@thomthom said:

Autosave generates Autosave_sketchupfilename.skp given that your working file is sketchupfilename.skp. sketchupfilename.skb (skb) files are generates when you manually save, it takes your existing sketchupfilename.skp and make a copy to sketchupfilename.skb before it overwrites sketchupfilename.skp.

I stand corrected. (And I think you told me this before as well )

So that means the .SKB file is the file from the PREVIOUS manual save.
Then howcum my SU directory does not contain an .SKB file for each of the .SKP files??
They are there for many, but not all, and I don't delete files (which I should).

One thing I've learned about the Follow-Me tool is to be very selective of where I start the face on the line to be followed.

If I have a perfect circle or arc to follow, it really does not matter. 99 out of 100, the face is perched on a line segments vertex.

But IF the line depicts a non circular CLOSED curve, it seems to matter where on the line the face is perched. It almost always has to be perpendicular to and ON the line, NOT at a vertex.
If the curve is open, then perch the face at the start of the line; but it must be perpendicular to that start line segment.

Doing that has reduced the anomalous results dramatically.

As far as I can understand the perceived problem, it's not a bug.
AUTOSAVE never did update the .SKP file. Only the .SKB file (B for Backup).
You can only update the .SKP with a manual SAVE.

Trying to close a model session after any changes since the last true SAVE should result in a dialog asking if you want to exit or save & exit. Exit without save will result in SU asking to open the .SKB file next time you call it up.

@tig said:

My 'Undo' is Ctrl+Z = Undo in most apps... which is just like Ctrl+X=Cut, Ctrl+C=Copy, Ctrl+V=paste and Ctrl+Shift+V=PasteInPlace..........

Yeah, I know. But "U" is a better mnemonic than "Z" for Undo.
And my "Z" is Zoom Extents. "V" is for Previous View.

I also set the "~" key to Hide Rest of Model, which I use a lot. "Ctrl ~" is Hide Similar Comps.

@tig said:

Actually I use U which is a one key hit with the left hand... But yours is equally as good....

My "U" is UNDO, which is about the rightmost key I use. Almost all my shortcuts are left of the "T G V" line, which is the limit I can single/left handed reach using the CTRL SHIFT and ALT extenders, and I am too lazy to reach over more than that for single keys.

Also, Thanks Chris.

@gaieus said:

Well, a golden coin of Caesar Caligula is always a cool thing.

You are always Gold with me.

Quite often (far too often) I have several entities selected that shouldn't be for any number of reasons.
Rather than de-select each one and miss a few, I would always hit ctrl-T to de-select all, then select the one(s) I really want. I hate moving my right hand from the mouse.

So I set a new (actually an extra) keyboard shortcut to de-select all.

ALT-Space

Now I just put my left finger on both the ALT key and the adjacent SPACE bar, and voila; de-select all in one easy finger move. Then just a 1/2 inch right to pick the select tool with the SPACE bar.

Hey Big G, that is a far superior avatar than that goofy replacement of your old (and pretty good as well) green animated avatar.

@wo3dan said:

jgb, then don't click "Download Model" but drag the decired icon into your SU instance.
The 3DW-page you are on stays open for other items to drag into SU.

(b) As for the abusing tags, I agree.

Well I be damned! It DOES work.

I had tried drag-n-drop long time before and it did not work, but now I know why not.

I always have the Warehouse in full screen, and I tried to D&D the large model view, not the Icon.
So because SU does not put the Warehouse in a separate Window outside of SU, I had no place to drag it to. And you cannot drag the model view.

Now with the Warehouse set to a large portion of the screen, I have a piece of my model space available to drag to.
Problem solved by endrun. Thanks again Wo3.

You all got that right.

I too would take on the cleanup job on an hourly basis. I need the money.

As for downloading the model to a directory rather than into SU, for me it's a pain, as I either have to specify the folder it goes into (every time), or use my general all purpose download folder, then hunt for the model later to move it to my SU models folder, then open it, only to find it is not of the quality or function I wanted. Far easier to d/l it right into SU and see right now if it is suitable.

Another note on tags, most of the tag abusers have more words by far in their tags than they do in the description.
Maybe making a defined ratio of descriptive words to tags would help.
5 to 1, 10 to 1

As for a quality of model test, not really practical. Who defines quality? Who's gonna check the model before it gets posted? Counting downloads is not the answer either, because you need to d/l it before you consider its' quality for your needs. The sparseness of feedback remarks on even the top quality stuff makes that a non-starter.

Also as Dave R mentioned, it is often faster to draw from scratch. Many times I've d/l'd a model only to find it is far too detailed (mega-poly!!) for my needs. Which is not a bad thing, just not suitable for my application. Or the quality is not there; too many extra lines, excess faces, folded faces, etc. that take a lot of effort to clean up. The 3D "Gray Men" are a perfect example.

In my model of the GE-115b engine I included a detailed version and a low-poly skin only version to use as appropriate. I still intend to do the same for the AB-609 helicopter model as I will need a low poly version to include with my big hangar model. Except the skin accounts for 80% of the poly count.

