hi. I've searched the threads/posts and manual, even tried an advance search to no avail for this question.
Has something changed in how you upload a new filter that you create to your Filters menu? It used to be that you could create a filter (basically via opening an SVG document, create a filter in the filter editor, remove anything you've drawn, but the filter remains in the editor, then save it in the Inkscape.../share/filter folder, reboot Inkscape, and it would appear in your Filters Menu. voila, easy peasy (that's the quick version of course). I've successfully done this before (v.47 I think), but it's not working now in v.48, and I can't figure out what I'm missing, doing wrong, or if something changed? I'm on a pc, using win7, v.48. I also tried to update my filters.svg file with new filters and that didn't work either.
Any ideas?
thx

Ha, you're going to think this is funny, but I have no idea how to install a filter, lol. Whenever I've downloaded a filter, like from OCL, it comes in an SVG file. So if I want to use it in a different file, I just open the SVG file that the new filter is in, copy an object which has that filter applied, and paste it over into the new file.

Inkscape.../share/filter seems like a reasonable place to me, to try and make a filter permanently appear in the menu.

When you say "remove anything you've drawn" do you mean everything except the object with the filter? If you delete everything, it seems like you would be saving a blank file. But again, I don't really know. Although, I don't think it would hurt to try saving the SVG with 1 object with the filter applied to it.

Brynn, I about fell over when you said that, LOL!
I had followed instructions on someone's blog to install a filter called Country Shading (The filter is from ChrisDesign blog BTW and he referred to OCL). Anyway, I copied down the instructions step, by step, so I'd always know how to install (and I repeated them in my above post), I'm wondering now if I left out a step.
To answer your question, you do save a (blank) page to the filter directory in Inkscape, and yes, really, a 'blank' page, let's say I created a drop down filter and in the process created a rectangle, when I get the filter as a want, I delete the rectangle. That does not delete the filter you created in the Filter Editor, so you can save the file normally, then re-open it and be able to use the filter.
I want to add some filters, by name, to my Filter Menu, so that's when you save (the blank) file to the Inkscape/share/filter folder. I successfully added the Country Shading added to my menu (I was so proud of myself too, lol). But, and here's the strange thing, now that I've upgraded to v.48, the filter is still there, but there is no filter file in the filters folder in Inkscape anymore - so what happened to it? and where is Country Shading running from now? I checked the main filter file that comes with Inkscape, and it's not there either, so now am really confused - is this an Inkscape bug (doubtful, usually it's me that's at fault). I'm not sure where else to look for the Country Shading file (I did a name search too).
dee

Idk, maybe something about the newer version is different? Why do you use 0.48 and not 0.48.4?

Brynn - well, good idea, so I downloaded .48.4 I was able to re-install the Country Shading filter successfully, but not save the filter I made, hmmm. Maybe there's something special or different that need to do to tell Inkscape it's a filter? Clueless here.
I did notice something - the filter I downloaded was called VSD_Country Shading, but it appears as Country Shading in the filters - so I must be missing a step in making the filter file.

RESOLVED!!! finally - the filter(s) have been saved, they are now under Filters then under Bundled, then mine come up! yay.
Brynn - when/if you get a moment, give it a try and see what you get. thx
I'm not sure if this is a change in v 48.4 but I don't remember seeing it in v.48, so no matter, it's working and I'm happy about it. yay.