@brookefox said:

I use a separate 'sheet' (and layer) positioned at an appropriate Z for each view which I wish to print or document. This actually works quite well for me once I learned some little tricks, like making masks of various transparencies placed again at appropriate Z to aid in the process. I've set up plans, sections, elevations, etc. in this manner. It ain't perfect, by a long shot, and in that sense, a lot like Layout. Dave is happy with LO, though, as are many and perhaps it would suit you.

What do you mean by a 'Z'?

I've tried using the watermark feature in the free version of Sketchup to print a title box as follows but am running into one snag. I create a title box in a graphics program and then import it as a watermark. I position it centered on the bottom of the screen and print it to 1":1' scale (using the free program pdfprint to generate a 11"x17" pdf file, which I then email it to Fedex Office for printing). The problem is that the watermark resizes along with what is printed across different pfds and although I can get it close I cannot get it the same on each pdf. I've tried drawing guidelines on the screen for a 11"x17" box and then using zoom window just to zoom just inside of the guidelines hoping that will make what appears on the pdf file about the same but that doesn't work either. Is there a method to get the watermark consistently sized the same?

I did try the Cartouche plugin for a title block and although it's quite flexible the output is a fixed font and you cannot include graphics. If I create and import my own graphic I can make it look exactly how I want it to look with my logo, font, etc.

I guess my other option is to print out the title blocks separately using another program and then to just paste them on the printouts, but that negates part of the reason for using a CAD program.

I figured out that in order to change the location of the cartouche on the screen you have to click on the cartouche, then press delete, then go to settings, change x and y, then click add and only then does the cartouche appear in a new location. It seemed logical that if you changed the settings the cartouche would move according to those new settings and nowhere is it mentioned in this thread or your program that you have to hit delete first. Of course if you could not delete then you could not remove the cartouche but perhaps you could add 'Delete existing cartouche' and change 'Add' to 'Add new cartouche'. Then it would be more obvious that you must delete first.

Now that I know this, the cartouche does move when I change X and Y. But when I put in X=1 and Y=1 the cartouche does not appear on the screen or print-out (using 8-1/2 x 11" paper). Also, I am still wondering how the X and Y change position according to 0 and 1. Is 0 one side of the screen and 1 the otherside, or? How do I get the cartouche to appear on the lower right hand corner (where most title boxes appear).

This is a wonderful plugin, but I find that changing the X and Y values do nothing to change the position of the text on the screen or on a print out. I've tried 0, .5, 1 and even higher numbers(even though 0 to 1 seems to be the range) but nothing changes. Also, what was or is 0 and 1 supposed to signify? X=0 left side of page, X=1 right side of page? I would like to place the text on the lower left of the screen underneath a title box I have placed using the watermark feature.

Lastly, when I click 'record existing cartouche' a box keep pops up telling me to 'please select a cartouche before you use this plugin'. How do you do that? I thought that that is what I was doing by clicking 'settings' and then 'add'. What am I doing wrong?

Now, my wish list:

1. A %TIME variable. I often print multiple printouts of the same drawing in a day and forget which was the last I printed.

2. The box that pops up when you click on settings is so high that I can barely click the OK button as it is almost scrolled off the bottom of my screen. Could the box maybe be resized more square, ie 2 columns, so that it fits better within the screen boundaries?

3. Ability to put text anywhere on the page with the X and Y feature (which doesn't seem to work for me).

4. Ability to leave a blank line or have double spaced lines rather than single spaced.

Thanks for a great plugin.

Ok I guess you don't understand my question. It has nothing to do with backups.

I did have backups, but after I made the changes, the backup backed up the backup that was before those changes, so both the file and the backup were the same.

What I am looking for is confirmation that what I am saying is true. The components did indeed have those materials applied as they showed up as those materials in the cutlist. And, in fact, I imported the components that had nested components into one drawing in order to get a cutlist layout, and they still show up properly in the cutlist. It's when I go back to the components that are in the individual files (the ones that I made into a single component with nested components) that I do not see any materials when I click on Entity Info, yet the materials can be seen.

So, again, does creating a component out of a group of components, ie one component with nested components, result in the losing of the materials attributed to each nested component even though you can see the materials? Or, did I somehow do something else wrong that I am not aware of?

If you have 2 components, A and B, and paint each with different materials and then make both components into one component, say C, ie a component with nested components, when you later explode C it seems to me you lose the material information applied to A and B. Is this true as it seems to have happened to me with a complex design I just did. But the funny thing is I still see the material colours applied to the individual components, yet when I click on the component and click Entity Info it shows the material as being default. But it seems like the material information is there. Is there any way to get it back for that component or do I now have to go through and redo all the materials for each component?

That worked, but it gave the old component the name of the new component not the other way around, so I just undid it and did it the other way around and it named it like I wanted it to. So, I guess you choose the component with the name you don't want to have first.

Thanks!

I made a kitchen cabinet back panel and made it a component. Then much later I forgot I already had that component and made some new ones from scratch with the exact same geometry. Is there a shortcut to make these new ones the same components as that first one so they all have the same name or do I have to erase them now and copy over that component? I know I can just make them components with new, but close sounding names, like back panel B or 2, but I'd rather have the same name.

Thanks. I have to say though that it seems odd and unintuitive for the screen not to go back to your original drawing and layers, etc, if you click View|Scenes to hide the scenes. One accidental click of View|Scenes (if you haven't created a 'WIP' layer, as you suggest) and you lose what the drawing you were working on looked like and have to do a lot of work to get it back to where it was before (albeit no actual redrawing).

