I’m using a separate numberpad (iHome) with a MacBook Air. It’s a pain to have to go back to the keyboard for the comma key, when entering rectangular dimensions. I’ve tried mapping a comma to an unused key on the numberpad ( the 000 key) but that doesn’t work,
Has anyone else come up with a shortcut, or is there another way to enter that second dimension?
I have programmed CTRL+` for Select, F2 for Orbit, and F3 for Pan. Great timesavers!
Are you not using a mouse with a scroll wheel? If not, you should really get one, it makes navigating so much easier, and with the other hand, easy to move around the keyboard to just tap the “,”
You can also get a mouse with several programmable buttons for all your favourite shortcuts.
No, I’m using the trackpad. With the F2 and F3 shortcuts, and a 2-finger scroll, I really don’t feel the need for one, yet. That may change, but for now, I’m pretty comfortable without it. Except for the “,”.
Use one for some days and you will feel…
I’ll try, I promise. But even with it, I would like to enter the comma without leaving the numberpad.
What’s your left hand doing while you tap in the numbers? I don’t see many solutions here, unless you have programmable buttons/keys
You sound like about the most efficient, productive human ever. It must be a wonder to see you work.
-Gully
OS X Yosemite: Use Dictation Commands to tell your Mac what to do
john
My left hand is generally entering shortcuts, drinking coffee, or keeping the cat off of the keyboard.
Actually, I do lot of work with Finale, a music publishing app. There, the left hand is entering notes, while the right is on the number pad. So, I’ve gotten used to using it on the keyboard. I would like to shift more functionality to my left hand with SU, as well.
Not really. I just like to eliminate some wasted motion.
It’s a little less of an issue on the desktop, where the numberpad is attached to the keyboard. But on the laptop, it’s a USB plug-in, so it’s not quite so easy to reach.
That sounds nice, but I’m skeptical. If it were true, you’d be using a scroll wheel mouse with SU, for which its interface was designed. Frankly, I would consider use of a trackball with SU something of an affectation.
-Gully
Gully,
I’m not arguing; I’m trying to learn. As I understand it, the three-button with scroll wheel allows you quick access to Orbit, Pan, and Zoom. In my world, working from a trackpad, I can tap the F2 key and swipe the trackpad to orbit, F3 and swipe to Pan, and 2-finger swipe up or down to Zoom. That doesn’t seem any more complicated than remembering which button on the mouse does what. Select the tool, click and drag on the pad for drawing, push-pull, etc.
What else does the mouse do for you?
Thanks!
Mike
I didn’t say that whatever gestures you’re accustomed to using in “your world” are more complicated; they just don’t happen to work in SU. (So what is your world?)
Let’s see. Position tool pointers in 3D space, zoom, orbit, pan. Yep, that’s it. What else are you looking for?
-Gully
Edit: Incidentally, here’s an article (blog?) that may interest you: Mapping the Num Lock key to a comma (31/05/12)
(I presume he meant to say “mapping a comma to the NumLock key,” not the reverse, but hey, the guy’s a nerd, not a linguist.) I think I would prefer to use the pretty much useless Pause/Break key in any event.
But my gestures do work in SU, once I’ve programmed the shortcuts to switch the tools. So I can do everything you can do, without the mouse. It’s not an issue.
All I really want is a shortcut to enter a comma!
No. The mouse navigation commands act as an interrupt. You can interrupt an operation, such as drawing or moving, in progress, to zoom, pan, or orbit and then resume the operation where you left off. You can’t do that with the toolbar buttons or their keyboard shortcuts.
You can use the keyboard mapping utiliy I showed you to map a comma on a little used keypad key.
-Gully
@wawoodman you should try holding cmmd-control for orbiting.
that way, you can do something like click the first point of a line, then orbit, then finish the line.
sketchup has no support for trackpads but still, I rarely ever use a mouse with my laptop… there are talks of adding support but I don’t know when/if it will happen. some other 3d applications do have support and it’s real sweet. (2 finger orbiting, pinch zoom, then all the various 3&4 finger swipes as tool shortcuts)
OK, I’ll give you that one!
I’ll look into the utility, thanks.
I give this a new try. I’m looking for how to change the shortcut for dimensions. Using two windows computers. On my my stationary I use the comma in the numpad when entering rectangular dimensions. (145,178) but on my laptop it wants a semicomma. (145;178) Don’t know why, but it was the same with my last laptop.
Is there a way to change it? Using shift and moving my hand every time is not effective.
Is depends on the language stetting of the operating system. More precisely depends on a Regional Format .
The List separator is determining how you have to separate the entered dimension and the Decimal symbol should be different than List separator.
Here is an example of German Region formats
