[Plugin] Q JS ALIGN TOOLBAR

ROHIT532 · 31 Aug 2013, 08:59

i use 2D graphic softwares like illustrator/corel new to SU.... want to learn how to use Q JS Align tool...

Box · 30 Dec 2013, 22:45

Hmmm, not a tool I have used before so I installed it. As the first post in the thread shows a toolbar I simply looked for a toolbar after installing it and would you believe it, it was just sitting there smugly waiting for me.

frascati · 30 Dec 2013, 23:05

@unknownuser said:

Hmmm, not a tool I have used before so I installed it. As the first post in the thread shows a toolbar I simply looked for a toolbar after installing it and would you believe it, it was just sitting there smugly waiting for me.

"smugly"? There's a whiff of Freudian slip there. Depressingly common of these threads when someone gets a little over the top frustrated like myself. Pile on even if you don't have anything really substantial to add such as help to find and use the plugin, or some more elegant method of accomplishing this very fundamental task in Sketchup.

No link in my toolbar. Is there another "bar" i'm missing? Is it the toolbar along the side as "toolbar" would suggest? Or is it in the menus?

It almost does not matter. I looked, again, for solutions to this crap and was once again utterly demoralized by discovering threads I started as long as six months ago that never did eventually address this. For a program like Sketchup not to be able to do this with it's basic functions, and then require an addon script that heaps layers of complexity on top of my principle, oft stated, need is just mind bending.

So Box, with 1600 posts here, and never finding the need for this plugin, would you mind sharing with me your method of accomplishing the following...?

I have two objects on the screen.
neither occupy the same x,y,or z plane.
I want to be able to click a point (a if you will) on both objects and fasten them, or move one to the other, in one move or click. Easy enough at this point with the move tool.

...click point 'b' on the second object, click any point along the same plane on the first objcet, and align them together on that axis with a single click or move.

...click point 'c' on the second object, click on any point along the same plane in the first object and with this third operation align them precisely within all axes.

Better yet, by far, would be some method of selecting one object, selecting the second object with the shift or alt key so that they were both selected but understood to be related in the next move, and then having ONE dropdown command under tools to "align objects x,y,z.

So all bad blood aside, please, someone tell me that my request has simply been misapprehended or misworded all along and I am, in fact, able to do this with sketchup wit a few simple commands.

The couple of videos on youtube that address this need to align two objects are JOKES. Moving one point to an anchor on the second object and then fiddling around with the rotate tool, hit or miss, to bring the next two axis points into alignment. Watch these. It's actually laughable.

frascati · 30 Dec 2013, 23:20

I'm so damn sick of this stuff that I'm bordering on rampage. One more of, dozens, examples of finding a plugin that I'd like to try.. downloading it, installing it in my sketchup plugin folder, and then not provided with any heads up on HOW TO FIND THE #$%%&^ THING!!!!!!!! I go online to google just to discover half a dozen threads indicating that others have the same frustration. Every %$^&^& TIME a plugin is offered up in a thread and discussed it involves half a dozen or so smug %%^%$##'s who forgot how irritating it can be to crack the learning curve toward guessing WHERE THE HELL THE AUTHOR DECIDED TO PUT THE PLUGIN IN ORDER TO USE IT!!!!!!.

Go ahead. Kick me off. I'll come back under a fresh name and start anew. I'll do it anyway just to keep my blood pressure down. A plugin, that I know is going to take an hour or so to get the hang of to be useful to me, and yet part of that struggle must, just about every time, require me to go outside the thread I discovered it on here in sketchucation, half an hour or more through multiple links via google, JUST TO FIND THE %##$$%i& THING IN THE MENU DROPDOWNS!!!!!!

Box · 31 Dec 2013, 00:19

Interesting bit of editing there. Nothing Freudian, simple sarcasm.

If you filled in your profile we might know what system you are using, But I'm guessing you haven't moved to SU13 so you are either SU7 or SU8 if so.
Click View on the top tool bar, move your mouse down ever so slightly till it hits the menu item, Toolbars,
Move the mouse over and down the list till it hits the one called QJSALIGN and click it
a new toolbar should have appeared for you to use. It has colour coded icons to show you which axis it will align to.

If this isn't where it should be then you must not have installed it properly.

As to your alignment question, I have attempted to explain how to you before and you only get upset so I politely choose not to get involved again.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you.

frascati · 31 Dec 2013, 04:11

@unknownuser said:

Interesting bit of editing there. Nothing Freudian, simple sarcasm.

If you filled in your profile we might know what system you are using, But I'm guessing you haven't moved to SU13 so you are either SU7 or SU8 if so.
Click View on the top tool bar, move your mouse down ever so slightly till it hits the menu item, Toolbars,
Move the mouse over and down the list till it hits the one called QJSALIGN and click it
a new toolbar should have appeared for you to use. It has colour coded icons to show you which axis it will align to.

If this isn't where it should be then you must not have installed it properly.

As to your alignment question, I have attempted to explain how to you before and you only get upset so I politely choose not to get involved again.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you.

Box, I did follow your video, and followed your advice, and (to my mind anyway) responded directly and respectfully to you with

@unknownuser said:

Thank you very much for the workaround. Sincerely.
But it only works for objects with all 90degree corners. In fact I'm presently, and usually in these situations, dealing with more complex objects.

