Great idea, can’t wait for it!
Please consider a version with english labels on the layers (or even better: add multi-language support to layers descriptions in Synfig 
)
I had a similar wish some time ago and thought about a template-based approach to ease the semi-automated generation of multiple objects… could that kind of thing be supported by your approach? let me put it in a story: I want to develop a music video scene, where the lyrics of the song are animated in the video, one sentence at a time.
- I’d develop a standard “group” of synfig layers with text and effect layers to match the typical lyrics layout I’d want (ie: the template, see attached sif file)
- I’d have an input text file wilth all sentences in the song (say in a csv, json or excel format), along with some parameter value that I want changed for each of them (color code, timing, twirl distortion angle, zoom, origin…), see attached csv file.
- I’d do a right-click on my template group and select “duplicate with parameters” (or some better name) and select the input data file
- synfig would duplicate the standard group for each entry of my data file, changing each given parameter accordingly (text, color,…)
I could see use in this system in animations where many nearly-similar layers are needed, when a more programmatic “duplicate” approach is not fit, and manual fine-tuning would be too time consuming. More examples? fireworks, forest, crowd of people, set of color pencils, book library,… you name it.
Attached is an example synfig scene with a “template” group to be duplicated in such a way, and a possible “data” file in csv format (use OpenOffice to view it, ao)… where I used the relative XPath of the parameters to be updated as headers, or the key of the exported node… but many other approaches are possible (and hopefully more user-friendly).
If you are interested in such a thing let me know! … and if you want me to help make it happen along with your SPIDER project let me know too!
Good luck anyway with your library of components!
Berteh.
template test.sif (4.29 KB)
template test.csv (590 Bytes)