I’ve been battling with dynamic component attribute names since the beginning of DC time. I’ve been doing everything I could to keep them short, and on one line. The issue is, that when the names are long, they wrap to the next line and can become very hard to read.
Just recently I figured; Why not apply a minor CSS hack to the DC plugin, and get the attribute input fields to be responsive, with a variable size?
This is quite a harmless hack, but making a backup of any files you change is always recommended! Also, this will probably be overwritten when the DC plugin is updated.
How
Open manager.css located at: C:\%AppData%\SketchUp\SketchUp 2018\SketchUp\Plugins\su_dynamiccomponents\css
Paste the following to the top of the file: /* Responsive Flex DC attributes */ .attribute-label, .attribute-label-selected { width: 25% !important; word-wrap: normal !important; }
Done!
You don’t have to restart Sketchup to see the changes. Hit F5 in the attributes window to refresh.
I chose 25% as the width of the columns - I find it the most comfortable. You can choose any other percentage or a fixed pixel value (For example: replace 25% with 50% or with 200px).
Certainly handy with long names. And it works quite well.
It should be something natural to SketchUp to adapt the field(s) size(s) when working with such long names and/or formulas.
Maybe you can also do something to the Shortcut list window? (or preferably the SketchUp developers can make it a build in option to stretch this window to make long options readable), see:
Unfortunately, this is a native dialog with a set layout that on the Windows editions is compiled into the executable program. It is possible to hack it, but changes would invalidate the security certificate (I believe.) ie, the checksum changes for the .exe. file. This is not something Trimble wants us to do.
On the Mac, it might be possible to change a nib file ?
I do recall asking (a FR) for this dialog to be sizable.
(The “Files” panel has the same kind of truncation issue we’ve complained about.)
In the interim, perhaps moving the “Add” and “Assigned” controls down to the bottom would allow for a shorter but wider “Function” listbox ?
Not only shortcuts but filepaths, too (in the files section.)
The developers came across this, in version 2018 because it now shows the last part of the filepath, instead of the first part in earlier versions.
On the mac, it works when the line is inserted in the manager.css file
~/Library/Application Support/SketchUp 2018/SketchUp/Plugins/su_dynamiccomponents/css/manager.css
