Hi guys, so I’ve been a user of sketchup since version 5 so a long time and I’m now using version 2023 and slowly transitioning to version 2025. Having said that I have several plugins that are limited to version 2017 which I still have and I’ve try to re-install it to run some of these plugins again but I can get my pro version to accept my Serial number and authorization code that I had way back when I purchase 2017. Now since I’ve always upgraded every single version my Serial Number would change over time and if I use the license manager and type in my 2017 Serial number its says that serial number has been upgraded to **************** and please contact reseller for an authorization code to access your perpetual license ??? I can’t get anyone to give me that code ??? anyone else I’ve had this problem ???
@colin might be able to help you with the license stuff. What extensions are they?
The way licenses worked was that you bought the original license (v5 in my case, $495), then you would pay to upgrade the license to the next version. Google gave v5 users a free upgrade to v6, but I paid $95 to upgrade to v7, and $95 to upgrade to v8.
In the Trimble era, the initial license would come with a year of maintenance, meaning you would get any upgrades that happened in the next 12 months. To get another year of maintenance you would pay $120.
In both eras, when you upgraded SketchUp, and installed the new version onto any machine, that would commit you to the later version. The older version would continue to work on any machine it was installed on, but you couldn’t install it onto a new machine. Only the latest version you had upgraded to could be installed onto a new machine.
That’s the case for your licenses. You can’t install 2013-2020 on a new machine, only 2021 can be installed.
What are the extensions that only work with 2017?
Well one of the Main plugin extension I’m trying to run again is “MSPhyics” by Anton S which I got from the “SketchUcation” website and in my opinion the Sketchup Team should buy this plugin from Anton and make it part of the sketchup pro version… it is by far one of the best plugin I had ever seen for sketchup and the way it works rival some of the top cad software like “solidworks” which allow you do create rotation and movements on any model you create and even check for collision, plus many other options… Again one way that sketchup will keep taking pcs of the pie on the cad market is by adding plugin like this one as part of the pro platform. Anyway on the subject of the older version of sketchup I do get that as a software keep getting newer and bigger sure there as to be a point when older version are no longer supported, but it doesn’t mean users that have been with this software for like over 20 years now don’t get to keep any older version that we paid for and should be able to run them on any computer… the point of the classic license was that you paid for the one year and got to download any updates than you either kept paying every year or you could no longer update to the latest version but you could keep using the old one as much as you wanted, I don’t plan on no upgrading as I already have the 2025 version all I want is to be able to use my 2017 version which I paid for … I don’t need support for it as I have the downloaded install copy of it (actually installed on my computer now) and I have all my license original serial number and autorization number still on files, in this instance the autorization number no longer work ???
It would be worth contacting support, to see if they can do something to help.
Getting off-topic a bit here. I agree it is nifty to do these things with a model, but am not sure if this should be “baked into” SketchUp. It might cause bloat.
Maybe a new standalone companion laboratory application? Similar to how LayOut works, we could “Send to PhysicsLab” and manipulate the model and it’s parts in a new memory process.
Just brainstormin’ here.