idraw or touchdraw?

Of the two you asked about I think iDraw is the more technical CAD like app than Touchdraw. You might want to also take a look at iPocket Draw. Like iDraw it has a loupe view so you can more precisely snap to grid and objects.

I've been using TouchDraw for the past few days, so far it's been excellent. Using it for a network diagram now, will do so for a floor plan afterwards. The developers are very responsive to questions.

I've been using it in tandem with Atomic Browser to get vector files directly into TouchDraw. You can download a file (like a .svg) and then "open in external app" will call up TouchDraw if it's a supported file type. Makes it easy to import new shapes on-the-go!

Short: TouchDraw

Long: Not an easy question. The reason they both have solid reviews is they both have outstanding qualities.

Out of the two iDraw is actually the better drawer. It's easier to get at tools and has better free drawing support with it's pencil and brush tools.

TouchDraw buries lots of it features with little clear documentation (kinda like Apple). For example where iDraw can tweak a Square's paths with just a few logical taps. TouchDraw you first have to convert the square to a Path, then press and hold on the segment to bring up a pop-up list of options.

Despite TouchDraw being more scattered in its UI I prefer it to iDraw. It has features I prefer. The first is the folder grouping and custom image library, both of which are useful for making smaller parts to combine in larger projects. Second is the it's ability to "Open In..." export to other Apps. Both can export to iTunes/email/cloud, but TouchDraw can send files on to other Apps on your iPad.

It even exports it's own TouchDraw format which you can then pass along to other iPad users with TouchDraw for additional editing (workflow can go TouchDraw -> GoodReader -> WiFi/WebDAV/DropBox/etc -> 2nd user's GoodReader -> TouchDraw.

http://appadvice.com/appguides/show/vector-drawing

Sorry for digging up an old thread but I haven't seen anything else more recent on this subject.
How did you get on with your decision? I was in a similar predicament and looking to map out floor plans. I was in between Touchdraw & iDraw and ended up going for iDraw for two reasons - PDF import and also iCloud support.
The latter was not a deal breaker but I like having another option for sharing or backing up.


idraw has been great for most of what I wanted to do. I could import a PDF floor plan of a new house we bought and I could scale it and map out where various bits of furniture would. One issue I did have later on was mapping out the various floor spaces so we could estimate the cost of flooring. iDraw has dimensioning for area however it doesn't calculate area on anything other than a square boundary of the shape you have selected so the calculation is inaccurate for anything other than a square/rectangle. Any other floor shape can't be calculated. Touchdraw does handle this so would have been ideal but I wouldn't have been able to import the PDF in the first place. iDraw for Mac does do complex area calculations and I'm hoping this filters down to the iPad version because it seems disingenuous how the iPad version currently calculates this.
Touchdraw also supports flow charting - you could do this in iDraw but Touchdraw makes it much easier by featuring 'connectors' to link shapes instead of normal lines. This way if you link two shapes and then move one, the connection between the two is dynamic and is maintained. In iDraw you would need to recreate this line. Touchdraw also adds flow chart shapes to it's library to facilitate this.

Both apps seem great for what they do, it's just a shame that both have missing functionality for my ideal use.