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I've been using an old copy of a program called "Geometer's Sketch Pad" to design character sheets for a tabletop game (think something like D&D). I'd like to copy over my existing work into a better program, but I don't know which ones would have the features that I've been using from GSP.

The main things I'm looking for are being able to make points, lines, geometrically accurate shapes(triangle,square, pentagon, hexagon, etc.). I also need to be able to label and color any shapes, lines, words, points, etc. Being able to export as an image file to edit in Gimp would be ideal, since I'm somewhat familiar with that program, but as long as it's possible to screen capture the finished result that's fine.

While I know that there are ways to do all of these things in Gimp, or even Paint if need be, I'm looking for software that is specialized for the features that I need. Here's an example of a picture made in GSP using all of the features I am looking for, to give an idea of how GSP works.

Geometer's Sketchpad Sample Image

GSP is great software, but it was primarily intended as a learning tool for teaching geometry in middle-school and high-school, rather than as graphic design software.

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How about one of these?

  • Geogebra? Geogebra works on both standalone app as well as on the web. (free)

    Geogebra

    Image 1: Sample geogebra, you can open the file here, in your browser.

  • Inkscape (Free)

  • Adobe Illustrator (commercial)
  • Xara Designer (commercial)
  • Corel Draw (commercial)
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  • I'll see if I can take a look into these options. If I can try out the commercial ones on the local college computers I may have enough info to decide whether or not buying is worth it.
    – Jonathan
    Sep 4, 2015 at 11:58
  • You can take illustrator for a spin for a month for free. The big difference between inkscape and illustrator, at very base level, is how gridsnap feels, the general snapping tools in inkscape are feature by feature seemingly better untill you realize that in illustrator you need less time to snap for same effect.
    – joojaa
    Sep 4, 2015 at 12:15
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Inkscape would be an excellent choice. It supports the features you listed as required, and is fairly easy to learn. I use it frequently for drawing technical diagrams.

Inkscape also allows you to import a PDF file and retain it's vector information (so that it can be converted to Inkscape's SVG format). According to this, your Sketch Pad program can print to PDF. Doing this would allow you to convert your existing work.

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