...which is true. Then I followed that thanks with a generalized outpouring of anger at yet not getting anywhere with this.
To which you helpfully added
@unknownuser said:

Frascati: a fairly fullbodied whine from italy.

Then you provide me one more video, thank you again by the way, and couldn't resist dropping a snide little "happy?" for me at the end.
A few times now it's been me called childish simply for expressing outrage a little to volubly. Seriously?

Neither of your examples works for me. I've said that quite clearly in that thread and here as well. What do you suggest by my edit? Just out with it for god's sake. Really. What's with all the fun and sarcasm here? I just backed off on the swearing. I edited no other content than those specific words. What do you find so "interesting"? Did it change, even one small bit, the context relevant to our exchange? Can you explain how for me? I started a fresh thread on this hoping to escape some of this nonsense so I'll just leave this alone and back out of it. Please BOX, do resist any temptation to make me any more miserable there.

Or just petulantly ignore the thread. I'm just getting arguments and sarcasm on balance anyway.

micdidi · 19 Jan 2014, 16:00

CAN'T SEE THE ICON???

Bob James · 24 Dec 2014, 19:21

This is one of my most frequently used plugins since Jan Sandstrom (Pixero) first created it in 2009 (and then with CadFather's welcome addition of the toolbar).
I still wish there was some way to choose which one is the one you want to stay fixed

pbacot · 24 Dec 2014, 21:46

This plugin works fine for me. Thanks! Really speeds things up in some situations. SU should have this natively as does any CAD package.

I am also looking for an align plugin that would work with the current context axes. For example if you are in a component it would use the component axes as reference.

Also I wonder whether the plugin could be made to respect one locked object. Then the alignment would keep a locked object in place, and align the others to it. (It would have to reject operations with more than one locked object selected.)

CadFather · 26 Dec 2014, 11:18

i will look into this, though i can already predict a higher climb than my skills might allow..

meantime there are a few good scripts around: didier 2d align, su4you align and sd mitch A&D - and probably others i forget.

cesaro36 · 8 Jul 2015, 05:06

Is it possible to make this align plugin to work within a component/group? I usually have nested components and frequently rotated, the align plugin doesn't seem to work when the container has been rotated, so I assume that it needs to work with local coordinates instead of global ones.

Thanks

pilou · 8 Jul 2015, 09:11

Try s4u8 Align Toolsby SuForYou

Milo · 7 Apr 2016, 20:53

Thanks you for this plugin

cesaro36 · 7 Apr 2016, 20:59

If anyone interested, another tool for that matter.
http://www.eltallerconstructor.com/distribute-objects-sketchup-plugin/

Luisfon · 22 Apr 2018, 13:48

Don't see plugin folder just ifcplugin with DLL files, exe files and config files in it.

Dave R · 22 Apr 2018, 13:53

Install it from here: https://sketchucation.com/pluginstore?pln=Q_JS_Align

Matte · 12 Jul 2018, 16:41

Hi All, before I spend many hours playing with this cool plugin.. Could someone with experience with it give me their advice if this plug in will "solve my problem"? My present problem is that I have hundreds and hundreds of rectangular faces (There all suppose to be at the same Z height). The problem is many of them are rotated ( + or - ) .01 degrees from each other (For Example). So when I make a rectangle that connects between the four corners of 4 different rectangles... It does not make a rectangle. Could I make one of these existing rectangles "Perfect" where all 4 corners are at the same Z height.... And then use this plug in to Pick "bad" rectangle and "say" align to good rectangle and all the corner Z heights of the "bad" triangle will now match the "good" triangle?
Thanks !!! Mattee
(PS right now the OCD has taken over and I am manually fixing each rectangle one at a time !!!!)

pbacot · 12 Jul 2018, 17:02

It sounds like your rectangles are not all parallel to the ground plane?

If you are talking about 2d rectangles, yet rotated slightly in the z axis, you may want a plugin like "flatten vertices", I forget if that's the right name. But the objects would have to be ungrouped and they would not be true rectangles when flattened out.

If they are grouped rectangles, This tool will not change their orientation, It would only align top bottom or middle of each group.

If all the geometry is ungrouped, I don't see how this plugin would give a useful result.

Matte · 12 Jul 2018, 22:01

Thanks, you just saved me hours of time traveling down a dead end road!
PS there are no blocks, all lines and surfaces are all on the same layer,
so nothing to explode, just no consistent z height for all rectangles.

Arckadia · 26 Mar 2020, 03:49

Thanks, works perfectly, i test it on sketchup make 2017 to align 2 circles. I started a longtime ago on another 3D software so, maybe i am more attentive on this kind of tool.
Q JS Align is definitely that you must have to be precise. I make a vase, an amphora : an object where circumference is necessary.

Maybe i get lost a bit but i discovered by chance Sketchup when i was on Hammer, ( another 3D Soft). I would like to build house or something like that. But quickly i get started in a crazy project with 17 century architecture. I don't know if i'm gonna integrate it in a level design... etc...

Have a nice day users from Sketchup and thanks to CadFather.