I’ve been using this software for worldbuilding purposes for a while now. Admittedly, I am not coming here from an academic background. But part of using this software also has me often loading real data and investigating and playing around with it. To that end, I’ve made a list of possible QoL suggestions that I think would have actual use cases with real data in addition to the artistic appropriation of the tool. I’ve worked in the video game industry with 2D and 3D tools but still consider this to be one, if not the best, tools for working on a globe.
Lasso select points: This could be usable with either a hotkey toggle or hotkey hold, but the ability to use a drawable lasso feature to select, delete (or select then delete) points would be very useful for modifying the selected geometry for feature creation/modification. Selecting or click-deleting points is one of the most time-consuming parts of this software.
Bisect feature: Usage of lines to bisect poly features. Create a line, select it and the feature to bisect, and then bisect it. I understand that this could be problematic to implement with datasets that have holes in them, but this particular feature is probably one of the most common ones I’ve wanted or seen mentioned on the web.
Convert poly to lines: In addition to or as an alternative to the bisect feature above, select a poly feature, then toggle a “split to lines” option, and then select points. After selecting at least two points, you click a button to activate it. The selected points form the end points of unclassified line features (unless you create a dialog box to make them into something else). It would then be trivial to use those lines to form temporary poly geometries that could be copied into other subsequent features.
Snap only the active feature: This would just be an additional toggle to the “snap point” on the moving of vertices to snap only the selected point. I find that the snapping of multiple features’ points defeats the purpose of trying to make new features fit to existing ones. Dragging points to line up to other points is probably the second-most time-consuming process in the software.
Average selected points: This would be particularly useful for finding the center of an expanding triple junction or other middle point. The idea would be a hotkey (maybe the lasso selection?) that would have an option to execute and find the average of the selected points and select and create one point at the location. (As of right now, you have to find and record the lat/long for multiple points, average them outside the software, create a point, and then manually adjust its coordinates.)
Changes to Modify Geometry: I think that drag to reorganize, right-click delete point, and right-click add point would be helpful from that side menu.
Line multi-select and join: The ability to select multiple lines in general would be immensely helpful for building new features. Add to this the potential to join all selected lines into one feature (perhaps with a dialog window to assign a plate ID if the selected lines are from different plate IDs) and it could be really useful.
Internal parenting and separation of plate IDs: Using an exterior third-party program (like I do) or using a text editor to join and separate plates constantly cycling between changing the anchored plate and using equivalent rotations should be as simple as a feature option or tool like “Change parent plate at specified time” or “Separate plate at specified time.”
Shift-delete to end feature at current time: Shift-delete (or some other combination) to overwrite the ending date of the feature to the current time or “current time + 0.01” (so as to avoid visual overlap). A preferences setting could be used to configure the “plus time” option.
Custom age coloration scale: Change or customize the age that features shift colors due to age, add colors/ages to your own scale, etc.
Manual age of feature override: This would just be another feature field where you could override the age of the feature for age grids instead of using the original appearance date.
Change plate ID while keeping in place: This is so you can correct a feature without it jumping. A button on the window next to the plate ID or a toggle would work.
Referent tags in names: Having something like “Sub #Age_Start” as a feature name become “Sub 1600” where you could tag feature info for dynamic naming on features.
Allowing selection of and modification of flowline points: Once you create it, the points for flowlines are not selectable on their start date. Show or allow a toggle to show these so they can be modified.
Fix the flowline “jump”: Saving a rotation file after creating flowlines causes them to jump. I don’t know why, but you either have to basically constantly redo them or try and find alternatives.
Remember last entries: Sort of like how the create feature remembers the last settings of the last created feature, but when you change features you have to manually change the stuff. It’d be nice to change the feature and pull those last settings instead. (This would tie well to the dynamic name tagging idea, above.)
Temporary Rotation File: Think about it; Two rotation files. One for demoing changes with the option to clear the history or commit to the actual rotation file. It could be a toggle for which to use and make it so speculative plate histories could be tested without constant back and forth to an external text editor or other program.
Find relative pole of rotation: This might already exist through the stage pole feature of the small circle tool? I’m not certain. But a simple tool to take two plates, pick whether to use the real or temporary rotation file, and spit out a temporary relative rotation pole and small circle grid for making spreading centers, etc.
I think that’s all that I had. I am making my way through my fifth full 2,000 mya sim and playing around with real data and hoping for a way to make it less laborious.