I’m not sure what NDA you signed when you joined to Labs, but mine doesn’t allow sharing on the public forum or somewhere else (“strictly confidential”). In my interpretation, you even not allowed invite people to the Labs!
@dezmo I agree with you that the NDA creates a strictly confidential environment where we cannot share on the detail of the features, we can share that SketchUp Labs exists and that SketchUp Labs is developing features as that much is visible to the public. People are welcomed to create a Trimble ID and complete a tester profile to enter private labs
I see specifically on LinkedIn that engineers and managers inside of Labs are starting to invite people on LinkedIn to test more features.
I think in the age of AI we’re going to see a lot more people wanting to be a part of these testing grounds as there are so many exciting features to try out. I’m not speaking on behalf of Trimble, SketchUp, or the NDA at large but I think, given how AI accelerates the development of plug-ins and tools, the NDA might as well be revised.
This doesn’t mean it’s not valid, but it’s up to you how you interpret it and whether or not you follow it. I’m not the arbiter; I just thought I’d bring it to your attention.
I disagree that the NDA should be revised but that’s not to say I would be against Trimble revising it themselves.
I believe that if you sign up to Labs then what is in Labs stays in Labs and outside of Labs you should be as careful and discrete as possible – for example, if there is a discussion about a issue with a public release that, say, Labs is addressing.
If the developers are themselves talking about Labs – that’s their prerogative and not yours.
But for sure, if a developer has revealed something about Labs publicly then it’s in the public domain…
Yeah, I am glad you are bringing it to my attention to caution me against sharing too publicly what is happening behind closed doors in labs.
I think for one I’m excited for what anyone practising as a professional using SketchUp as software can look forward to when labs’ features get released.
For an industry where software updates have been so static in the last five years with small incremental changes, this last half year seems to, through the aid of AI, show a lot of potential improvement in a 2027 or 2028 rollout.
I’m operating on thin ice here and better warned than sorry.
And let’s be clear – being part of Labs is primarily about testing new ideas and features, and finding bugs.
Being privy to potential new features is secondary.
But that depends on which side you’re on. For Trimble, Labs is a signal to validate ideas before committing a feature to a release. For the user it’s a trade: early access in exchange for testing and feedback. And on this I stand firm, anyone who joins just for a sneak peek but never gives feedback adds little value to the program.
yep.
Whatever the project managers choose to post on linkedin is their deal. we’re not project managers, trimble employees or devs on the topic.
we join the labs to test new features, make sure they work when they are released and iron out the kink. We also provide direct feedback.
labs is a signal to validate things…
what ?
who speaks like that ?
Sorry I use a lot of speech-to-text so you’re right AI tends to clean up a sentence here or there and with English as my second language I am not always too sure if the way I am saying it makes sense to the transcribe feature
Hello,
I would like to point out that I have not shared any confidential information. I did not disclose any new features or share any models.
I was advised to try the Labs version to see whether the issue had been resolved. It had not.
To verify this, I used the SketchUp Labs test model instead of my own. The result was the same: both LayOut Labs and the latest official release show identical behavior.
At the moment, I cannot contact support. I provided all the requested information to the SketchUp manager on Tuesday, but I have not received any update. I also tried to report the issue in Centercode, but I received the error shown below.
At the moment, this forum is my only way of providing feedback so that this issue can reach the appropriate team.
For now, I can continue working with the older version, where this issue does not affect my workflow. However, I am concerned that when SketchUp 2027 is released, this regression may still be present. I would really like to see this issue investigated before then.
If I’m not mistaken and my apologies if I am – you shared a performance metric of Layout Labs.
Which I believe you should not have.
But hey – in the grander scheme of things I’m being pedantic.
That sounds frustrating. Since the slowdown started after the update, it may be a Layout performance bug. Hopefully others can confirm a fix or workaround
Hi everyone, just stepping in to clarify feedback for features in SketchUp Private Labs. We highly encourage and appreciate feedback on these pre-release features to help us improve. However, please remember that all discussions, and test results on labs features must remain strictly within the labs platform. Sharing these metrics on the public forum is a violation of the Trimble Early Access Terms and Conditions.
@adayev.o, I see that you have since been able to log this feedback successfully in SketchUp Private Labs. Thank you for taking the time to do that and one of our team will get back to you over there!
Brief reply to say that the developers have all of the details you reported about the issue, and will be trying to fix the problem as soon as they can.
Seems like this topic got off topic. I also have speed issues with the latest Layout version. One thing i learned a long time ago was to use stacked view ports. As an example I have a final output viewport, a working view port and a vector viewport. The final output has all textures turned on. The working view port has simple textures via the applied styles. I also turn off most Components. The vector view port is where I Dimension. This view port has everything accept the edges I use for dimensioning turned off. All textures are off all wall trim (assuming your working on an architectural project) . this view port is crisp and fast. Dimensions snap easily as possible objects behind are turned off. The dimensions are on their own layer so when I turn off the Vector viewport and turn on the final output Viewport Everything is aligned. This has helped with speed but version 2026.2 is slow. it updates but isnt really finished until you can select a viewport. It will alllow you to do things but is still rendering and doesnt tell you its still working. Your issue rendering all view ports can be turned off but then you have to render each viewport. You uncheck the “Auto” box in viewport settings. I come here when Im waiting for Layout ! LOL
