Getting the size of text without using the boundingBox function in Raphael javascript library
I am trying to create some buttons with text in javascript using the Rahpael library. I would like to know the size of the styled text, before drawing to avoid that so I can create proper background (the button). Also I would like to avoid drawing the text outside of the canvas/paper (the position of the text is the position of its center). I can use Raphaels getBBox() method, but I have to create (draw) the text in first place to do this. So I draw text to get the size to be able to draw it on the right position. This is ugly. So I am searching for some general method to estimate the metrics