General
Designing
Web Graphics
Interactivity

Speed

Direct Action Tools

Drag and Drop

Pressure Sensitivity

Profiles

Zooming

Undo

Speed
XARA X has one of the most sophisticated rendering engines in any graphics package.
For the user that means that the redraw speed - how long it takes to draw the image when you create, move or resize an object - is one of the fastest you'll see.
Many graphics packages will keep you waiting a few seconds while objects are drawn on the screen. In a complex document that can mean you have wasted a significant amount of time which can be very frustrating. With Xara X, when you create an image it appears instantly on the screen.

Speed isn't just restricted to creating and moving objects though - any time you manipulate an object by using one of the Direct Action Tools, the Profile or Attributes dialogs, or the Color Editor, any changes you make also appear instantly. This means that when you move a slider it's not the preview of the image that changes - it's the image itself, so you can instantly see how the changes work in the context of the whole picture.

Direct Action Tools
XARA X's Direct Action Tools allow you to create effects such as transparency, bevels or gradient fills by selecting the tool then dragging over the area you want to affect. Traditionally, to apply these effects you make your changes in a dialog box and they are transferred to the drawing. With Xara X's Direct Action Tools, you can apply all these effects on the object itself - without having to enter any numbers in a dialog box! And the changes take place instantly - it's as close to using your hands as you will get with a graphics package. This is a BIG advantage, because it not only saves time, but also keeps the creative work and the image itself at the center of your focus. It makes experimenting with effects and settings much easier too. Direct Action Tools include the Bevel, Shadow, Transparency, Fill, Contour and Blend tools

Drag & drop
MANY tasks in Xara X benefit from being able to use the drag and drop principle. When changing the color of an object, you can just drag a color from the Color Line and drop it onto the object, or its outline. With gradients, you can drop colors along the gradient path and make multi-color fills. Drag and drop also comes into play when using the galleries. You can place any gallery item on a page simply by drag and drop.

Pressure sensitivity
THE closest thing to actually drawing for real today comes from using a graphics tablet. Xara X just made using a graphics tablet even more realistic though as now you get the advantage of pressure sensitivity.What that means is that when you are using the Brush Tool you can alter the size and/or the transparency of the brush by applying pressure to the pen. Xara X allows you to choose whether you want the pressure to affect scaling or transparency - or both, or neither.

Profiles
WHEN adding a blend, transparency, contour, fill or shadow to an object, you can change the attributes or properties of the effect by using the Profile dialog box.What the Profile dialog box actually allows you to do depends on which effect is being used, but in all cases, you can either choose one of the set profiles or use the sliders to create your own.With transparency you can change the shape of the transition from start to end, while with blends and contours you can alter how the steps are spaced and how the colors, lines and transparencies are used. Altogether, the Profile dialog box makes a very powerful tool to help get your graphics just right.

Zooming
THE Zoom Tool allows you to alter the magnification of the current document, giving you a closer, or more distant view. Using the Zoom Tool you can zoom to the whole page, so you see the complete document, you can zoom to the drawing, which magnifies just the drawn image as opposed to the whole page, or you can select an object and then zoom to that selection. Another method is to zoom to a particular area by clicking and dragging the tool over the area. The Xara X Zoom Tool is capable of zooming in to 27,000% - that's 72,000 dpi (dots per inch).

Undo / Redo
BEING able to change what you have done is vital in a graphics package. Xara X allows you to easily Undo your most recent changes to a document. Undo allows you to get rid of changes which you've applied by mistake, those which went wrong or ones which you simply don't like the look of. Undo is a very powerful tool when combined with Redo because it gives you the freedom to experiment with a drawing, secure in the knowledge that you can always undo any changes or if you eventually decide you do actually like the changes, to redo them again. Some graphics packages only let you undo a limited amount of actions, but Xara X has an unlimited undo so it remembers everything you've done.