Posts made by halroach

1. I wish there were a way to see the file sizes of components within the component browser.

It happens that you load a component into a model, only too late to remember that it's way too heavy for the specific model you're working on. Or that you need to calculate what the maximum of trees cars and people you can put into a model...

2. It would be nice to see a little indication of how many or Mb or k each component is... preferably as part of the 'large thumbnails' view, which I find that I use most often.

3. It would be nice to be able to select a bunch of components all at once in the component browser... if for checking how big they are... or for deleting a bunch... you know, as the name infers... it should act as a browser, just like windows explorer where you can select a list with SHIFT or specific components with CTRL...

Hi,

I don't quite remember if I solved it at the time, though there are a few things you can do:
1. play around with your OpenGL settings (under 'window''preferences'\openGL tab\ - note that if your hardware acceleration was off, turn it on, and only after a restart of sketchup will you see some more options under the 'capabilities' section - play around.

2. Make sure your texture isn't bigger than 4096 x 4096
see the following post on Sketchupdate blog:
http://sketchupdate.blogspot.co.il/2012/02/solution-for-low-resolution.html

3. If you need the extra resolution you can split your large texture into smaller parts (smaller than 4096x4096) in an image editing software and rearrange the parts back into sketchup.

4. Updating your graphics drivers might help.

5. Maybe it's been solved in sketchup 2013-2014? I didn't bother installing those cause they've introduced more problems than benefits.

There is a similar (unsolved) thread:
http://sketchucation.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=15%26amp;t=24518

Hope it's of any help

Is there a way to strip a dynamic component from all of it's attributes, so as to "freeze it in place"?

explanation:
If for instance you use a dynamic component to create a repetitive picket fence, and then decide you want to erase one of the pickets, and or scale/rotate it etc. Depending on the characteristics of the dynamic component sometimes that can royally screw things up.
Exploding the main component may help, but then if it's a very complex one, all of the sub-components still have all sorts of attributes, that may cause components to fly around to all sorts of unexpected places in the model.

So,
Maybe there is a way to strip the dynamic component and all of the components within to turn in into a simple component? (while of course maintaining the characteristics of similar components).

Hi Thom,

When I edit a rotated 3D text object, it bounces to a new position and resets it's rotation...
On the other hand if I have multiple instances, only the one I select to edit bounces and changes rotation, while the others maintain their position...

@rich o brien said:

@unknownuser said:

This, along with the "premium members forum" are both eroding the basis on which the Sketchucation community stands on - "free and open knowledge".

I really don't know what to say about that comment...

But I feel extremely disappointed that you arrived at such a conclusion.

Seriously, I take it back.
You're right!
Please accept my apologies.

@box said:

You could fire a shotgun in that private tower and not hit a thing. It's not some club where all the cool guys hang out.

A premium membership is really just formalised forum sponsorship. It means you are happy to help the forum survive financially and as such the forum gives you back some freebies and discounts on stuff. There is access to private consulting rooms, which is just what they sound like, a place where you can talk and share with specific people because you are limited by non disclosure or other professional restrictions.

Premium membership isn't about taking stuff way from people, it's about adding value on top. There are many benefits to being a premium member, but nobody is missing out on any sort of discussion that would benefit from the addition of the general public. Threads in the premium forum are usually along the lines of, how do I renew my membership or some such.

@tig said:

@Hal

SCF is free to use, but does cost money to keep it running.
This is primarily got from the paymments from advertisers and premium memberships.
And for this modest consideration both get something in return - the former get their products brought to the attention of relevant SketchUp users, the later get free or discounted SCF Shop items and additional forums where they can receive more involved advice - but frankly, the advice that is always given freely on the open forums is, more often than not, adequate to all members' needs...
Premium Members effectively choose to 'sponsor' SCF with a few dollars a m
@box said:

specific people because you are limited by non disclosure or other professional restrictions.

Premium membership isn't about taking stuff way from people, it's about adding value on top. There are many benefits to being a premium member, but nobody is missing out on any sort of discussion that would benefit from the addition of the general public. Threads in the premium forum are usually along the lines of, how do I renew my membership or some such.
onth, and for that they know that they help SCF to survive.
There are some 'fringe-benefits' of having a Premium membership, but it is NOT some 'exclusive dining-club' where the members 'feast', whilst the rest of you 'plebs' get the table-scraps in the gutter ! The principal benefit is that by becoming a Premium Member your help SCF to thrive...
When have you ever felt unfairly disadvantaged as a non-premium member ?
I would bet that no one has ever said to you, "Sorry, we can't answer that question unless you are a premium member..." !

