The ∞ SketchUp Wish List

Hi,

it is posible to add auto-text for current Scale on page in Layout? If not it would be great to have, while we have different
scale on different pages and we need to add that manualy.

The trick with this is linking it to a model view… I often have 2-3 model views (some at different scales) embedded into the page. Some overlap, some are details, some are 3d views.

I’ve setup auto text tags and I just change 1 number on my details or page titles:

 <s0> = N.T.S.
 <s1> = 1/8" = 1'
 <s2> = 1/2" = 1'
 <s3> = 3/16" = 1'
 <s4> = 1/4" = 1'
 <s5> = 1/2" =1'
 <s?> = etc. etc.
3 Likes

I think it is not so hard for programmers to add one more option. We need automatisation. :wink:
Just add option “CurrentScale” in menu.

Sure, so long as you can link it to a model view… and have a way of seeing what ends up being linked to everything.

What I’d really like to see is some sort of LayOut version of the dynamic component. Then you could build text components with pull downs for scales, detail numbers, etc etc.

1 Like

Also the ability to resize the shortcuts preferences window so that you’re not forced to scroll down in a tiny window looking for the correct tool. When we use a lot of plugins and assign shortcuts often, it gets irritating having to search in this little space. A better designed UI for the shortcuts popup window please!

The rotated rectangle tool to allow us a simple input for distance when defining the point of the parallel edge. As it was before 2017:

2 Likes

My Sketchup 2018 Wishlist

Sketchup Pro&Make (In order of importance)

Sketchup developers should have no problem with the first few items in this list:

  1. Fix the bug that crashes sketchup without a bug-splat when holding down control and painting a large polygon model - it is a floodfill operation that I suspect has to do with Sketchup running out of stack space.
    Refer: Bug - Sketchup crashes without bugsplat when painting large geometry

  2. Fix the divergence between textured and plain-colour specular lighting in the openGl shaders.
    Refer: Plain Color vs Texture Specular lighting issue

  3. Sketchup brings the focus back to itself after it has loaded a large model, I don’t want this to happen if I have switched to another application (usually another instance of Sketchup), it is annoying and often-times confusing.

  4. Ability to lock the toolbars where they are docked. Often I hit the Orbit button (or think I’ve hit it) then start dragging the cursor to reorientate my model. What often happens is that I start the drag operation over the edge of the toolbar, and end up undocking and moving the toolbar over onto the model.

  5. Export to 3MF (Because Paint 3D cannot load a .dae file, which is supposedly the 3D model open standard, shame on Microsoft!)
    Refer: 3d Warehouse models moving to Remix3d

  6. Import from 3MF (So we can import our freshly painted models back into Sketchup before uploading to the Warehouse)

  7. Decouple the user interface thread from model operations - I should be able to minimize, maximize, resize, and move (i.e. basic windows operations) the sketchup application window during a large model operation such as explode, or while loading a large model.
    If our scripts can be validated and loaded in a separate thread after Sketchup starts, that will speed up the load operation.

3D Warehouse

  1. Default the sort order to the latest models. The existing ‘sort by relevance’ default option means that older models built in the Google Sketchup days get more views, downloads, likes, etc., even though there are subsequent and considerably better alternatives posted much later.

  2. Limit the number of tags (12-16 seems reasonable to me, although I may have more in my own models), to prevent people gaming the system. Refer: Model tag abuse

  3. Add an automatic 3D tag if the model bounding box is in 3 dimensions, this allows us to exclude most 2D face-me models from the search results.
    Note ‘3D’ as a tag should be automatically removed from a 2D model. Likewise a 2D tag could be included for 2 dimensional models.

  4. Include ‘Exportable’ tag alongside Private and Public, so it is treated as private during a search, but the model can still be shared and downloaded via the URL.

  5. Include direct-download URLs of the model with url parameter specifying model format, i.e. &format=[skp|skp2016|skp2017|kmz|3mf]
    Where skp format is simply the latest version of Sketcup available. Note I did not include .dae as it uses external texture files, and if I recall the kmz is simply a zip file of the dae along with the textures anyway.

1 Like

Fix the issue with focus (Mac only I think) when pulling down or changing a layer in SKP. I have so many layers named ‘m’ and ‘p’ and ‘l’. Such a time sync.

FIX IT! If I press enter, I want focus to change back to drawing window.

7 Likes

This!

During the 2-5 second it takes to open SketchUp I’d like to be able to check my mail, Facebook, this forum or other services without the SketchUp window randomly screaming for attention.

3 Likes

Workspaces

SketchUp has a lot of useful extensions, and in the future a new useful plugins could be created, and we maybe want to display them all at once, but the problem is that the workspace will become much smaller and displaying a lot of them at once could be confusing.

The workflow of turning the Toollbars on and off every time depending on what project we have or our design stage is not a convenient workflow.

So if we have workspace for each type of project or each type of design stage could be very useful, it will works in a similar way how we manage the workspace in Photoshop, there could be a dropdown in the Menu Bar to select the desired workspace, or to create a new one.

The workspace could save the Toolbar status (on or off), Toolbars Locations,Trays Status and positions.

