Illustrator (Desktop) Feature Requests
When entering a new feature request, please provide:
- Description
- Why is this valuable to you?
4800 results found
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Allow users to change the default Area Type Options
I prefer to have 'x Height' as a First Baseline, instead of current default 'Ascent'.
I assume other users would like to change something else, like having 'Auto Size' always enabled from the beginning, or have a different vertical alignment (when will you rename it from the wrong 'Horizontal' to the correct 'Vertical'?! — vote here: http://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/601447/suggestions/45711817)
I tried different ways to make these parameters hold — updating Paragraph styles, changing document profiles... it always defaults to these.
16 votes -
When a group is set as a key object inside of the ungrouped isolation, Distribute Spacing treats some other groups as ungrouped
- Open the test file
- Isolate the group
- Select all
- Ungroup — now you have just <Objects> as the last step of isolation
- Click the leftmost group once with the Selection tool to make it the key
- Press Horizontal Distribute Space button in Align panel Ai will treat the last group as if it is ungrouped — but it is not!
Why do I do this at all? To distribute all objects inside of a group.
I can’t do this when it is grouped, so I select it first, then isolate (to avoid interaction with anything else on canvas), then ungroup…16 votes -
Allow to set Shades, similar to how Tints work now
I'd like to see a Shade option added to global swatches. Currently, we have tint, which adds varying levels of white to the color until you reach 100% white. Shade would act in the opposite direction, adding varying levels of black until you reached 100% black.
I would envision this working by letting users click the "T" next to the slider in the color palette and having it switch to an "S", with the gradient changing from white on the left to black.
This would be helpful because I often find myself needing not only lighter hues to work with…
16 votes -
Rename linked file
If I want to rename a file which is linked to a file (for whatever reason), I have to perform a humiliating process: find a link in Explorer, rename it, return to Ai, wait until it finds out the file is missing, search for the file in a dialog.
When this would be so much faster just to right-click the file (on canvas or in Links panel) and do 'Rename linked file'.
And please consider the other similar request about renaming an embedded image:
https://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/333657-illustrator-desktop-feature-requests/suggestions/47013226-rename-embedded-image16 votes -
Make Appearance work for Type objects
More specifically, with type objects, the Appearance palette just says 'Characters', without reflecting the current stroke and fill state of the object. New stroke and fill have to be added to make the Appearance palette useful.
16 votes -
Please allow "ACTIONS" menu to record the SCALE in EXPORT SCREENS dialog for Artboards
Please allow "ACTIONS" menu to record the SCALE in the EXPORT SCREENS dialog for Artboards. I'd love to be able to record ALL the frequent filetypes and associated sizes for each asset and deliver an ACTION to my entire TEAM that makes this efficient for our everyday usage.
16 votes -
Temporarily disable snapping while dragging objects or anchor points
Currently when you move objects or anchor points while you have Snap to Point and/or Smart Guides turned on it is necessary to stop what you're doing and switch them off then switch them back on again when you've finished moving.
This is very disruptive to workflow. Productivity would be significantly increased if there was a modifier key set to disable all snapping while moving an object or anchor.
Obviously all modifier keys and combinations are currently used up for use before clicking an object or starting a process. However the control key (similar to its function in Photoshop) or…
16 votes -
Make Preferences user friendly
These are various recommendation to simplify preferences in all Adobe Applications.
• list groupings (i. e. General, Type, etc.) in alphabetical order
• or list groupings in logical order; example for the first three — General, User Interface, Performance...
• re-review all preference settings and reduce or simplify (Slices has two options?)
• incorporate a Search function to provide the user the ability to quickly locate a specific preference (refer to Apple's System Preferences Search capability) — http://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/333657/suggestions/50114196
• make preference category lists universal in title and order for all Adobe applications when possibleThe reason is, I wish to…
16 votes -
Allow Warp Effects to distort linear gradient
When you turn on distorting linear gradients (Object > Envelope Distort > Envelope options: Distort Linear Gradients Fill), AI still won't do it when you use Warp Effects (Effect > Warp). This should be fixed.
I'd even extend this option to treat other gradients types, not only linear.