The 'More Info'/'Feedback' changeover has only just started in the last week or two to redirect the 'More Info' button link on the PluginStore page entry or equivalent dialog listing, to a page that is specific to each Plugin - this has consistently presented information etc to help memebers understand the capabilities and use of each Plugin; in turn, this page has a button called 'Feedback' that links to the forum-post that relates to that Plugin: this is where you can comment, read others advice etc. New or updated Plugins will automatically have this new dedicated page created: however there are many hundreds of Plugins, and therefore there are some older ones that are currently 'unconverted' and are without a dedicated page of their own, and these will therefore still link their 'More Info' button directly to their principal forum-thread [usually the first post]. Over time this should change and all Plugins ought to end up with their own dedicated page, and the 'Feedback' button will then apply to all for accessing the Plugins thread. There has been some internal-SCF debate about what the 'Feedback' button should say, so we welcome your feedback [ ] - it can't logically say 'More Info' because it was by clicking on a link using that name that brought the user to this page in the first place: but instead of 'Feedback' it could say 'Posts', 'Thread', 'Main-Thread' 'Forum-Page', 'SCF-Thread', 'SCF-Posts' etc - would anyone else like to chip in on this with comments ?

All of the pages etc discussed above are free to you, as a valued member of SCF [irrespective of you membership-type], the 'private consultation' pages in the Premium section are just that, the other pages contain general housekeeping questions and responses, the only thing you missed out on recently, by deciding not to have Premium Memebership, was the beta-testing of the new PluginStore software, which Premium Members helped with [thank-you!] - but if you think about that, they actually paid money and then they did additional work to help make SCF better, with no reward other than knowing that SCF was helped... but I can assure you that there will be nothing there that disadvantages the 'hoi poloi'... so please have a little, understanding, humanity and just be thankful...

Hi Box, Tig,
Please understand that I did not mean to be harsh or offensive, and I have no criticism on your ways. I am very thankful for these forums and for the hard working people behind them.
I guess the plugin store did come up as a surprise to me. But I can completely understand why you would want to develop such a plugin in a closed forum - keeps things more tidy and under control.
I think it is up to each individual do decide how he contributes. I contribute with my experience, knowledge and time, suggesting ideas and giving solutions. And time = money. Maybe not the kind that will keep your forum up and running, but that's what forums are all about.
Your explanations for why and what the premium membership is all about, are very good and convincing. I am very glad to hear that it is all about "adding value on top".

So please, no hard feelings.
Keep up the good work! and Cheers to you all!

@cotty said:

@halroach said:

You're right! simply speaking there should be a feedback button (or a link to the forum)

There is a button called Feedback which leads you to the forum

Oh! There is a feedback button! It took me a while to find it...
I think it needs to be placed somewhere else more visible, or renamed as Tig suggests: I'm all for any of these:
'Thread', 'Main-Thread' 'Forum-Page', 'SCF-Thread', 'SCF-Posts', 'Forum-Thread'.

@cotty said:

@halroach said:

There should be a link to the forum.

It's called Feedback.

You're right! simply speaking there should be a feedback button (or a link to the forum)

@halroach said:

This, along with the "premium members forum" are both eroding the basis on which the Sketchucation community stands on - "free and open knowledge".

Did you ever asked a question and didn't get an answer because of the premium membership?

I am glad to say I have always gotten an answer, and that the members of sketchucation are a wonderful group of people to correspond with.

But, there may be some interesting threads going on up there in the towers of "premium membership" that may be losing the feedback of the general public. I don't wish to sound too harsh - I am sure there are good reasons for a closed membership forum, but it comes at the price of losing a percentage of collaboration.

(Taken to the extremes are the Vray forums of chaos group which are very dry because of "complete closed forum policy").

I've noticed that with some plugins in the plugins store (loaded from within sketchup), when I click on 'more info' I get to a 'clean dedicated plugin explanation page'.
For example:
http://sketchucation.com/plugin/715-jointpushpull

Whereas with other plugins I am pointed directly to the forum thread (like it always used to be).

I can understand the desire to keep things clean and simple, without confusing the average user with tedious forum threads... but right now there is a complete disconnect between this 'clean description page' and the forum where one could once ask questions and add his own two cents.
It's like you're defeating the whole basis on which all the development of these plugins started on - communication and sharing.

There should be a link to the forum. Maybe an added 'see in forum' tab, along with the 'overview, quickstart, documentation, release notes' tabs...

This, along with the "premium members forum" are both eroding the basis on which the Sketchucation community stands on - "free and open knowledge".

Hi Thomthom,

Just a note.
I was recently installing (through plugin store auto-install) either selection_toys or edge_tools... (or it may have been another, not 100% sure), and I was missing or had an outdated version of TT_Lib2, so it prompted me with a window to click and download the latest tt_Lib2, just that the version it was pointing me to was an outdated one.

I may have had tt_lib1 laying around in my plugins folder, which may have been causing some confusion... I really don't know, but anyway, for your info.

Great great plugins!!!

Hi,

I'm trying to dimension heights of an elevation using Layout.
I am used to marking elevation heights by placing a little upside down triangle on the floor height with the height annotated. Is there anything like that in Layout?
I found the different scrapbooks within layout, but is there a way to just place the little marker (which ever I choose) and have it know what height it is without calculating it manually?

Using the dimensions gives me... dimensions, but not quite heights... maybe I'm missing something here?

Another suggestion. a toggle to be able to orient the component to the surface it is being dropped on, Or the ability to maintain it's "glueing" properties that were set upon the component's creation.

