Re: Jeff Hammond;

Thanks for the tip about the Ruby Rectangle tool! ...but still, it seems resonable that the SketchUp rectangle tool - and all other surface tools - should respond to a forced axis inference via the arrow keys...

Re: the Rotate tool "slick ways to control its orientation but it's not very well known" - it's only slick if you have existing geometry to infer to -- you can't enter two precise angles manualy to set the orientation. [to be fair, it is a helpful behavior but would be more useful if you could read and enter the two angles]

Of course, these current, basic behaviors (or lack of) really need to be documented because they are fundamental for new users being able to get their geometry into the desired positions with maximum efficiency and minimal frustration. (when they frustrated, they give up on the tool and tell all their friends about how bad they think is)

-- BrooksL

Thought this wish worth mentioning because I (and it seems others) was having quite a frustrating time trying to get a rectangle to draw on the desired plane or rotate it when it didn't draw on the desired plane.

I kept looking in the SketchUp help doc for how to force the inference to the desired plane and found the normal behavior seems to be undocumented and the tools do not respond to the arrow keys for forcing the inference.

I understand now that the Rectangle and Rotate tools tend to stick to the plane most parallel to the screen.

I see this as a novel and sometimes convenient way of determing the active drawing or tool plane, but really I don't understand why the Rectangle and Rotate tools should not respond to the arrow keys being used to force an inference similar to how they do for the Line tool, Move tool, or Tape Measure tool:

Locking an inference http://support.google.com/sketchup/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=70142

...I think the Rectange tool and Rotate tool SHOULD respond similarly to the arrow keys by setting the infered plane because there are often times when the desired drawing location is not easily viewed from an angle that will cause the inference engine to automatically select the desired plane.

Of course, please let me know if there's a better way or work around.

Thanks Jean for that tip... I was having quite a frustrating time trying to get a rectangle to draw on the desired plane

-- and then if I couldn't get it to draw on the desired plane, I had yet MORE difficultly rotating it to the desired orientation because the Rotate tool seems to behave in the same way - the protractor tends to stick to the plane most parallel to the screen.

I see this as a novel and sometimes convenient way of determing the active drawing or tool plane, but really I don't understand why the Rectangle and Rotate tools should not respond to the arrow keys being used to force an inference similar to how they do for the Line tool, Move tool, or Tape Measure tool:

Locking an inference http://support.google.com/sketchup/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=70142

...I think the Rectange tool and Rotate tool SHOULD respond similarly to the arrow keys by settign the inferred plane because there are often times when the desired drawing location is not easily viewed from an angle that will cause the inference engine to select the desired plane.

Please let me know if there's a better way or work around.

The problem apparently still exits in 8.0 I found your posts after also becoming frustrated that some guidelines I need for constructing geometry keep disappearing.

I'm also having a heck of a time getting the inference engine to work correctly: I'm drawing a circle and the inference tip dialog reports "line" when I'm over the guideline, but after setting the circle, it's clearly parallel to the surface face just behind the guideline and NOT on the guideline as the inference tip reported.

Any word on fixing the disappearing guides?