no network or usb involved.......just dropbox sync between 3 pc's / laptops

All of them.

RED FILES.pdf

I never touch file preference settings........but regardless I am now getting this pop-up at launch:
"One or more of your preferred file location paths are invalid. Please correct this by going to Sketchup's preferences > files and specify a valid path for any items shown in red."

the frequency of this error is increasing and it's killing me.

THANKS...THEY FINALLY FIXED IT

In reference to Sonder's suggestion, it works. At least with LO 2016 linked to SKP 2015. Viewport was set to raster.

In a remote access session, Dave R. demonstrated:
To avoid disconnecting the initial viewport from the model by using the viewport's camera panning tool, tick 'preserve scale on resize' in this tray: Sketchup Model > View; drag the vp off the paper; grip-edit the bounding box; drag vp back to its home.

The basic premise is to avoid hidden geometry issues by never using the viewport camera tools.

I have yet to try Sonder's method.

the same exact plugin/extension/ruby files exist in each of my machines running pro 2016 with the same version 16.1.144 64 bit. however, machine A only lists the curve maker extension; machine B properly lists all the plugins. what am i doing wrong?

ANSWER - NOTHING. i had to reinstall the program - and then it worked fine.

I need to reiterate.......the software needs to be revised so the materials palette pops open when the paint tool is activated - like it used to do.

Thanks Rich for the video

Tig - the premise of this exercise was not to change camera position - aka do not pan/orbit/zoom. But thanks anyway for the good narrative.

WITHOUT CHANGING CAMERA LOCATION in the attached file, how can a circle be placed on the far end of the line path? With SU 2015, you would initiate the circle tool, hover the cursor over the near end of the cylinder so as to turn the cursor green, hold the shift key, place the cursor on the end of the line, left click, release the shift key, drag the cursor to form the circle and left click to complete. with 2016, the inference engine behaves differently and will not allow this old method to work. Or am i missing something?

INFERENCE ASSISTANCE IN 2016.skp

Query tool should adjust itself to mimic any changes made to the model's axis / origin. Cannot simply select all geometry and shift it to compensate for this issue because the annotations in every viewport in the LayOut file would need to be overhauled.

Just got done playing around with a simple 2 scene model and LO. There is definitely something peculiar with hidden geom. I tried all kinds of combos - update scenes, tick / un-tick hidden geo from styles, activate / de-activate hidden geom from view menu, switch between raster / vector / hybrid, save model, update LO etc etc. Sometimes i get expected results, other times I do not. Need to try with 2016.

ya learn something' new every day

sent via pm

LOWERING JPG COMPRESSION is applicable only to LO files containing stuff other than vector linework?

in the attached image, both raster vp's are indexed to the same model (obviously) yet one vp has hidden geom and the other does not. the model has only one style throughout all its scenes and lo is set to render automatically. I tried restarting both programs to no avail. this has been an issue since day one. the only thing that resolves the problem is to switch offending vp from raster to vector or hybrid.

HIDDEN GEOM..pdf

I suggest Trimble looks into scrolling scene tabs by placing cursor on scene tab row and toggling the mouse wheel left or right. That sure would quicker than clicking the distant arrow icons!! For example when you have a scene tab selected that is on the right end of the row and now you want to pick a far left scene tab that's now off the screen.

Document update normally is a 6 click procedure. (file>document setup > references > select file > update > close. Another way is to context click a viewport - but my viewports are often locked, thereby adding steps. I was happy to discover a shortcut as well as a tool to make it a one click procedure. However - they fail to work.

UPDATE DOCUMENT FAIL.pdf

What's the secret for getting rid of hidden geometry? I have several viewports that look at the same model. The model only has one style throughout all of its scenes. Yet some viewport show hidden geometry and others do not.