The SU Warehouse (File; 3D Warehouse; Get Models) function is great. No real problem with the models available, but the design of the Internet App needs some tweaking.
And, some model posters need a whack on the knuckles for abusing tags.

First, Often I will browse through the warehouse pages based on a Selection criteria.

If I download a model, the warehouse vanishes. If I want to return, which I often do, when I need several versions on a theme, ie: 2D people, I have to start all over again.
I have to call up the warehouse, full screen it, then retype the selection criteria to get back on topic.
Then I have to page through to get back to where I was in the list to continue my search.

So, to summarize;
Keep the warehouse open, on the page I was on, until I close it, not everytime I d/l a model.

Some posters are abusing tags. When I just did a search on "2D people" I expected to get almost exclusively 2D People. I got 3D people, I got lots of cars, some airplanes, some buildings and a lot of other stuff, that, all of which had no real relation to "2D People". And NO, the models themselves had NO 2D People in them, just "2D" and "people" in the tags.

Unless there is some policing done by those running the warehouse, I will start clicking the "Policy Violation" button next time I see tag abuse.
Go lookup Corsa Tuning Aston Martin Rapide by Hotrod1 for a prime example.... close to 200 tags.

I know exactly what you are talking about. SU tells you that it is "Constrained by line at point" or something like that and you can't draw the line at a very slight off angle to an axis line.

So here is what I do...
When I try to draw a line from point A to B, and at B I get that message, I hit ESC and start the line from B to A and it works every time. Sometimes I need to make a temporary short line at A, if that start point is a bit ambiguous.

I've mentioned this before, elsewhere.....

Make SU aware of extra mouse buttons.

Wheels are now standard with side motion; SU is oblivious to that.

My Logitech MX 600 has a total of 10 button/wheel actions.
2 main buttons, wheel rotation, wheel down, wheel left/right, zoom in/out, plus 3 other buttons that I have programmed for various functions, such as double click and browser back.

SU only recognizes 4, 2 main, wheel rotation and wheel down. It does recognize my double click (left) button, but only because the mouse sends it out as a double click.

I have also made significant use of keyboard shortcuts, using almost all the keys my left hand can pick easily, but here again I am faced with an SU shortcoming.

SU only recognizes Shift, Ctrl and Alt as extender buttons.

There is also the Tab and the Windows keys that can be used as extenders, as they have no other function in SU.

I would really like to be able to use some other extender key to duplicate the R,G & B arrow keys on the left side of the KB.

@johnsenior1973 said:

File > Save As

Click on the down facing arrow and you'll be able to select anything from v3 to v7.

DOHHHH!!

@krisidious said:

you'll never get 2 cylinders out of that engine... you're stuck with a V8

Took a few reads to understand what you said. Good one!

You can dispense with Logitech drivers, but only if you have a simple mouse, ie: 2 buttons and a wheel that Windows built-in drivers recognizes.

If you have a complex mouse; like my Logitech MX-600, with 5 additional buttons, Win will not recognize those extra buttons. The Logitech drivers allow you to redefine any of the 10 available buttons & wheel to do pretty much anything you want, as well as read the battery status.

Their S/W isn't crap, but it could be much better. In fact the version of their interface for my wireless KB and mouse is not that bad at all.

Unfortunately SU still does not recognize any more than the 2 main buttons and the wheel, and THAT is crap.

@dave r said:

Or uninstall the Logitech driver altogether. It isn't needed. The mouse will work just fine without it.

But only if you have a simple mouse, ie: 2 buttons and a wheel that Windows built-in drivers recognizes.

If you have a complex mouse; like my Logitech MX-600, with 5 additional buttons, Win will not recognize those extra buttons. The Logitech drivers allow you to redefine any of the 10 available buttons & wheel to do pretty much anything you want, as well as read the battery status.

Unfortunately SU still does not recognize any more than the 2 main buttons and the wheel.

I would love such a tool, but alas, as far as I know, there ain't no such tool for SU.

The closest I know of is Sketchyphysics. This will allow all sorts of joints and controls, BUT, does not allow you to set the position of parts in the drawing proper. You can only move parts via a run-time module within SU. Stop the run and everything reverts back to its start point.

It's a great tool, and can do a lot of wondrous stuff, but the learning curve is quite steep and quite frankly, although I loved it, I gave up on it.

So now, if I need to see an articulation I create layers for each position, and rotate copies of the component around the axis point, with each position on its own layer. Making the rotated part a component allows you to edit the part in any of its positions and the change ripples through all the positions. Great for fitting parts in complex geometries.

Not sure if this applies to a Mac, but I upgraded my Logitech mouse last year and had the devil of a time getting the wheel down click to work like my previous mouse.

Try this; Open your Logitech mouse settings dialog and redefine the wheel down as "Middle Button".

This way may be a bit easier.

Select one group and clipboard copy it. You can now delete it if you wish.

Select the other group and edit it. Do a Paste in Place, NOT a paste.
This will put the group in the exact place it was but inside the other group.

Now you can either explode the pasted group, which will merge the 2 geometries, or just leave it as a separate but nested group.

(Sorry TIG, didn't fully read your reply before I posted this)