Boundaries and Callout

[olaf_gy]

Hi,

I think an additional Boundary type in form of a bracket would be nice.
In addition it should be possible to add Callouts to boundaries (if this is possible, I didn't find how to do it).

Regards,
Olaf

[Gerhard]

Hi Olaf,

I tried out this workaround:

create a new floating topic, change the color fill and stroke color to white and place the floating topic close to the boundary.
Clear the text. Now add the callout topic
Ready!

Regards
Gerhard

[olaf_gy]

Hi Gerhard,

thanks for the hint, it is a possibility, but it has 2 disadvantages. First there is some distance between boundary and Callout and seconds more important when the branch is moved you must take care for the "Workaround" manually in addition. So a real callout on a boundary would be a nice thing.

For the bracket form of the boundary I tried to load a example picture, but I was not able to load a jpg into the thread.

Regards,
Olaf

 

[Patrick]

Yes, I agree. Allowing these type of boundaries and callouts is certainly something that we would like to implement in the future.

There's one interesting issue with this in that boundaries are technically not part of the hierarchy of topics and don't show up in the outline view or when you export to Text or Word.
This means that callouts and any topics underneath the callout would also be missing from these places. This is  something that we think might be hard to understand at first.

We also want to investigate the possibility to allow boundaries which surround a dynamic set of topics, which might also complicate things.

In NM5 we simply didn't have the time to go into the finer details to analyze these scenarios and to come up with a solution which is simple and easy to use.

All this is to say that we definitely see the use of this and we will consider this for future updates (no promises or announcements at this stage) but it is not something that is likely to come soon.

At the moment the workaround that Gerhard suggested is a good option. Unfortunately you will need to re-position it manually in this case.

A possible (albeit a bit complex) solution to get a connection line connected to a boundary:

Add an attached shape to the parent topic where the boundary was added. Right-click on the shape and set it to 'Ignore Shape in Layout' - this not only causes it to be completely ignored during the layout which means that you can put it as close to other topics as you want but it also excludes it from the boundary so that the boundary does not go around this shape.

You can then add a flexible link line which goes from your floating topic to this shape. Once the shape is positioned correctly and you are happy how the line visually connects to the boundary you can set the shape to be invisible. (no fill, no outline).

Now you have a connection line from the floating topic to the boundary. and when moving the topic around the shape will move with it and thus the link line will change too. The floating topic still needs to be positioned manually however.

hope this is useful.

Patrick

[Gerhard]

Thank you, Patrick,

great idea!

Regards
Gerhard