Recently active topics in Dabbleboard

One thing that can be improved with the online whiteboard experience is real-time feedback for whiteboard participants. While the tool makes it easy to people to participate in drawing, you don't know where people are drawing objects on screen. To people viewing, graphics just magically show up. Additionally, while on the whiteboard, although highlighting exists, there isn't a way to just point at things to focus the groups attention on items on the whiteboard.

Perhaps a pointer (or visible marker) identifying a person's mouse movements on the whiteboard before items show up would be a good step in that direction.

different back ground colors for my white board instead of just white

An idea for AlmostThere: Allow the different panels to float in their own windows. I have multiple large monitors. I'd like to have a single large whiteboard, and have the video and other tools on a different screen. Using a single window is like going back to 1985 when Microsoft introduced the first version of Windows with tiled (instead of overlapping) windows.

Organise drawings into multiple folders.
I will have different types of drawings so will want to create and choose a toolbox for each type

When I type non-english UTF-8 letters in the drawing, they appear as two characters. (I use Ubuntu, Firefox, it's not so easy to make them use ISO charsets)

I'm currently doing some research into collaborative diagramming for internal use at my company (300 people). I like Dabbleboard so far, but if you had these two extra features, I'd be recommending it unreservedly:

1. The ability to draw a shape, then put text in the shape, and have the text belong to the shape (while remaining editable). At present you can group text with a shape, but the text won't be editable unless you ungroup.


2. The ability to draw link lines between shapes so that when you move a linked shape, the connection lines move with it.

Shortcut keys for colors and line thicknesses? I use Dabbleboard in a 3/4 width-minimized window on my 15-inch monitor with Skype in compact view running next to it. I almost always draw freehand. It would be nice to be able to really switch colors and thicknesses around faster without having to tap-tap-tap on the menu bar. With AlmostMeet's smaller interface, it would really make sense.

can't log in

problem:
i was "drawing" but i needed more space so i raised the canvas size. when i got back to dabbleboard another day the canvas size wasnt the way i left it.
wish:
once i changed the canvas size make it default, so next time i get back to dabbleboard the canvas size is correct.

problem:
when the canvas is bigger than the browser's window size changing the tool you are using becomes a little annoying. and the toolbar and library dont scale right (that is i have to scroll to see them all). i have to scroll too to reach the chat and settings window.
wish:
1) make the toolbar and library to follow the user's view point
- and the toolbar and library to fit (correctly) to window (when canvas is big)
2) or (best) make the toolbar and library to always fit to window and the drawing area (real canvas) to change accordingly to whatever i set. that will make the toolbar and library independent from the canvas.

wish:
better pan view. i guess that with the current ui will have to be with a mini-map...

my browser = google chrome

I know my use case is nonstandard, so feel free to ignore these if you feel they don't go in the direction you want. :)

Right now, as far as I can tell it's impossible to select an object that's "behind" another object. For example, I have a large imported image, with a smaller imported image behind it. I can't click on the smaller image, even though it's plainly visible because much of the larger graphic is transparent. It'd be nice to have some way to select the smaller image. One possible way would be that repeated "select clicks" on the same area would cycle through the stack of images under the cursor. Alternatively, if there were some way to manipulate the "stack" of images so that I could put the smaller icons "on top" of the larger one, that would also work.

While I'm at it, it'd be nice if clicking on fully-transparent portions of an imported image didn't select that image.

If I want to move several objects to different places, right now I have to do this:
* Select object 1, click "move" button, drag to new location
* Click on unused bit of canvas
* Select object 2...

It's that second step that's annoying, since I have to click somewhere that has nothing to do with the objects I'm manipulating, and sometimes truly empty canvas is hard to find because of large background images. Ideally (for me), selecting one object when another object is already selected would not cause both of them to be selected; I'm more used to using the Shift key when I want to select multiple objects. Alternatively, if there were a keyboard shortcut to clear the current selection, that would work too.

I have to say, though, that this is a already a huge usability win for me despite the minor issues I'm running into. You're doing great work!