Sketchup Pro 2023 Custom Trays Have Portions Blacked Out

Windows 11 Pro 22H2 Build 22623.1325
Intel(R) Core™ i9-10900K CPU @ 3.70GHz, 3696 Mhz, 10 Core(s), 20 Logical Processor(s)
64GB Ram
Sketchup Pro, Version 2023.0.367 64-bit
Installed new version today,
Created 3 Trays, T1, T2, T3
T1 contains Components
T2 contains Entity Info, Tags, Scenes
T3 contains Materials, Styles, Soften Edges
When I open SU Pro:
The T1/Components window is blackened out
The T3/Materials and /Styles windows are blackened out.

I have to close and reopen the trays for them to display properly.

It happens every time I open SU Pro 2023.
I disabled every plugin and restarted - no impact.
I deleted the trays and recreated - no impact.
I renamed the global and local preferences JSON files and rebuilt the toolbars and trays - no impact.
Here’s a screenshot:

Any input toward resolving this is appreciated!
Have no similar issues in SU Pro 2022.

2 Likes

Seems you are not alone… :frowning:

Well, that would suggest it’s them and not us… I submitted a ticket to SU, we’ll see how quickly they respond.

1 Like

There’s a way to make this a bit more convenient as a workaround.

Merge all your trays into one like so:

It’s just a matter of dragging all the trays together and anchor them on either side:

You can then set this tray on your secondary monitor. When Sketchup loads, just slightly resize the tray and it’ll start working again. It’s not much, but it’s a workaround.

1 Like

Just tried this on my system and all was well.

Thanks for the responses - SU has responded to my bug review request and they’re working on it. Will advise of any progress or suggestions they make.

I submitted a bug report and it has been escalated up a tier. SU recognizes it’s a bug.

Resizing the tray seems the easiest work around for now. I wrote an AutoHotKey script that positions my trays where I want them and added a line of code for each tray to resize it slightly and size it back again. It resolves the black screen issue and an issue where clicking on a component isn’t updating the model info dialog. With 3 monitors, I can easily move the trays with the hotkey to the left, middle or right monitor and the resizing code I added seems to get the trays back in proper working order.

I’m having the same problem, except that my tray panes aren’t blacked out; they simply retain their initial values. I posted about it in the thread that dezno mentioned above.

Would you mind sharing your AutoHotKey script?

Bret Sutton

@OldCoot - The AHK script is below. Take careful note of the comments. A lot of this is hard coded to work with my setup, so you may need to make adjustments. Use at your own risk.

; AlignTrays - Align Trays
; I have to run in administrator mode for this to work with Sketchup 2023
;
; This is set up for 3 monitors.
; My display resolution is 2560x1440
; You may have to adjust defW/defH variables below for your screen
; This script also assumes the center display is the primary monitor,
; with the left monitor having negative coordinates, the center monitor starting at 0, 0,
; and the right monitor starting at the display width coordinate.

#NoEnv ; Recommended for performance and compatibility with future AutoHotkey releases.
#Warn ; Enable warnings to assist with detecting common errors.
#Singleinstance force
;SendMode Input ; Recommended for new scripts due to its superior speed and reliability.
;SetWorkingDir %A_ScriptDir% ; Ensures a consistent starting directory.

;--------------CRITICAL INFO-------------------
;I’m working with the following customized SketchUp trays:
;T1 (SU Tray 1)
;T2 (SU Tray 2)
;T3 (SU Tray 3)
;Model Info (SU model info)
;Profile Dialog (profile builder dialog)

;set AHK definitions
;Use Alt+F9 to align left, Alt+F10 to align center, Alt+F11 to align right
!F9::AlignTrays(1)
!F10::AlignTrays(2)
!F11::AlignTrays(3)

