Close LayOut.
Open it with a texteditor and paste the path from your NAS (Rightclick on the folder, then hold Option to see the Copy as Pathname option)
Close the layout.private.json
See if it works, I tested with various local an iCloud locations.
The caveat is that as soon as you search for other Styles, the ‘LastStyleFolderDisplayed’ will change and you would have to repeat it.
So better have all the Styles you need in that folder
Another thing is, I think changing Styles in SketchUp and saving them would not be seen directly in LayOut, as with changes in Finder with materials on Mac, one needs to restart the App in order to load the current lists.
The save part is directly and a new style can be seen and used in that SketchUp session.
But LayOut then needs to be restarted in order to see changes, it loads what is current upon startup, it does not ‘refresh’
This is good to know. I wasn’t aware that this was the case.
This is an interesting solution, but it doesn’t really help if I have to perform this operation every time I forget that I forgot to put ALL my styles in that folder…and I WILL forget that I forgot.
Just seems to me that this “feature” isn’t fully realized. Wouldn’t it make sense for Layout also to be connected to the same folder just like Sketchup is? Wouldn’t that shorten the processing time if, in a local environment, it was working WITH Sketchup by looking at the same folder for style references? And if it was, LO would not need to then be restarted for style updates because it already sees those updates when they are made in SKU.
Seems like I’m stuck on this one. Will have to move to the default folder I guess and manually transfer styles to other platforms.
You can use syncing tools for recurring tasks. I use Trimble Connect Sync and have set up different locations to sync to when I want, so all my machines have the same (our pc’s that we use for training, for instance.
The latest or current version is always in the cloud and acts as my ‘data silo’
make sure and press “Option” to get the /Library to show.
I’m not sure I understand this. Well, I do. Because LO doesn’t do what seems like a rather intuitive thing, the user has to accommodate the missing need with an alternative feature that is another round of cost. I totally get why you solved the problem this way (have used the same solutions in the past), but it doesn’t really solve the inherent issue with Layout’s handling of Styles.
I woke up at 5:30 am this morning and my brain was pondering this comment…I am mystified by it. I’m hoping you can help me understand.
You say that Layout loads styles at startup. There isn’t technically a Styles panel in Layout and there isn’t a link to any Styles folder so what is it loading and from where?
By “at startup” do you mean that Layout loads styles at startup when it loads a file with viewports? That would make more sense because the linked viewport is really the path to the Styles…correct?
Am I the only one that thinks that restarting Layout to update it’s connection to updated styles from Sketchup looks like a haphazard solution for a problem that has never been truly addressed? “We don’t know how to solve that problem…just have them restart.”
Perhaps I just don’t understand fully how Layout relates to Sketchup Styles.
Whatever the answers to these questions are, I’m stuck doing terminal work to make sure that Layout performs a function that just seems like it should be hard-coded. It’s a waste of time and works against the idea that I can truly save my Styles in Sketchup to any folder I want and that will transfer to Layout.
If I don’t want that waste of time Im left to just use the Default Styles folder and either spend the time setting up syncing systems with cloud services I don’t want to pay for or doing the manual work of copying the Styles between the platforms.
To find this area to be this clunky is surprising.
LayOut loads the Styles in the package (SketchUp.app in the Application folder)
It also looks in the user App…Data for collections (not sure in which order, though)
Then looks for Styles that are in the linked models of the Viewports and lists them. (Try renaming the SketchUp.app and then start LayOut).
Unused styles of viewport only get purged upon saving a document.
So there are three locations where LayOut get’s the Styles (available when selecting a viewport)
The first two (package content and user App…Data) get loaded upon startup of LayOut. Any changes to those folders won’t be seen in the current session. (The same goes for material lists in SketchUp)
The third (linked SketchUp models) can change if you edit something and then refresh the link (Update).
I think it was designed to include all Styles one needs in LayOut should be in the SketchUp Model, or save collections of Styles in the default User App…Data.
SketchUp in general is not that friendly towards users in a more ‘company’ like setup, like when you want a collection on a different location to be used for collaboration.
That’s why I set it up once in Trimble Connect. Whenever I need to install on a new machine I just run Trimble Connect Sync and it all get’s done without me worrying. It saves time, is included in the subscription and when something changes in my styles or materials, I just upload it , so the next time on another machine, I just need to confirm.
(If you pay for it, why not use it:)
Here’s a thread to set it up:
Appreciate your explanation here. That helps me understand it a bit better.
I’ve edited my comment because really, this is the answer to this entire thread. Sketchup doesn’t have the on-board tools to manage a local environment for teams. Maybe one day.
Working on figuring out the redundancy (for me) of Trimble Connect.
