Answers suggestions from MAC & PC SU users.

[CalypsoArt]

Next week I'm going to give a couple design friends some beginning SU training. They both work on Macs, and I a PC. I'm hoping SU users who work on BOTH platforms might give me some suggestions on the differences between the two UIs and and/or procedures due to those differences. On a previous thread the Layer toolbar was addressed, (Thanks Jean et al)so I know how to deal with that. I'm hoping to put together a brief but useful instruction reference card for the procedures as we would uses them for our work.

This is not intended to be a MAC vs PC thread. I just want to know of any differences I might be unaware of, especially in setting up their work spaces. When I started out I got a lot of help and good advice from the original forum, and many of those people are now here. I'd like to pass on the good advice to these two.

Thanks in advance.
Nicholas

[jeff hammond]

possibly the most noticeable difference between the two will be the paint bucket tool.

mac su uses the OS X color picker and if your friends are familiar with their computers then they'll be familiar with the color picker.. unfortunately, SU modifies the color picker so that a list view of the materials aren't given in mac SU and you have to rely on thumbnail views of materials or popups for the actual names.

there are also differences in which modifier keys to use with different tools.. namely the cmmd and option keys on macs being different than ctrl and alt on pcs.

see these reference cards for details.
http://dl.google.com/sketchup/gsu8/docs/en/SketchUp8RefcardMac.pdf
http://dl.google.com/sketchup/gsu8/docs/en/SketchUp8RefcardWin.pdf

there are actually a few things you can do in mac SU that you can't in windows but since you're training from pc to mac, i don't think it matters much at this point.

re: setting up the workspace.. the toolbars work differently on macs and pcs.. all of the toolbars on mac will be floating unless the tools are added to the custom toolbar at the top of the su window.. that said, as far as teaching sketchup goes, it shouldn't matter much and your friends can just arrange their toolbars as they deem comfortable.

all in all though, sketchup is very similar on both platforms.