SketchUp Start up

jprokos

Hi all,

New guy here. Is there anyway to stop SketchUp from creating a new document every time I launch it? Being able to open recent documents once it's open is great but having to always close a new window on each launch of the application is silly. There should at least be an option in SketchUp's .plist file on the mac to turn this behavior off. Do any of you think there is a ruby plugin around that will stop SketchUp from creating a new file every time it's run? I did a cursory search on this forum and the internet and didn't find much.

Thank you.

John

jeff hammond

yeah, i like the behavior but for the wrong reasons
if you have a customized toolbar (on mac) then the custom icons wont' be positioned properly on the first new window upon launch.. all subsequent new windows will be right so i basically launch then close the first window before doing anything else.

besides that, you know you can just double click the actual .skp you want to start drawing on and sketchup will launch with that model open ?
[or right-click-> open with, or ->recent items, or drag/drop the .skp onto the sketchup icon etc]

TIG

If you launch any app without a target file you'll get a new 'empty' document/project/skp etc...
If you launch any app with a target then that file opens - you do this by double-clicking a preexisting SKP file or context-clicking its icon and picking 'Open', or by selecting the file from a browser and selecting Open...
As far as I can see you want Sketchup to exist as a process without having a window open - which seems somewhat pointless as it's little different from the other 'targeted' options I listed...

Aerilius

Hi jprokos,
It's hard for most people here to comprehend the idea behind your suggestion. On all other operatings systems where SketchUp runs, this seems not to make sense. When we open a program, it generally consists only of one window which contains lots of space. So in this space there can always be an empty document so that we can either start new work or choose a specific other document from the menu (File -> open) which replaces the empty one. Opening an empty template doesn't slow down SketchUp anyways.

OS X uses a "document centric" paradigm which means a window is a document and all other parts of the program are floating around (or in the global menu). So if I understand right, you always have to close the empty document to open a specific other document?
In this context it's easier to imagine another solution instead of an empty document, either no document at start up, or for example a welcome dialog that proposes recently used files or different templates to start with.

driven

@jprokos said:

Do any of you think there is a ruby plugin around that will stop SketchUp from creating a new file every time it's run?
John

you can't use rubies until Sketchup has loaded the window [that you don't want], however you can write an applescript or automator or similar (keystroke macro app)
to launch SU> click on the File menu > click close, > click new or recent files... you could then choose from the last few.

I've got scripts that I've wrapped in an apps in my menubar items, so you can get to them anytime.

there is a slight problem with this approach when some of the rubies load other bits on startup. This is because it slows the loading and macros can't tell when to click so you either need long delays [1>2 secs] or wrap all of the offending rubies so they when you want them, but not at every startup.

If you have a search for sumac in the forum you'll see some of my apps that start SU differently for different things, i.e. paste script into console.

it would be trivial to adapt one to open on the recent items menu.

john