AlignTrays(mon)
{
; Get the system settings for available monitor space
SysGet, m, Monitor, %mon%
defW := 447 ; default width of the trays, adjust as needed to your monitor resolution
defT := 30 ; This can be set to zero, but I need an offset at the top because I have WinStep loaded and it takes up some top space.
defH := 1100 ; default height of trays, adjust to your monitor resolution
if (mon = 1)
{
x1 := (mRight - defW)
}
else
{
x1 := (mLeft)
}
; set the the position of T1, everything else aligns with it.
; the +10 was added here to resize the window to work around a SketchUp bug.
; the next line can be removed once SU fixes the bug
WinMove, T1, %x1%, %defT%, defW+10, 1100 ; remove when bug is fixed
WinMove, T1, %x1%, %defT%, defW, 1100
WinGetPos, x, y, w, h, T1
; some adjustments to get coordinates to align.
; the sketchup trays don’t report window sizing the same as other windows, so had to adjust
if (mon = 1)
{
x1 := x - defW - 1
}
else
{
x1 := x + defW + 1
}
y := defT + 1
; move and size tray 2 equal to tray 1
; the +10 was added here to resize the window to work around a SketchUp bug.
; the next line can be removed once SU fixes the bug
WinMove, T2, x1, y, defW+10, h ; remove when bug is fixed
WinMove, T2, x1, y, defW, h
if (mon = 1)
{
x1 := x1 - (defW - 1)
}
else
{
x1 := x1 + (defW + 1)
}
; move and size tray 3 equal to 1 and 2
; the +10 was added here to resize the window to work around a SketchUp bug.
; the next line can be removed once SU fixes the bug
WinMove, T3, x1, y, defW+10, h ; remove when bug is fixed
WinMove, T3, x1, y, defW, h
; move model info to new coordinates
if (mon = 1)
{
WinGetPos, x, y, w, h, Model Info
x1 := (x1 - w + 6)
}
else
{
WinGetPos, x, y, w, h, T3
x1 := (x1 + w - 6)
}
y := defT - 1
WinMove, Model Info, x1, defT
WinGetPos, x, y, w, h, Model Info
if WinExist(“Profile Dialog”)
{
; adjust coordinates for profile builder
y := h + 24
h := defH - h + 12
; move profile builder dialog under model info
WinMove, Profile Dialog, x, y, w, h
}
}

And it seems that choosing a layer in ENTITY INFO by pressing the first letter doesn’t work any more too…
For example… If I select a group and roll out the tag selection menu in Entity Info and then press “P” to quickly select a “People layer” sKetchup will push-pull instead of scrolling down to layers starting from P. I guess this is related to trays not refreshing too…

I see a fix to another issue that could have caused this. I added a note to that fix, to point out that it may have broken the Entity Info tag menu selection.

1 Like

2023 is officially first relies that makes me want to go to previous version… I’m with sKetchup since sK-7. Is it really an official relies or I downloaded some beta testing version? It says 23.0.367.
It doesn’t have some extra new things that I would be in need of and broke at least 3 that I use and can name:
-Trays
-Entity info Tag menu
-Drape Tool…

Another SU update launched today (5/1/23) and still no fix to the trays getting blacked out on startup, or to the component tray not retaining previous settings. Wondering if there has been further progress by anyone in tracking down the cause of this issue?

Thanks, in advance.

According to the release notes the latest release was just for some security updates.

True, but we’re 3 months into this version, and even with an elevated bug report there is still not a resolution to the problem. Very frustrating! The dozens of hours I’ve wasted tweaking my setup, pulling and switching video cables, reinstalling drivers, coding workarounds, etc., to find a solution - all to no avail is crazy. SU is an expensive subscription - we should not have to deal with such buggy software. Again, very frustrating.

I agree with you that it may be frustrating to have this problem but I wonder why other people aren’t having this issue, I use sketchup on Mac and Pc and I’ve never had this problem and also haven’t seen anyone else having it.

1 Like

When I submitted the issue to SU, they confirmed it was a bug and elevated it. They replicated the issue on their end. Other people in this very thread are reporting it as well. All of the cable swapping I’ve done has been at SU’s behest. So yes, other people are having the issue.

Recently I ran across the dysfunctional trays on the second display bug. The computer in question is a HP EliteDesk, Windows 10, integrated Intel video. After a couple of hours digging into possible fixes it seemed that the easiest approach was to use the Windows Script Host SendKeys method to send the appropriate keystrokes to Hide and re-Show the affected Trays. Many thanks to ThomThom, a good bit of the code is siphoned from TT_Lib2

If you would like to try this solution, drop this file into the Plugins folder. Each time Sketchup is started the code will execute and refresh the trays. The code contains a lot of fiddly bits so I’m just throwing this out there to see how well it works.

Outdated
SW_ResetTrays.rb (5.6 KB)

Version 2.
Updated to be language aware as provided by @DanRathbun.
Updated to only apply to Sketchup version 23.0.419 in accordance with the comments from @colin.
SW_ResetTrays V2.rb (7.0 KB)

2 Likes

I found the bug report about the problem, and it does show as being recently fixed. That should mean it will be fixed in the next update we do. I can’t tell you when that will be.

Meanwhile, I will try your extension and see if it takes care of the problem cases we had listed. Assuming it does, I will let Support know, so that people can have a fix while they wait for the update from us.

Do you know if ALT + W works for all localizations to open the Window menu ?