Great question, I had to noodle that one over a bit, but I think it helped me clarify that difference between pikchr and reladraw. My container example was a poor one, and you are right that pikchr can handle adding elements to a container without fiddling.
My main objection to pikchr is that it is turtle graphics plus coordinate offsets, which to me feels like the wrong tool when I want to say "I have A to the left, and B, C, and D all right of A". I don't want to have to translate that to turtle graphic movements like saying "there's a group, draw B, move down some amount, place C, move down again, place D".
Similarly, if I'm thinking at the level of abstraction of nodes and edges and relative positions, it feels awkward to say something like this in pikchr (where the 0.2 is a guess to fiddle with):
arrow from Web.s down 0.2 then right until even with DB.s then to DB.s
Rather than saying in reladraw:
edge web -> db from: bottom to: bottom
I think it's less a matter of "reladraw can do it, but pikchr cannot". It's more like, "both can get to the same destination, but how you get there is a matter of taste and how you express your intent".
For example in pikchr:
A: box "A" fit
G: [
down
B: box "B" fit
move 0.1
C: box "C" fit
move 0.1
D: box "D" fit
move 0.1
E: box "E" fit
] with .w at A.e+(0.5,0)
arrow from A to G.B chop
arrow from A to G.C chop
arrow from A to G.D chop
arrow from A to G.E chop
To me, it's not as clear that your intent is that you want several nodes right of A. However, in reladraw, it's clearer to me that the intent is "these things are right of A":
node a "A"
node b "B" right of a
node c "C" right of a
node d "D" right of a
node e "E" right of a
edge a -> b
edge a -> c
edge a -> d
edge a -> e
However, that's a subjective taste thing and I could see some people liking the pikchr approach.
Oh interesting! I plan to add custom attributes, functions, variables. I was also thinking about macros and will add your parameters for object labels in as another idea. Thanks :)
My main objection to pikchr is that it is turtle graphics plus coordinate offsets, which to me feels like the wrong tool when I want to say "I have A to the left, and B, C, and D all right of A". I don't want to have to translate that to turtle graphic movements like saying "there's a group, draw B, move down some amount, place C, move down again, place D".
Similarly, if I'm thinking at the level of abstraction of nodes and edges and relative positions, it feels awkward to say something like this in pikchr (where the 0.2 is a guess to fiddle with):
Rather than saying in reladraw: I think it's less a matter of "reladraw can do it, but pikchr cannot". It's more like, "both can get to the same destination, but how you get there is a matter of taste and how you express your intent".For example in pikchr:
To me, it's not as clear that your intent is that you want several nodes right of A. However, in reladraw, it's clearer to me that the intent is "these things are right of A": However, that's a subjective taste thing and I could see some people liking the pikchr approach.