16 votes -
I'd love for the pathfinder to be able to cut up bitmaps, avoiding having so many extraneous paths in a complex file
It would be nice if I could embed a jpeg or some other graphic format and then be able to use the pathfinder tools to change the shape of the image. Seems doable as the graphic imports as a path that happens to be filled with pixels rather than a color or pattern. The main reason I'd rather use the pathfinder for this over a clipping path is to reduce the number of paths in a complex document. When there are many elements in a file, having a lot of clipping paths makes the structure of the file difficult to…
16 votes -
When outlining dotted lines with "aligns dashes", unnecessary anchor points are generated
When dotted lines with “Aligns dashes to corners and path ends, adjusting lengths to fit” are outlined , unnecessary anchor points are generated in the circles at both ends.
When performing detailed processing to create artwork, I sometimes outline dashed lines. So, unnecessary anchor points are an obstacle in such processing.
Although there are workarounds, I hope that users will get clean outline results without any ingenuity.Workaround:
(A)
1.Double-click anywhere in the stroke with Width tool to add a new width point.
2.Execute “Expand Appearance” , “Outline Strokes” or “Flatten Transparency”.(B)
1.Drawing strokes in accurately calculated length with…16 votes -
Start editing text hotkey
Whenever I want to edit a text, I have to pick a Text tool an click it, or double-click it with a Selection tool. Why would I need to click a text which is already selected?
Please, make Ctrl+Enter start editing selected text, as PS does now. If several text objects are selected, use topmost, or closest to the screen's center or cursor or give people an option to choose.
16 votes -
Copy the 'Indent to here' command from InDesign
'As it says on the tin'
So many times you start out creating a graphic and you're in two minds whether to use Illustrator for it's superior vector tools, or InDesign for its superior type control.
When I need to quickly add a couple of bullets it would be so much easier if I could fake the tab stop of the first line with an em dash and then an 'Indent to here' (Ctrl+) so that any wrapped text is quickly brought into line.
16 votes -
Make guides to be like in InDesign
Certain features of the guides are very disturbing. The fact that the guides are movable in the counter intuitive directions (horizontal guides can also be moved sidewise and vice versa) create situations when "objects" are being moved out of the canvas, which prevents curtain actions. Basically, the fact that guides behave like objects is a problem. Guides always get mistakenly grouped with objects, which leads to deleting objects when attempting to delete guides. Guides are being copied with objects when objects are chosen in hide guides mode - bad news. The feature of being able to align guides with objects…
16 votes -
Please give us a way to disable newbie help
I know the "Tour" window goes away if you skip it 3 times, but this is professional software we should have a way to disable ALL automatic help features. Also this doesnt need to reset when a new version of illustrator is sent out.
16 votes -
Allow Illustrator scripts to run in background
I use a script to package a lot of ai files at once. Currently, the Illustrator window needs focus to run the script, or else the script will pause. If Illustrator could do this by itself in the background, it would eliminate the need to wait for the script to finish.
16 votes -
Set export options to default to the same folder the native is housed in
Set default export or save as locations to start in the same folder as the native Ai file as opposed to previous locations. It can be rather cumbersome when switching to an entirely new project, then exporting that project and having the 'save as' default to the entirely other project's recent save.
16 votes -
Create symbols from Global Edit
Global Edit is great, but it should have a way to make the globally selected items into multiple instances of a symbol. Once you start Global Edit, as long as the individual items qualify as being instances of the same symbol, that option should be made available to you.
16 votes -
Allow Custom Brick Offset Values in Pattern Maker
The 9 fractions included in Brick Offset are not always enough to align patterns properly. When bricking a pattern, to achieve the acquired random look of a pattern, paths may need to be repeated just so it evenly fits within one of the fraction presets. The fractions are sometimes only off by a slight degree, that would be perfectly symmetrical if one were allowed the ability to adjust their own decimal chosen. Part of the confusion may also stem from complex patterns where they are difficult to update, as well as sorted fractions where Illustrator otherwise uses decimals. By size…
16 votes -
Let's add Vasily Hall's name to the Ai credits?
These never get added for some reason, so I'm going to try once per day to put it up here:
As you may be aware, Illustrator has a natively build CSV-import feature for variables now. This wouldn't have come if Vasily didn't undertake the effort to create this feature as a script, 3 years prior. https://github.com/Silly-V/Adobe-Illustrator/blob/master/Variable Importer/VariableImporter.jsx
His contribution was:
1. User research, connecting with users from all over the world to get a sense of whether anyone even wants to import CSV files and use graph variables.
2. Naming convention syntax for visibility and graph variables.
3. Logical mechanism…16 votes
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