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On a project I'm working on, I've got some views that use maps generated by Inkscape. However, we've ran into some slight problems...specifically, some of the maps do not render text, at all.

After some research into this issue here on StackOverflow, I discovered there's some good reasons for this:

  1. Inkscape generates SVG 1.1 documents, not SVG 1.2 documents, despite including flowRoot, flowRegion, and flowPara elements. I updated my maps to be version 1.2 documents, but it didn't help.
  2. I read that those flow* elements, being part of the SVG 1.2 standard, aren't actually implemented in most browsers, because SVG 1.2 was never accepted by anyone. This explains why no amount of cajoling caused the text on our maps to appear.
  3. It's generally recommended that if your SVG is going to be viewed in a browser, to use <text> instead of <flowPara>

This revealed a deeper problem that I couldn't find the answers to from a Google search: Inkscape is filling the documents with other crap that it can render (flowRoot and flowRegion, respectively), but IE/Chrome has no implementation for.

Questions:

  1. What widely-implemented SVG tag makes a good replacement for flowRoot?
  2. What widely-implemented SVG tag makes a good replacement for flowRegion?
  3. If no such alternatives exist, is there some easy way, or even a general heuristic, on how best to modify the SVG document to be fully viewable on a modern browser (IE11 or Chrome)?
Community
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Andrew Gray
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2 Answers2

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In Inkscape, select the flowed text object(s). Go to the Text menu, and select "Convert to text".

The flowed text elements will now be plain <text> elements and will display properly in the browser.

Paul LeBeau
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    Thank you for that! How are you able to tell whether the document is using flowed text or not/ why is that the default inkscape chooses? – Scott Staniewicz Nov 28 '18 at 06:12
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    People often/usually want to enter blocks of text. It makes sense that Inkscape implemented that by using the elements that were designed for SVG 1.2. That was a sensible idea IMO even though SVG 1.2 never took off. However flowed text is not the default. You have to specifically choose that mode (Text -> Flow into frame). As for how you tell, well one way is to look at the XML view. I'm not sure if there is a a more obvious way. – Paul LeBeau Nov 28 '18 at 07:35
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If you save the document as an "Optimised SVG" Inkscape will warn you about the flow elements that won't render in browsers.

David Edwards
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