There are two plugins which export 6 cube faces: CubicPanoOut PanoScene which you can transform to a spherical image (equirectangular) afterwards (e.g. with hugin) ...

Thank you TIG - this is just the kind of info I was after. I'll print this out and sit back down with the IT guys on Monday and see what we can come up with. @tig said: Your IT guys are on a sticky wicket if they want to control ALL plugins use, because you can download a plugin to any folder you have full rights to We don't have permissions to anything other than our user folders (my docs ect) and we only download .rb and .rbs files from sketucation / smustard that have reviews and credible history but yes I get what you are saying. As I said I fully understand the need for PC security, just want an easy workaround (which you have provided) that enables me make full use of the flexibility and power that plugins provide in SU. Hopefully this will be ok with our IT guys. Thanks again for the speedy response - as always much appreciated....

Thanks for your help. My problem is solved. I used a template that was geolocated to create some components. Now to un geolocate the components.

Thanks for your help Mitcorb. I will use your methodology.

Well that was surprisingly painless. just deleted V8 same problem. So deleted v2013 and re installed and all is 100 % well and good. All my plugins and other folders of concern were retained and bugspalts have vanished and icons showing up as 2013 Yyaaaaaay so happy !!

I no longer experience the crash which leads me to believe it was an NVIDIA driver issue; I am using the latest beta drivers (331.40).

I think there is a plugin here about selection memory. You can't lock your selection but, at least you can bring it back.

Yep, XRef Manager works a treat. Thanks

A user's AppData 'Roaming' profile will be synced across a network. http://www.blogtechnika.com/what-is-application-data-folder-in-windows-7/ So if you have two PCs on the same network the same users will 'shared' stuff in his 'Roaming' AppData folders... However, most of the time your AppData stuff stays on one original PC [e.g. AppData Local folders] and therefore it needs manually copying between different PCs - either across a network or by other 'cloud' or 'hardware' methods...

Look in the SCF PluginStore for my batch importer, which will import all files of a given 'type' found in a folder...

Could you post or PM me the full error message (from the top) Also, I see a mention of jbb_layer_panels in the error message. So there may be a conflict there too. Fredo

This reminds me of the way things had to be done in SU6 to get colour textures on terrain. The technique was set out in detail in a go2school video. Not sure if its available from them still - it was a great help to me at the time. The technique was to explode the mesh of the B&W, get colour imagery from Google Earth as PNG, Project as Texture, measure on mesh then use the tapemeasure to scale. Final adjustments were possible using the pin tools. Hope this helps!

The models were aligned to the origin in standard orientation. It was one of the things I personally checked to make sure this wasn't a factor. I'm not 100% sure, but it seems to me that all features like edges, groups, components, and planes, are ignored in the conversion from SU format to STL format and none of this information is saved with the model. When you use the export STL plugin from the Extension Warehouse you need to select all parts of the model you want to convert (I just go CTRL-A), choose the format (binary or ASCII) and the units and away it goes. If you haven't exploded groups/components and turned off edges it will tell you it has ignored these things in the process of creating the STL file. This is what leads me to assume that things like datum planes are also being ignored in the process. I need to workout how to reorient the model in Pro E by inserting new datum planes... which I don't know how to do yet. Maybe if I could export the SU file as some other format that preserves these features that would solve my problem???

@tig said: I first saved_as a R12 DXF [25Mb!] - which retained geometry etc, imported it using mm as the units, *NOT retaining the CAD origin... and it came into the SKP pretty quickly. *Some of the DWG's geometry is pretty far from 0,0,0 Here's my v2013 SKP version, looks like everything is there ? I zipped it because it's 5Mb. TIG You're a star. Thank you again for your time and skill. Talk about a convoluted path to getting the thing to behave itself. I am pressing on now with the model at full speed. Have a great day. Patrick depth3d

@lorenzos said: ... because I can not buy the license anymore. yes, we can (sell) you a SUP v8 lic., just drop an email with the platform and your full address to our sales. hth, Norbert

Yes. This is basic stuff in SketchUp. Put your components into a folder or folders and choose them as "local collections". Add those collections to favorites so you can quickly get to those libraries in the future. Place the component axes and origin to make inserting the components easy.

Well that me leads to another conclusion. VisTools locks the hidden geometry. So going to give it a try. Very frustrating to use the laptop. Program has a long way to go before if can complete with other programs on stability. Thanks for your insights. Ken

John, this may be a long shot but... Do you ever move or realign the model axes? Is there an option to 'Reset' when you right click on the origin? It may not be the problem in your case but I have seen models in which the user moved the model axes and didn't get them aligned accurately. The result was that many parts of the model were drawn just slightly off axis. It was difficult to identify until I found components that were drawn before the axes were moved and then found the Reset option for the axes was available.

You might want to get on the face orientation thing and correct all those reversed faces before you get much farther along in your model. They are likely to cause you headaches later.

No problem ! Try to keep things near the Origin . Also when it happens like this you can always move back the camera with the Previous camera view button !This is one of the few default icons I have kept in my toolbars(I could have assigned a shortcut, but well) .