Hi, I’m doing an online tutorial (in this case, SU for Builders from Fine Homebuilding), and though the instructor has said that the same commands work in Pro vs Free, I’m finding that not to be the case. For instance, right now he’s going over the Hide function, which for him is Cntl-E, but that doesn’t work for me. I can right-click to get the Hide option, but there’s no way I can seem to Unhide.
Is there a list someplace of the keyboard shortcuts for Mac for SU Free/Web? Cheers -
Also, some of the navigation commands don’t seem to work. When I go to the App Settings/Navigation, it has Two Finger Swipe set to Orbit, then “Shift + swipe = pan” But when I press the shift key, I get the “+” sign and it stays in Orbit function. What am I doing wrong here?
You can set up your own keyboard shortcuts in SketchUp Free. Some keyboard shortcuts that author uses are ones they made.
Thanks, Dave - can you point me to a tutorial for how to do that? My searching hasn’t lead to any results, except to pages that say you can’t do that in Web/Free.
never mind, I may have found it
Ok, back to problems. I want to se Cmnd-E as the Hide, but hen I enter in in the box it tells me 'Unavailable." But when I enter Cmnd-E on my drawing with a component selected, nothing happens. So, I’m back to looking for a list of the keyboard shortcuts for Free/Web.
Ok, I was able to assign Option-H to hide. I assigned shift-option-H to Unhide, but it’s not working. Nothing happens. I used the search too to confirm that I had assigned that combo to Unhide. What am I doing wrong?
On Mac OS command is reserved for system shortcuts so is unavailable for SketchUp to use. Option should work.
Thanks, got that figured out. Any idea why the UnHide isn’t working?
Recheck that the short cut is in fact set to this. And… I’m assuming that you have something on screen that is hidden and selected, so that there is something to “unhide”. Otherwise there is no effect. Hide an object, it disappears. Turn on hidden geometry to see a hashfilled outline of all hidden objects, select one or more, then run unhide. Unhide is a context menu item, you need a hidden object selected to run it on.
There are also commands for unhide all and unhide last available in the Display menu.
I looked up the shortcut and it says “unhide - Shift+Option+H.” The text for that is displayed in light gray, but the same thing happened when I was assigning the “hide” shortcut.
I created a group (top plate of a wall), selected it, pressed Option+H and successfully hid it, but nothing brings it back.
How do I turn on ‘hidden geometry’? I don’t see that option anywhere -
Found it after searching deep in the forums.
That’s kind of a POA, because I then have to toggle hidden objects off and on, which I can see being an issue later on… I’ll try assigning a different shortcut to see if that works.
Nope, doesn’t work. Unhide is an option when I search, so it’s not like I’m making up a term… Anyone know what I’m doing wrong?
A shortcut for hidden geometry and objects on and off is very useful. You are correct that hiding or unhiding a large number of objects to control visibility is cumbersome which is why that’s not the way to manage object visibility. For choosing what objects or group of objects to see you should be using tags and scenes.
This is such a PITA… The instructor is using what he claims are the standard keyboard Mac shortcuts, and seems like half don’t work and it takes me at least half an hour to try and chase down if it’s even possible to do it in Free. I know SU wants me to subscribe, but when it’s this hard to get through a basic first class module, it doesn’t make me wan to give them my money. I’ve gone through this multiple times over the years, each time I get frustrated and just go back to pencil and paper. I’m really determined this time, and I don’t think it’s just me who’s having these problems…
Sure, but I haven’t even gotten to those yet. I just want to unhide something. Why is it so hard?
Sounds like you are misunderstanding how Hide and Unhide work in Sketchup. Unhide is a command you apply to a specific hidden object, you must have the hidden object selected. To be able to see hidden objects in order to select them you need to turn on hidden objects.
What instructor are you following? The keyboard shortcuts can help speed things up but it’s important to learn where all these commands exist in the menu system. Shortcuts don’t do anything that isn’t available by clicking. It’s like teaching someone to drive only with the cruse control and ignoring the accelerator pedal. Shortcuts are great but a good foundation in the SketchUp menu systems will really set you up of success. Stick with it, SketchUp is a complex program but most things are really developed with a lot of thought and once you begin to pick up momentum you will understand and agree with how the systems have been set up. Standby a few moments, I’ll make you a short video.
The course is Sketchup for Builders from Fine Homebuilding Magazine. It just got released on November 5, so it’s not an old version of anything. The instructor is Jon Beers, and in the beginning he says that he’s using Pro but that the things he’s covering are the same in Free.
So here’s what he’s doing that I’m trying to replicate. We create a wall of 2x4’s, then create the two top plates (boards that connects them over the top). He says, maybe you want to show the nailing pattern to the crew, so you hide the upper top plate by selecting the component and clicking (Jon uses the shortcut Command+E), then to unhide he clicks Shift+Command+E. Works like a charm for him. Command+E zooms in on my screen, so I created Option+H for Hide, which works great, but I’ve tried three different shortcuts for unhide, but nothing works. I’m just trying to hide a 2xe4 and then unhide - nothing complicated.