saturation but with maximum brightness, OR you can reduce brightness but with maximum saturation.…
6 votes -
Lasso select tool selection lines should be always be visible, even when selecting over black fills.
I often use the lasso select tool and often i am selecting over top of objects that are black filled, and the lasso line is invisible over these black objects.
Conversely, in photoshop, the lasso line is drawn so it always contrasts the colors behind it, so no matter what colors we are selecting over top of, the lasso line is still visible.
Illustrator desperately needs to replicate this functionality from photoshop
6 votes -
Stacked bar chart to support positive AND negative numbers in the same chart
Refer to https://forums.adobe.com/thread/2615233
This is the type of graph that I want to create, and be able to update it EASILY, and not manually moving bars from two different graphs.6 votes -
Improve compatibility of object's features between Illustrator and InDesign
It's about 80% easy to share an object such as a logo or ad design or similar between the two packages, which is facilitated by the programs sharing an overlapping feature set.
With some features, such as gradients (InDesign to Illustrator) and type (Illustrator to InDesign) there are serious problems and the feature either doesn't travel across or is corrupted in the process. These problems mean that some parts of your project will easily copy and paste (or travel via PDF export) yet others fail.
It's not uncommon to use Illustrator as a publishing software for web assets and InDesign for print and use them as partners for that, so let's see if the overlapping features can fully travel between them, saving workflow and increasing confidence in the term 'Adobe Suite'.
It's about 80% easy to share an object such as a logo or ad design or similar between the two packages, which is facilitated by the programs sharing an overlapping feature set.
With some features, such as gradients (InDesign to Illustrator) and type (Illustrator to InDesign) there are serious problems and the feature either doesn't travel across or is corrupted in the process. These problems mean that some parts of your project will easily copy and paste (or travel via PDF export) yet others fail.
It's not uncommon to use Illustrator as a publishing software for web assets and InDesign…
6 votes -
Let us Favourite fonts during font search
Right now you can favourite fonts, but only during browsing fonts normally. If you search for fonts there is no favourite column in the results.
6 votes -
Check Spelling function should ignore placeholder 'Lorem ipsum' text
The automatically generated placejolder text should not be picked up by the 'Check Spelling' function
6 votes -
Open Corel Designer files (DES) in Adobe Illustrator
For the transition from Corel Designer to Adobe Illustrator you should be able to open Corel Designer files (DES) in Adobe Illustrator. At least the import should be possible. This would be a great benefit for users like me, who want to switch to Adobe Illustrator.
On the other side especially AI files can always be opened in Corel Designer.6 votes -
Option for Artboards to be non-printing
Would be very useful if there could be a setting in the Artboards palate that could make them 'non-printing' (Like in Layers) - I use a lot of pre-prepared template files and sometimes don't use all Artboards, so to 'turn them off' rather than having to delete (as I may need them later in a job) or keep changing print options would be great.
6 votes -
the ability to search with in the symbols palette
we can search with in the swatch palette, can that be carried over to the symbols palettes?
6 votes -
The ability to adjust the width of a gradient line using the new Freeform Gradient Tool
The new Freeform Gradient Tool is great, except that it doesn't have an option to adjust the width of the gradient lines. I think there is no need to further explain why this should be useful, because it's such a basic feature.
To make it really powerful, adjusting the width should work like the Width Tool.
6 votes -
Set grid as percentage
Set grid as percentage so the X and Y can have the same number of divisions.
6 votes -
Change Adobe Illustrator's UI from dark to light with macOS mojave dark mode
It would be nice if illustrator (and photoshop) changes the UI from light to dark with macOS Mojave's light/dark mode automatically
6 votes -
Bring back the rounded corners in the rectangle dialog
Please place the rounded corners back into the rectangle dialog window. The new experience for this feature is undiscoverable and not intuitive at all. The usage pattern is inconsistent with the rest of the drawing tools e.g. polygon, stars... Have you consider testing it on users before launching the new 2019 version? Please do not redesign for the sake of redesign. Your users are not being efficient in their workflows because they have to spend time to figure it out where those features have gone. I am very sorry but this is a frustrating experience.
6 votesAs per the comment.
The rounded corner box is still there in new versions, but hidden, as a 'not-frequently-used' — well, statistics-wise. Click on the three dots at the bottom of your toolbar and pick Rounded Rectangle tool directly, or drop it into your toolbar.
Please free to add comments, if you think that this tool should be included to the Essentials toolbox anyway, and why you think this is important.
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Show artboard user-assigned names and numbers when exporting/saving
When saving as a PDF (and other similar activities) the dialog box will allow you to filter to certain artboards using their numbers. However if you're using lots of artboards it can be difficult to know which artboard to select. I usually have to go back through the document, activate the artboard tool to see the names, make notes of the number, and then resume my export/save. How about adding the user-assigned name along side the artboard numbers in the dialog filter. Or possibly have a list of artboards (like the artboards panel) and simply check boxes for exporting.
6 votes
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