I have uninstalled SU 2019 and gone thru Colins’ process again and can now open SU 2020 files by clicking on them, but the thumbnail next to all my Layout files has greyed out and the files will not open at all.
Strange, a black hole alright. Any other thoughts anyone?
You could repeat the steps, only set .layout files to open with LayOut.exe in this folder:
C:\Program Files\SketchUp\SketchUp 2020\LayOut
If you open the file from the windows file explorer it will open the file in a second copy of SU so you can view both at the same time or compare them or work on both at the same time.
Sorry used the wrong word should have said run as administrator not installer.
Thank you, have done that, but the LO file will not open until I click on “open with LO 2019” and then it opens with LO2020, but the LO thumbnails are still greyed out.
Strange behaviour indeed, hopefully will get a bug fix soon.
Is there a fix to this problem? Thanks
Which problem exactly? Opening newer Sketchup files with an older version?
I have 2020 installed as well as 2017-2019. When I double click in Win10 file manager a 2020 file, it won’t open, it tells me to get 2020. I have done the uninstall and reinstall of 2020. I can only open 2020 files directly in the SU app. It also opens when I click a “bogus” 2019 version that apparently masquerades as 2020 in “Open with…”. When I search for other files to open “on this computer” ie SU 2020 it doesn’t work either. In short the same problem as everyone else in this thread.
Yep, same here - it’s annoying.
I manage to avoid the issue but occasionally I forget
After some of my earlier suggestions I found that a more sure way to fix the problem was to go into Default Apps, choose Choose default apps by file type, then scroll how to .skp or .layout in the list. In the apps that you will see that can open that file type, choose the upper one. It may be a duplicate of SketchUp 2019 or earlier, but really it is SketchUp 2020.
Test to see if you picked the right one in the list by double clicking on a SketchUp file.
That works for me - thanks Colin
Thanks Colin,
That worked for me too, possibly not a good look for SketchUp, but it solves the immediate problem anyway.
So is thus something we just live with until someone at SU fixes it? It’s not punishment for having a classic perpetual lisc is it?
No, it affects subscriptions users as well. I don’t know when it will be fixed. I do know the installer team know that it’s a problem.
Thanks all for help and insight. Helps to know it’s not something with my machine. I can live with the work arounds.
i noticed that whenever i was backing up files to the Drive or OneDrive, it could trigger SU to “install a feature” and errored out as “failed to find SketchUp.msi”. so after a few months of this, i dug a bit. apparently in the Windows\Installer dir (hidden typically) was an old 2020 installation which was getting triggered even after 2020 has been removed. manually deleted the folder containing the older version and we’ll see if that fixes it.
another things triggering this install was double clicking on an SU file. and same issue with failed to find MSI.
HOWEVER - double clicking on a “.layout” file triggered the SketchUp Pro install, and this time it succeeded. so now the SU files are triggering SU launch instead of install. note that the files were all properly associated with the 2021 app in explorer and default apps… also note, all installs (prior to the layout triggered one) were done as Administrator… hmmmm the thick plottens…
With the duplicate (or triplicate) repeat Open With entries, one of them is really SketchUp 2020, another may be 2019, and the third could be the installer. The situation was improved with SketchUp 2021.
You could delete the installer in your downloads, to increase the chances of SketchUp opening.
thanks! i’m good now. hopefully this may be helpful is other folks run into a similar issue… maybe have the install team contemplate some sort of scrubber tool as a separate download to cleanup older installs without wrecking what some folks might want in terms of multiple version of SU…
Thank you colin. That did the trick for me. For some reason SketchUp 2020 didn’t appear on the list so I selected the upper SketchUp 2019 version. It looks like the 2020 version of SketchUp is labeled as SketchUp 2019.
This has been bugging me all year- feels like I just pulled out a year-long splinter. Seriously thank you.
With the 2021 version the issue is half solved. The pop out menu that says Open With… still can have the same issue. But, the initial right-click menu will list SketchUp 2021 correctly, so open files that way.