Perhaps it would be easier, yes. That would be a first, considering Blender’s history with preselection highlighting. Also to consider : in some of the prototypes by @lone_noel the multi-input sockets are more widely spaced, so that there’s pretty much no ambiguity when picking a link. That’s in addition to better grid alignment, consistent spacings, etc. See Feedback wanted on node layout changes to match the node grid
I’d also like to add a papercut ! that ties in a bit with the changes by Leon.
The problem :
The node auto-offset feature is bound to always nudge some of the nodes out of grid alignment, because the nodes themselves are of arbitrary width. So even if they’re left-aligned to the grid, their right side is usually not, yet that’s where the margin is calculated from. That means even with a margin that’s an exact multiple of grid units, you can still send all your upstream/downstream nodes (from the point of insertion) out of alignment.
So I fiddled with the node_margin property to find that on my install, 83px correspond to exactly 4 grid units, a spacing I find comfortable, but is only valid with a ui scale of 1.5, and solves only half the issue.
I suggest :
- have node_margin use grid units/subdivisions instead of pixels
- when inserting a node, if the node’s position ends up unaligned with the grid, nudge it to the next grid unit (and with it all the upstream/downstream nodes)
- have node widths be snappable to grid increments