Yes I completley agree some housekeeping is in order!
Back in early SketchUp days it was all about the Makers and the Innovators. SketchUp had a “indy” vibe about it that meant people kind of overlooked all the issues. It was a cheap/free, simple tool to accompany 2D CAD. But come to 2021 and we have all matured. SketchUp (Pro) also needs to grow up in some areas, starting with tidying up its toy box
There is a tonne of stuff that can be improved, I think, quite easily, to make the extension ecosystem what it should be - User friendly and easy for people to realise the full potential of SketchUp Pro. I think it’s sad that most Pro users I’ve met only have a few extensions installed.
I dont agree that a Purge is needed, but maybe it can take the form of a refresh to the way the extension warehouse is served up, and also an audit of older extensions (ones that are simply broken or totally obsolete).
Maybe a new policy that after 10 years of no development, the IP/code becomes open source? what is the policy there anyway?
My issues with Extensions all step from the fact that the low quality user experiences taint the whole sketchup user base and brand. That “brand” also matters to me, since I am a SketchUp professional and dont want to be seen as a DIYer when pitching for work against people using Autodesk. And of couse I want the popularity of Sketchup to grow.
Trimble aren’t adding much each year in terms of new functions or tools… I guess they feel they don’t need to. So, since SketchUp (out of the box) is way too simple, we do rely heavily on extensions and should expect to do so gong foward. But there are some common, serious and ongoing issues that need to be resolved…
Every year there are extensions that just stop working. Some of these are pretty useful (3d Treemaker) and have no replacement options. (I will be maintaining a SketchUp 2017 copy just to keep that one going.) Some arent available in the Extension Warehouse (or SketchuCation). The developer probably never returned the email inviting them to join.
Some extensions don’t follow current behaviour for SketchUp (eg still refering to Plugins, Layers, Google Earth) and a few functions like the Eneroth Face Creator not making all new faces point upward toward the camera. Some extensions are just obsolete for most users… I figure they were probably made to add features from Pro that were missing from Make or Free (<v 2017).
I get plenty of errors on startup when there are outdated or incompatible libraries (eg FredoLib or TT_Lib ). Why can’t these be bundled with the extension RBZ??? @thomthom Why do we have to maintain two seperate ones?
The toolbar/menu system sucks…there’s little consistency about where things go into menus , and little ability to change it (do I really want more stuff added to my right-click context menu? Or hidden under the Draw, View or Tools menu?). I do want the ability to create shortcut keys for key functions, or arrange their icons into a customised tray. Somebody (trimble) needs to make an “Extension menu manager” extension.
A lot of the popular extensions bundle about 12 different functions into one thing… I don’t want 12 things, i usually just want one or two of those functions. Stop giving me 10 useless and confusing things that clutter my menus.
Most extensions dont have a very good help menu or any references to know how they work. Architect Tools by ThomThom is a good example…(magnet?..contour tool? No explanation given.)
I certainly dont wan’t someone’s idea of a “Menu system” complete with it’s own (ugly) pop-up windows and a “Extension Warehouse” ( @ChrisFullmer …update and change your stuff please!..its broken)
The process for obtaining, licensing and updating extensions from 3rd parties is still very haphazard…providers have their own stores, processes and policies, and it’s a chore to have seperate accounts/maintenance plans with numerous extension providers, generally for trivial amounts like $8/year (or worse, $8 per seat, per year, at a non-consistent time). I just avoid those paid extensions and probably have about 10 paid ones that i never use because i cant be bothered with the EULA temrs or getting a refund, or theyre just not very good (Natale Zappia and Chuck Vali…).
With respect to Sketchucation and any other 3rd party source… Trimble could create something like the App Store where there is one authorised source and higher standards for how extensions integrate with SketchUp. I think as a Pro userbase, we expect a bit more class. I also think learning SketcHup’s more advanced functionality would be much much easier if extensions were better quality and (as I keep saying) bundled so that all archtiects can install the “30 best tools for architects” and have them on hand, so that some consistency is created across a particular industry.
I am getting really concerned with installing files from small extension developer websites, especially those involving credit card purchases (using company credit cards) and I dont think it will be long before our IT department simply ban the download of RBZ files to our company PCs. Some of them even use .EXE installers. Hacking is rife in 2021 and small websites like that are easy pickings for hackers.
I absolutely would love to pay $10, to $100ea for quality extensions using a APP STORE type process.
As soon a somebody makes a really average extension for free, it takes away the incentive for somebody to create a professional-grade extension (eg Chris Fullmer’s Color by Slope - it’s okay…like it barely works…but a few tweaks and some better processing code would make it 10x better for the professional).
The Adobe licensing model is okay, eg, you can install Creative Cloud apps and buy stock photos all through the Adobe subscription plan. Trimble have enough resources to create a similar setup for Connect, SketchUp / Studio, and the Nearmap Hi-Res imagery, etc.
Actually I’m not sure what will happen over time if Trimble keep hiring all the top extension developers. 3 of the 6 most prolific have not apparently published anything new since joining Trimble. Natale Zappie (4th of 6) has apparently retired.
Can we expect the same level of development in extensions now that a large amount of the userbase has been shifted to Web or Shop, which don’t allow extentions? I would hope that developers oudl go bak through the Warehouse and find those popular little ones that may have been free, but give them an update and sell them for $5 to pros. Except that theyd have to compete with the free version…hmm…
Or may be we need Eneroth and others to busily start making 100s of awesome extensions, from scratch, that they then sell to us as the “Official Trimble SketchUp for Architects extension suite” at $150/year/seat. I would buy ten.