I've got an idea for a nice feature that could make this plugin even more powerful.
Having the option to limit the "edge gap closing" to points that are on the same Z. Any chance for that?

@tig said:

@Hal

We have already been discussing the possibility of a way of users keeping their Plugins Sets synced across their PCs.
At the moment it is a 'Local' setup for each PC...

Why would you ever want to log-out of the PluginStore IF you use separate User accounts properly setup on your networked PCs then each User gets there own login.
BUT if you have been on someone else's PC [during their User-login session] and you have then used your own SCF login details in the PluginStore's dialog, then these details will be reused, until that user's applicable 'cookie.dat' file encrypting your info is deleted from that user's own ../Users/XXX/AppData/SCF/SCF/ folder. So all you have to do is find their 'cookie.dat' file in the ..Users/XXX/AppData/Local/SCF/ folder, as I outlined before, and delete or rename it...
BUT it is best to always login as yourself onto any PC, the other user opens a personal security breach - by letting someone else use their session, anything 'bad' done by the other person appears to done by them, when traced back...
This simple IT protocol ensures that the PluginStore login issue never arises because you always run SketchUp 'as yourself' not as some other user...

However, we will consider a 'logout' option for the dialog, but then we'll have an extra button on the dialog which we are trying to keep simple... Perhaps a "Log-out' of the Plugin Store" menu item in the drop-down menu list ?

PS: This string, copy+pasted+<enter> into the Ruby Console, will rename that user's cookie.dat file with a random-prefix, so the next use of the PluginStore dialog will ask for a login and make a new cookie.dat file. I stopped at deleting it as you can then reuse it by renaming without the random-prefix
File.rename(SCF::SCF_Dialog::SCFDIR+"/cookie.dat", SCF::SCF_Dialog::SCFDIR+"/#{rand}+cookie.dat")
To delete the file use:
File.delete(SCF::SCF_Dialog::SCFDIR+"/cookie.dat")

Hi Tig,
I agree with the premise that each user should login with their own credentials on their own computer. But yeah, there will always be the exception or someone like me, trying to see what happens .
So a little inconspicuous button in the menu would be a good idea.

In my case, it just so happens to be (unfortunately) that the concept of searching for plugins on forums, or searching for plugins period, may be difficult for some of my workers. So it's up to me to keep them up to date on the cutting edge of the sketchup world. That's why syncing plugins would be nice, but it would require (in my case) a syncing option between different users... And then another question arises, how do you sync/manage 'purchased plugins'/'plugins that were downloaded from elsewhere and not from the Sketchucation plugin store'... it can be quite a mess to code and design I imagine.

Thanks Tig.

I'll have to take a vacation to go through that explanation...

The reason I used my login on another computer was so I could check out which plugins and extensions I have installed on my original computer...
Basically I was hoping I'll be able to "sync" all my plugins on all computers I am logged on.

Bottom line:

1. There should be a login/logout feature for the plugins store.
2. Suggest an option to sync plugins in the cloud!? (Apple iCloud style) or at least something similar that will help me install the same plugins on a few computers. (I know of the dropbox option which is not very straightforward for the average user).

Is there a way to logout my account from the plugin store through sketchup? I logged in using my credentials on more than one computer and I'd like to logout and have that user use his own account...

1. This plugin's download needs updating on the first post. On the plugins store it's 1.1.3

@tig said:

If you offset some guidelines at the required distance you can snap to those when pulling a scaling handle...

But why not come at this from another direction...
If the object in question is a group or component... then edit it.
Use the Tapemeasure tool and pick two points that are a known distance a part.
The VCB will show say 123456.7
But you know that it ought to be 123456.1, so immediately type that in the VCB +<enter>
When prompted say Yes to rescale the contents of the group/component.
Now the object is the exact size you wanted ?
You don't need to worry about calculating tiny scaling factors like 0.99999...

Using the tape measure is possible when the aerial is in perfect proportions to the plan.
In my case at hand both orientation and proportions are off, so I need to continuously see the scaling differences at each and every point to get an approximate average precision... To make sure I don't get a situation where a few buildings are right while others are off scale and position. It can be very tricky and time consuming which is why a visual method is preferable.

@cotty said:

Did you try to zoom in very close? The inference distance is zoom dependent and gets smaller this way.

That would work, but in this case it is hard to zoom because the object being scaled is huge and it's scale handles are far from what I am trying to align.
Just added a video with a workaround.

@cotty said:

@halroach said:

without inputting those numbers

Why not? You can type 0.9999 in the VCB very fast...

It's not convenient when you have to type .999998 .999997 .999996 trying to get to the right place. and what if it were .4569 .4568... or what ever the precision factor may be.
There should be a visual way to do this.

I am trying to scale an aerial photo onto a map... and actually I have just come up with a workaround to the problem by creating a grid of lines at the approximate interval I want, and using the native scale tool while snapping to those lines as I scale. Not very difficult to do actually, but it would still be nice if I could do without these guides, or without typing long numbers.

Edit: added an explanation video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYEl9Wv1BsQ&feature=youtu.be