Hey guys,
My name is Pratyush Harigovind (@0SlowPoke0), and I’ve been selected as a GSoC 2025 student developer to work on Graphite. This summer I will be working on enhancing the Polygon Tool by introducing a wide array of new shapes and designing unique gizmos for intuitive shape manipulation.

Synopsis

Graphite currently has a limited selection of predefined shapes in the Polygon Tool and supports only basic gizmo operations. This project aims to introduce a broader variety of geometric shapes—such as the Trapezoid, Star, Donut, and Pie—each accompanied by its own unique gizmo. These shape-specific gizmos will enable users to create more intricate and expressive vector designs.

To support this, a centralized Gizmo Manager will be developed to manage both generic and shape-specific gizmo behaviors. This includes integration with the Select Tool, allowing seamless shape manipulation and transformation via intuitive visual controls.

Benefits

• A wide selection of new predefined shapes will be available for users.
• Unique gizmos tailored to each shape will allow for more precise and creative editing.
• Enhanced user experience through more interactive and intuitive shape manipulation.

Deliverables

• A centralized Gizmo Manager system to manage and coordinate gizmos associated with shapes created using the Polygon Tool.

• Seamless integration with the Select Tool, allowing users to transform shapes using an intuitive interface.

• Implementation of unique gizmo points for custom shapes including:

  • Polygon, Trapezoid, Triangle, Star, Donut, Pie, Diamond, Segment, Crescent, and more.

• Support for transformation features such as:

  • Editing edge curvature

  • Adjusting segment lengths

  • Modifying radii and angles

  • Moving and refining vertex positions

Final Report

• 10 Merged Prs
• 5 in pipeline

The central focus of my project was redesigning and extending the Shape Tool, building a flexible Gizmo Manager API, and introducing a new Operation Tool. Together, these improvements lay the groundwork for a more powerful, modular, and intuitive editing experience in Graphite.

Toward the final weeks, I felt my progress slowed somewhat because I often explored multiple approaches on my own before seeking input. While this gave me a deeper understanding of the problem space, it sometimes delayed implementation. Looking back, I realize that reaching out earlier for feedback could have helped me move faster.

That said, I’m very glad to have contributed to this ambitious project. Working on Graphite has been a valuable learning experience, and I’m motivated to continue contributing in the future.

Unified Ellipse ,Polygon, Rectangle ,Line into a unified Shape-tool

Instead of maintaining separate handlers for each shape, we now have a single Shape Tool that lets users select and switch between different shapes. Ellipse, rectangle, and line are provided as aliases within this tool. It also integrates transform cage overlays, enabling users to select and modify shapes directly. In short, the Shape Tool is now the central hub for creating and editing shapes, with gizmos assisting in precise modifications.

New Shapes

Some shapes like Circle, Arc, and Grid already existed but had not yet been integrated into the Shape Tool for direct user drawing. Support for these has now been added, along with a new Spiral node capable of generating both Archimedean and logarithmic spirals. Implementing the spiral involved researching academic papers and experimenting with different efficient algorithms to balance accuracy and performance. In addition, the Shape Tool now supports adjustable parameters while drawing such as polygon sides, star points, grid rows and columns, and spiral turns, giving users more control over their shapes.

Gizmo Manager

This was the most important milestone of the project, since all further work depends on it. I redesigned and iterated on the gizmo API to make it modular and easy to extend, so new gizmos can be added and integrated without friction.
The Shape Tool now delegates input handling to the Gizmo Manager, which decides which gizmo is hovered, manages activation when multiple gizmos are nearby, and controls overlays (e.g., hiding the transform cage when a gizmo is active). This makes the system more robust and reusable—any other tool can also make use of the Gizmo Manager.
Screenshot 2025年09月01日 123538

New Gizmos

• Star/Polygon – A radius gizmo for adjusting size with snapping support, plus a gizmo to change the number of points/sides.

Untitled.video.-.Made.with.Clipchamp.24.mp4

• Arc/Circle – The Arc now has a turns handler for adjusting start and sweep angles, along with a radius gizmo.

Untitled.video.-.Made.with.Clipchamp.25.mp4

• Spiral – Includes three gizmos: inner/outer radius control, number of turns, and tightness adjustment.

Untitled.video.-.Made.with.Clipchamp.26.mp4

• Grid – Provides a rectangular gizmo for modifying X and Y spacing, an isometric gizmo for adjusting X spacing, and row/column gizmos to control the number of rows and columns.

cc-4.1.mp4

Screen-Recording.28.1.2.mp4

Screen-Recording.27.1.2.mp4

New Operation tool

By the end of the week, I began working on a new tool similar to the Shape Tool, but focused on adding nodes such as Circular Repeat (already implemented) and, in the future, Repeat. This tool allows users to click and drag to adjust the radius and create circular repeat instances. By reusing the already implemented gizmos—such as the number-of-points and radius gizmos—we extended them to the Circular Repeat node, enabling users to modify both the radius and the instance count in an intuitive way.

Untitled.video.-.Made.with.Clipchamp.27.mp4

Challenges and Learnings

• Gizmo Manager API Design – The first challenge I faced was figuring out what the Gizmo Manager API should look like. I spent several days iterating through different versions, discussing with my mentor, and refining the design. Initially, it was a bit disappointing to realize that my earlier attempts could have been better, but this was an important part of the learning process. In the end, I’m glad I arrived at a cleaner and more extensible interface.

• Math for Gizmos – Another major hurdle was the math involved in implementing certain gizmos. For the Star shape, I had to derive how one radius should change when keeping the other constant so that a set of points become collinear. This required working with polar coordinates and applying the Cartesian area-of-triangle formula to establish a relationship. It turned out to be a fun exercise in applied math, something I hadn’t done before. Similarly, reverse-engineering the math for isometric gizmos was also quite tricky.

• Spiral Approximation Algorithm – Finding and implementing an efficient algorithm for spirals was another tricky part. The goal was to achieve a good approximation while keeping the computation lightweight. The current approach works, but when the arc of the spiral is adjusted, the approximation breaks down. I still need to develop a more robust algorithm to address this.

• These were the main areas where I got stuck and ended up spending more time than I initially expected, but they were also the points where I learned the most.