Periodically, my section planes break. Now, it may be that this happens when I raise them out of the way so they don't cut anything, while I do something. In any case, when this happens I have to delete them and recreate them, and then they work again. Is this common? It doesn't seem to have anything to do with turning section planes or cuts visibility on or off. When they're broken, I can move them and they act just like Section Cuts vis is off.

Well, I see now that "locking horizon" really helps control in Perspective mode, though I like the flexibility of an unlocked horizon in Parallel mode. Maybe I'll get used to it.

I've been using SN in SU for a bit, it's been really helpful. I'd read a few people's experience about it being really jumpy/overshooting, and I thought I must have superior eye-hand coordination ... until I switched from Parallel to Perspective. Then it became completely uncontrollable, flying through walls inadvertently etc. I often edit in Parallel, so this isn't a deal breaker, but I'm wondering if there's anything I can do? I saw some mentions of a 3dConnexions' extension, but I think that may be outdated. The only control interface I have is the 3dConnexions control panel in my system tray, which I currently have set up like this (actually I've unclicked "dominant" now):

Thanks Aurelius, I don't think I understand, but now I understand that I don't understand. I haven't really looked at creating commands, my level of sophistication extended only to picking something off a list

This would be just what I'm looking for... if I could get it working.

When I open it up (v. 1.1.2 on SU 2014 on Win7), the list of available commands is very limited.

The vast majority of them is from the 1001bits extension I've got installed. Then there are perhaps 20 more. No View menu commands, for example, which is what I wanted.

Speaking for myself and as a relative noob, I think I'd prefer the commands listed in menu order: i.e. Tools/Sandbox/Smoove, but I perhaps I'm putting too much stock in the menus, with which I'm faintly familiar. I'd also love an option to list in different formats, i.e. a nice tight text list that would show about twice as much per page.

This looks awesome, and I can see it's working for other people. I've tried shutting down & restarting SU. I also just uninstalled and reinstalled TE, and an interesting thing happened: it still had about as many non-1001bits commands, but not the same ones! I only know this b/c I saw smoove on there before, and it's not there now. I tried disabling 1001bits, and interestingly enough there aren't any more non-1001bits tools there than before. 25 to be precise. Then I uninstalled TE, reinstalled, and same thing.

I made a small table/schedule in Open Office Calc. Copied it to Open Office Writer. Saved it in .rtf. Then I successfully inserted it in an existing Layout document.

Then I tried to update it, and couldn't do any of it again. Rebooted the computer, restarted all the programs, did everything from scratch... the most likely thing is that it's something stupid, but I can't figure it out. Tried cutting and pasting it, inserting it, inserting it in a text box. Tried a new Layout document, everything. In fact, it seems that it's only the table that's the problem: if I put some text in my rtf doc, it can be inserted. Wha?

AH! If the toolbar dialog is open, it works like you said. If it's closed (which I'd done, since it didn't seem to buy me anything) it works like I said. So I can move tools around without ever opening the toolbar dialog using Alt. Thanks for sticking with me!

Hi Dave: I can't tell you why this would be, but on my computer Ctrl definitely doesn't do it: I have to hold Alt down to do move tools between toolbars, and then Ctrl (simultaneously) allows me to make a copy while moving, vs. just moving (analogous to SU Move). I don't really know what you mean by the "reset" button?

There are actually three pull-down tool menus on the Getting Started toolbar, I am just going to use them directly but it seems like it could be a helpful trick in the future, if it's possible to do with other tools. I guess you're saying it isn't.

AHHH! Almost! I have to hold Alt to drag from one toolbar to another, but then it moves the tool from the first toolbar. I have to hold Ctl & Alt to move and copy the tool to a new toolbar. I sort of can't believe I didn't try that.

Any idea how to create pull down tool menus in toolbars? Examples are in the Getting Started toolbar. For a moment I thought it was "start group", but that appears to just create a separation character on the toolbar. I can start a new thread if necessary.

In case anyone is reading this with the same question, Alt & click/drag a tool off the toolbar (and into the drawing space) removes it from the toolbar.

I think this must be obvious, apologies....

I am trying to create a custom toolbar. I can create one with View/Toolbars/Toolbar tab/New, but I can't populate it. Knowledge Center says "Click on the Command tab. The Commands panel is displayed. This panel contains a list of tool and commands categories as well as all tools and commands in each category."

There is no Command tab anywhere I'm looking.

It also says "Note: You can also click the toolbar options arrow on the toolbar to add or remove buttons from a toolbar or display the Customize dialog."

Uh, what? I don't see no stinkin' arrows, options or otherwise.

Finally: I noticed in some existing toolbars, there are pull-down commands (like putting all the arcs in one pull-down). I like this style, perhaps it will be obvious when the above is answered, but be forewarned, that's going to be my next question

Thanks for any help. This is an awesome program, though I'm brand-spanking new to Pro, and pretty green with SU generally.

Oh, Sketchup Pro 2014

Thanks so much for the replies. Guidelines are perfect, I use them in my CAD package all the time. What a great feature.

I'll try all this, and especially get a lot more experienced with components, groups and layers.

Keith

In the tutorial, Chris mentions "be sure to use the right thickness for walls". I can't figure out how to change that, or exactly what he means. Do I draw a rectangle that is 6" "thick" over every wall, or is there a way to set lines to 6" thick? Or would people typically do the outside outline, and then offset the 6"?

I also don't understand what is meant by "trace the door and window openings". Is that just drawing some short perpendicular lines to break the walls at the door and window locations, or is there something more tricky going on?

Sorry, I'm not real experienced with Sketchup, AND this is the first tutorial I've looked at. Thanks for any clarifications!

Warmly, keith

I'm a slightly experienced beginner at SU.

I'd like to use it to model houses. But often the plans change and evolve with time, so I need to be able to go back and move windows, resize them, move walls, etc. And do so precisely.

When I'm creating a wall, for example, I can control the size directly. But if I want to move or create something that is, say, 6" away from something else (say, a window that's 6" from a corner), or 6" from where it currently is, how do I do that? And if I then realize it needs to be 8"? I've just drawn by eye mostly, so far. Perhaps I should try to make sure that everything is components, so I can move them more easily?

Keith

Hey Kris,

Thanks for these neat tutorials. I've only glanced so far, but they look very useful.

Are you going to get to #3 at some point, roofs and foundations, as you seemed to imply before? Or did I miss something?

Keith