How to align and distribute objects?

How do I align a few objects, place on top of each other, by their centers?
This is very basic functionality, but the only way I could find is to manually move them with some poorly working “inference” enabled.

What is it that you want to accomplish ? Aligning in a 3D space is somewhat different then in a flatten world like a face or paper. That ‘basic’ functionality maybe was implemented in some DTP 2D Cad programs because there weren’t any inference engines like the one ‘under the hood’ of SketchUp at the time?
The inference is not yet something that you can turn on or of, it is always there or ‘enabled’.
I never missed align tools in all the years I worked with SketchUp, because, as a builder, I would like to get the objects in the right place first and not messing around :slight_smile:

I know @barry_milliken_droid would disagree, and that is why he developed this extension:

Watch at the end of the demonstration video where I center an chandelier over a table.
I disagree because I’m a designer not a builder. A designer needs to experiment with many arrangements of sometimes large sets of objects. Simple inferencing just doesn’t cut it.

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Hi @barry_milliken_droid

Ref: 00:02:20 scaling windows
I’m curious if the window sash stiles and other vertical elements of the windows retain their size.

Not unless they are dynamic components.
But for preliminary design (which is what I use SketchUp for), I don’t want to be focused on such details. I need a quick way to explore many different sizes and arrangements of many sets of objects: Which in SketchUp, is too laborious to do. As an architect and CAD developer for 40 years, it was shocking to me that these types of functions (which existed in many graphic and CAD systems before SketchUp was invented) did not exist in SketchUp.

Did you get over it?:slight_smile:

Thanks, @barry_milliken_droid

I understand the use case better now.
Slick tools indeed !
Still, I wouldn’t recommend such things to new users who’ve yet to learn SU’s powerful Inference system of dynamic guides and snap points.


A craftsman doesn’t blame his tools for his errors.
Neither should the novice unfamiliar with his tools.





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New users need all the basic tools they can get.
And the SlickMove tools are extremely basic ways of dealing with the real world when we move real objects around.
Should we deny users an electronic calculator until they have mastered long division and square roots derived by hand? Maybe. Should we deny users Push Pull until they learns to add the same faces manually? Should we deny new carpenters an electric drill until they have mastered an hand cranked drill. If I have a few dozen objects that need to be aligned, do you want me to do them one at at time with inferencing?
Designers want design tools that free them from the drudgery of conscious focusing on the mechanics of the tools.

When I first learn to draft with a mechanical pencil 45 years ago, you didn’t get a good line unless you learned how to twirl the pencil, evenly over the entire length of the line. Thanks goodness we don’t have to know these things anymore.

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