File versions differences?

[jiminybillybob]

What are the differences between files of different SketchUp versions?

When creating files with the 2018 SDK, what can I lose by saving as a SketchUp 8 file, for instance?

I guess 2015 introduced something about IFC classifications, what else?

[eneroth3]

PIDs were added in 2017 (if I remember correctly).

[eneroth3]

Section fill state and section fill color added in SU2018.

[slbaumgartner]

Since the file format is proprietary and has never been documented, in the end you can only guess. If you review the release notes for each version, certainly any new model data features such as IFC and PIDs necessitate a format change, while new tools or model creation functions probably don’t. But we have no way to know whether the format might have been altered in some additional ways, for example to fix bugs.

[jiminybillybob]

Thanks!

[MikeWayzovski]

there is also an option in Generate Report to ‘Save to Model’ since 2016, and since 2018 we have the advanced attributes on components

[eneroth3]

@MikeWayzovski

there is also an option in Generate Report to ‘Save to Model’ since 2016

Based on being an extension author I suspect this uses attributes though, and not a new file format. Easy to check by saving the settings to the model, save to an older format and open again.

[MikeWayzovski]

Not that easy to check, the developers haven’t implemented the downsave ‘Save to model’ , yet.

Generate Report and backward compatibility

@Barry Hi I use SketchUp 2018 pro, I create a report saved to that file. The Client has 2017 and can not read that report. I was under the impression that the “on line” report software was on the cloud. So why is it version dependent? Does this mean I have to resort to the “off line” report and sort it in excel? Isn’t this counter productive? Please inform, as need to work out a solution Thanks Philip Edit: I realize that there is a new attribute directory, but these could be version depe…

[Aerilius]

Christina’s idea was to down-save a model with a specific feature to a file format version that presumably doesn’t support it. If after opening that file the feature is missing, then it is actually only supported in newer versions of the file format.

When you save a report “to model”, the report’s template is indeed stored as a model attribute in a “dynamic_components_templates” dictionary (although it is no dynamic component…). Attributes are supported and thus preserved in all .skp versions since SketchUp 6. However SketchUp 2018 might be needed to read/interprete this specific attribute so that it is used by the new report function.