What's new in 0.4

spinagram 0.4 moves layout work from you to the engine. You declare what exists, how it is grouped and how it relates. The engine fits text, lays out zone headers, places labels and routes edges. spinagram check finds what the engine could not fix, and check --fix repairs it.

The source is examples/layout-engine/git_two_sites.py. It has no hand-computed anchor fractions, via points, label_at positions or widened boxes.

Text fits its boxCopy Anchor Link

Long hostnames, CIDR lists and titles fit without hand-tuned widths. The engine wraps at spaces, then breaks long tokens after -, ., /, : or ·, then shrinks the font down to 85 %. It never splits an address like 10.0.8.0/21. Characters missing from a font fall back to the body font, then to bundled symbol fonts.

d.box("lb-pool-https-8081", text="8 members · nginx :8081", w=230, h=90)   # fits, no overflow

Zones that lay themselves outCopy Anchor Link

• Headers. Icons sit inside the outline at one size, the label is centred on them, and several icons become chips. Content starts below the header.
• Outlines. dash="dashed" | "dotted" | [4, 2], stroke, fill="none". SVG and PowerPoint draw the same pattern, and CSS reaches every zone by #id or .style.
• Size. fit="children" wraps a zone around its content, nested zones first.

Boxes, rows and gridsCopy Anchor Link

Leave out w and h and a box takes the size of its content. with d.row(..., same_size=True): gives a row one size. d.grid(...) names columns and rows, and cell=g[1, 0] places a node there. d.edge(a, b, straight=True) keeps an edge vertical or horizontal without hand-computed anchors.

EdgesCopy Anchor Link

• Labels take the first clear spot, away from boxes, zone headers, other labels and arrowheads.
• Zones as targets. d.edge(pool, net_zone) ends on the side of the zone that faces the source. fan="bus" adds a bar inside the zone.
• Routing. route="ortho" routes around boxes and avoids crossing other edges.
• Trunks. d.bundle([e1, e2], trunk="right") joins edges into one target on a shared trunk.

Icons and legendCopy Anchor Link

Wordmarks keep their aspect ratio. badges=[...] adds up to three corner logos to a box. Themes declare icon fallback chains, and spinagram icons report lists where each icon came from. Add meaning= to edges and zones, and d.add_legend(items="auto") lists one row per style you used.

check finds more, and fixes itCopy Anchor Link

check now also reports icons touching borders, headers covered by content, missing glyphs, clipped or underused zones, content outside the safe area, low contrast and edge crossings. Each issue has a severity and, when it is safe, a fix:

spinagram check --fix specs/runners.yaml   # writes runners.fixed.yaml; Python specs get suggested edits
spinagram render --relayout specs/         # applies the safe fixes in memory

Stable outputsCopy Anchor Link

output="runners-network" writes stable file names. requires=">=0.4,<0.5" warns when the installed version does not match. Every SVG carries a content hash, so CI can detect drift.

Layout engine guide →

Also in 0.4Copy Anchor Link

• Edge labels also stay off arrowheads in auto-laid-out diagrams.
• The MCP styles tool reports issues, like check --json.