I created a bunch of scenes with most of my components hidden except for one. How do I get back to my original drawing? If I click View|Scene Tabs so that the scene tabs go away, does that mean I am in my original drawing before I created the scenes? I can't tell because my other components are hidden and it looks the same. Would hate to work on this drawing (without the Scene Tabs) only to find out much later that I wasn't working on my drawing but some other 'scene' or something. None of the video tutorials or help files tell you how to get back to your drawing for some reason. Maybe it's obvious to everyone but me!

Edit: So I clicked View|Scene to get rid of the scene tabs, unhid all the layers where the other components were on, then worked on my drawing, then clicked View|Scene to look at one of the scenes, then clicked View|Scene again and my screen did not go back to the original drawing and I had to click all the layers again to view all the components again. Surely you don't have to go through this process all the time? No easy way to go back to your original drawing?

Thanks. I understand. Someone on here kindly and generously gave me a long online tutorial on geometry vs components and now I fully understand the many things I was not understanding properly. You have been a help too. All my questions (so far) are answered. Thanks.

If you could, could you check that file I posted because the geometry does show up there

Ok, if you will indulge me then, lets go one by one. I thought this was a pretty simple question but maybe I am not asking it in the right way since you are confused by my question:

"1. It's not only components that show up in the component browser? Geometries show up in there too?"

If you click on Window|Components in that file I sent you, you will see a 'component'chen there called 'BC Kitchen Side". That appeared not to be an actual component as you informed me when you examined my file, yet it showed up in the browser. Hence, the above question.

Sorry to bother you. Was just hoping to get answers to my specific questions, that's all. Things happen and I don't know why. I am not over-complicating just asking for answers to things that happen when I use Sketchup.

I think I figured out the answer to Q.4. I clicked on the left side and a blue box connected the left and right sides and bottom (not sure what that meant though), then I right clicked the left side panel and clicked Explode which turned whatever I had there (which seemed to be some form of component that I don't understand) from whatever it was to simple geometry, then I clicked on the right side panel 3 times which made it light up in blue lines and then I right clicked and clicked erase, then I was able to delete Kitchen BC Side in the component browser by right clicking on hit then clicking delete, then I clicked 3 times quickly on the left side panel and right clicked and clicked Make Component and named it Kitchen BC Side. Now I have 2 components in the browser but the Kitchen BC Side one only has 1 drawing in it of a side instead of 2. Is that one of the clues to knowning that the component in the browser is really a component and not what I had before (a 'component' named Kitchen BC Side that had 2 drawings of sides in it)?

In the skp file I first posted here when I looked at the component browser I saw 'Kitchen BC Side' (showing two sides in it) so I figured it was a component or why would it show up there. I thought only components showed up there, so I have some questions if you don't mind with regard to this original file I posted:

1. It's not only components that show up in the component browser? Geometries show up in there too?

2. When I right click on the left panel in that drawing and then click 'Entity Info' it says it's a solid component and the name 'Kitchen BC Side' so this also led me to believe it was a component and that the bounding box being around both of the sides was just notifying me there were 2 of them. Why does it say it is a component when it is not?

3. I never made 'Kitchen BC Side' a group so was it just a group of geometries not an actual Sketchup group?

4. I am trying to create the same exact drawing you did with mine without redrawing the sids(excluding those components you have that have 'light' in their description - I don't even understand what they are), but nothing seems to work. I tried deleting the 'Kitchen BC Side' in the component browser by right clicking it and it let me, but then the two side disappeared. I then undid it and triple clicked the left side and made it a component but couldn't name it the same name as there was one there already, so I called it Component #1. But then I tried to delete 'Kitchen BC Side' in the component browser like I did before and it gave me a message 'Cannot create a recursively defined model or component'. I googled for 1/2 hour trying to figure out what that meant with no luck. Then I deleted the two sides in the drawing separately by clicking on each 3 times then deleting. Then I inserted Component#1 and tried to delete 'Kitchen BC Side' in the component browser again, but got the same message. How in the world did you do it?

5. Are there any tutorials on here that deal specifically with components and groups, what appears in the component browser and why and the bounding boxes. I've looked at so many but I still don't see much about the problems I am having. I hate to take up so much of your time as you've been so kind.

Yes it is very clear why you flipped it. So that when I paint one side wood the inside of the other side is painted wood instead of the outside.

What I mean by subtle difference (but who knows maybe I just don't get it), is that it 'appears' that you are copying the component because it is exactly the same size and looks like a copy, but it actually isn't really a copy of the component just the geometry. And no it is not subtle in how it affects your drawings. Cutlist alerted me to this because I would only get a partial list of the components that were in my drawing not all of them and I could not figure out why. It was because what I was looking at were not all components. Some were just geometry.

I was wondering how you figured out that I only had geometry and not a component. Is there something you can click to find out?

Well thanks so much for that. I owe you big time. That makes it a LOT clearer. So it looks like I was making a copy of the underlying internal geometry, not the actual component itself, and so only the internal geometry was duplicated and not the component itself which is why the geometry copy did not behave the same as the component when I manipulated the component. I did not know about any of this. That is indeed a subtle difference which one might not easily realize.

Not one of the tutorial videos I looked at explained this subtle difference or somehow I must have missed it.

Thanks so much!

Thanks for taking a look at it but I loaded what you posted and it acted like it did before, so I closed all my sketchup programs and now it works like you say. So, there must be something wrong with my computer. I noticed it gave me a message about the fact the 'GL properties' were reset when I reloaded Sketchup and that happens quite often. In fact I can't seem to load a default template that I set the way I want it. I always seem to have to start from scratch.

So, how do I do what you did (other than the flipping)? What did I do wrong in how I copy a component. I notice I can either 1) click on it a few times so all lines are blue and then move/copy it or 2) click on it a few times so it is blue and there is also a dashed box around it and then move/copy it.