-It could be useful if we could save these workspaces and load it to other machines ( like shortcuts).
-If plugins Toolbars could display as a drop down menu (Like the Rectangle, Arc and Pencil Tools in Sketchup) that could make the workspace larger and very tidy.

6 Likes

While I like the idea I don’t think this necessarily should be accessible directly in the menu bar. This is exactly the kind of stuff that makes Adobe’s and some other UIs so utterly cluttered. At some point you can’t even distinguish the buttons that does something with the document you are working on from those that just changes the UI itself.

I propose adding an Export and Import button in Windows > Preferences > Workspace. These features could also be added to the API and then plugin developers could create various ways of switching between profiles, e.g. by a menu, a dialog, a shortcut or even based on what profile was last used for the opened file. By letting plugin developers handle the interface it can be customize much more than a native feature ever could be.

New users shouldn’t have to worry what a dropdown menu in the top of the windows do before they have learned what extensions are, or even the native tools.

1 Like

Photoshop Workspace Bar is not on the Menu Bar, it’s available on the right corner on the Toolsbar and from the Window Menu, that maybe make it a little bit cluttered.

The idea of having it in the Menu Bar is to have quick access to it, and as you said it could be Exported and Imported through “Windows > Preferences > Workspace”, it could contain a list of the workspaces.

-Add a shortcut to between worksapaces could be useful.

That would be very useful, specially if they could add their “Plugins Windows” to the Trays.

-Maybe if the Workspace Menu contain only “Default Workspace”, that may not effect the new users experience.

You might find the 'Sets" option of the SketchUcation toolset useful.
It allows you to create various extension sets that you can load depending on what type of work you are doing.

As far as some method of saving settings/toolbars/extensions/etc as Workspaces goes. I like the idea. And there should be a couple (at least) that are installed with new/updated versions:

  • The current, fairly minimal workspace that appears with new installations
  • An “expanded” one that - at the very least - shows the Large Tool Set. Why? There are more than a few threads over the time I’ve been here asking: Where do I find the tools shown in <this> tutorial? With the answer frequently being some variation of “Enable the Large Tool Set”.
1 Like

Thanks for the advice, SketchUcation is very useful plugin, but my suggestion is something different. SketchUcation toolset is disable and enable plugins, so to see the changes we have to restart SketchUp.

  • For example, if have to create tensile structure (organic modeling) while we design a building, we don’t have to restart SketchUp to show the tools which is required to create it.

Most don’t require a restart any more and can be enabled for just a session.

I was only offering it as something for now, not contradicting your feature request.

1 Like

My wishlist for Sketchup 2018:

  • Python scripting. I can use Python in a lot of other 3D softwares but not in Sketchup. I can use Python in Maya, Houdini, Rhino3D, Fusion360, Blender but not in Sketchup and I don’t want to learn that Rubi thing only because Sketchup uses only that.
  • MacOS antialiasing. Seems that this feature is broken in Skethup 2017 and the display looks horrible.
  • Linux support. With all the WannaCry problems that windows have lately I think that Linux becomes a more compelling option. The company for which I work was infected by this virus and they lost a lot of data because of that. Windows is a joke when comes to security and safety.
  • True circles and arcs, without segmentation. I don’t understand why Sketchup can’t do a normal circle like any single other CAD program can do such a basic thing.
  • More accessible price. I think that the actual price for the Pro version it is a little to high.
2 Likes

Here’s my MUST requests:

1- import dwg or dxf or pdf into layout. Having to rastered your vectoriel or having to simply redraw it is REALLY not a cool thing.

2- Be able to choose a different folder for the autosave and the skb. That would fix a lot of sync problem with dropbox.

3- In layout, be able to have a “component” as well as groups. This is The most annoying missing feature in Layout. That cost me hours and hours of my time when using hundred of symbol for site plan.

4- In layout, be able to edit lines in group edit.Having to constantly ungroup and regroup could be a pain in a busy drawing.

5- In layout, Improve leader basepoint. When copy a group of details drawing with multiple leader, they not always fallow. Its very time consuming to reposition them everytime you move something.

6- In layout, create new layer when copy elements from different file. In LO2017, you need to manually create all the layer in the new drawing first! Annoying.

7- have a different extension for sketchup viewer so client CANNOT have edit your model and have access to your priceless library. This missing feature create serious political problem in companies.

8- Having a measurement tape in sketchup viewer. Basic simple essential tool!

thank you.

5 Likes
  1. On a Mac I can bring in PDFs into LO. Also, if you are looking to bring in just geometry - you can import the DWG or DXF into SU and then bring that into LO - I have done this to stack model views - my model over a floor plan as an example.

  2. Yes! As well as be able to import AutoText as a CSV file for easily setting up different drawings.

  3. Yes! I hate handing over a model that can be manipulated - I often explode all important instances first to make it a mess for someone to manipulate.

There is already a X-REF mamager available as a free plugin. I operate in an arch office of 14 and it has worked well on large complex models where we need to work on individual parts of the model at the same time. It has the basic functions found in autocad, and will inspect the model for updates and newer versions of a file. Models can also be re-pathed
It can be found in Sketchucation.com