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Disappearing cues


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Make sure you have the correct constraints turned on. If you are looking for a corner cursor cue while drawing a line to an object with a corner, you need to have the appropriate constraints turned on.

In your constraints palette, which ones do you have turned on?

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Katie..

This is a situation where the cues stop working for no apparent reason. Unless there is some keystrokes which disable the feature... Without doing anything other than save, quit and re-launch the cues re appear. Can you figure this out? It is not particular to a file.. it happens on all files which are open when the problem manifests.

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Well I don't have 8.5.2 installed here at the moment. In version 9 there is a key to turn the smart cursor on or off. By default it should be set to "y".

Check the workspace editor on the misc. keys section.

Matthew GiampapaNNA Technical Support

(O.K. I got a chance to check version 8. It also has the same default key, but it is labeled screen hints in the workspace editor.

Other possible causes of losing your smart cursor cues are...

1. A strange problem with your graphics driver and it's accelerated mouse cursor. This most happens on Windows, not the Mac. To try and fix this you can update the drivers, or disable the accelerated cursor. In order to disable the cursor, you need to go to the display control panel, then the settings tab. Click the advanced button, and go to the troubleshoot tab. Here there will be a slider you can move 2 notches to the left.

2. That your snap radius is being set to 0. You can check this by going to VectorWorks preferences and looking at the setting on the edit panel.

3. That the checkbox for smart cursor cues is unchecked. This is also on the edit panel of the preferences, and is what the y key should be changing.

4. That the various constraints on the constraints pallet have been disabled. By default, we leave the first 5 constraints on. Most of these will effect some kind of smart cursor cue, but snap to object is the most important.)

[ 05-30-2002: Message edited by: Matthew Giampapa ]

[ 05-30-2002: Message edited by: Matthew Giampapa ]

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This is a windows issue. I want to make it clear that the smart cursor cues or whatever they are called are functioning one moment and then all the sudden stop functioning. The check box for smart cues IS checked when this happens. No other setting or preferences have been changed. For some reason they simply QUIT and the only way to get them back is to quit the program and relaunch it. I can try the mouse acceleration or perhaps the driver... but clearly something is not working the way its supposed to work.

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defjef,

Is snapping working when your screen hints disappear? You can tell by looking at the cursor - if you get close to a point or vertex and it changes from the hollow arrow to a black arrow or cross with a dot to the lower right, that indicates you are snapping, with or without the accompanying screen hint. If you are NOT snapping, this is probably because the appropriate contraints are not selected. "q" and "w" toggle the two constraints that enable snapping.

If you ARE snapping and not getting screen hints - I have always found that I had inadvertantly hit "y" and toggled screen hints off. That, however, is inconsistent with your observation that "SmartCursor Cues" remains selected in your preferences box. Checking that box and hitting "y" perform the same action. So if you are getting snapping but no screen hints and hitting "y" does not solve the problem, something unusual is going on.

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The cursor DOES appear to work normally when the cues disappear. I can find the corner, for example.. but not the CENTER... and things like ALIGN do not manifest. Perhaps I hit a Y and turned them off.. BUT when I check the preferences... it tells me that they are ON... I suspect something is faulty there. Is the Y a toggle type function?

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Go to the smart points constraint. Double click it to bring up the preferences. Do you have the HOrizontal.Vertical Extensions and Extension lines options checkmarked?

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Yes, "y" toggles screen hints on and off.

I use VW 8.5.2 and Win2000 as well. I haven't had your problem, which does sound like an abnormality of some kind.

The snapping pattern you describe (no centers) is consistent with having the "Intersection" constraint option turned on ("Intersection" toggled by "w"), but with "Object" constraint turned off. You will observe the lack of snapping to centers if you have not selected the "Object" constraint option (toggled by "q"). Constraint settings are reset when you reboot vW, so if you have accidently toggled something on or off it is often corrected by quitting and restarting the program.

[ 05-31-2002: Message edited by: P Retondo ]

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Katie,

unless these are toggles and I inadvertantly turn them off... they are never changed. Further when I restart the program its works fine, so whatever is causing the cues to disappear no longer is present. Unless there is some toggle-like feature. I would say that there is some bug which could be related to anything. It only occurs after some time... perhaps with several files open. A mystery it will remain... I suspect.

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defjef,This is a long shot, but when it happens again, reset your view to Top/Plan, the first menu item under the View menu.

For reasons unknown to me, sometimes my snap-to-object ability goes out the window. If I have the 2D selection tool enabled I may notice the 3D view icons on the data bar, but with other tools selected the lack of snap-to-objects is the only symptom. Why? I haven't a clue. I've noticed no pattern of when it happens. My workspace is set up entirely for 2D drawing. This never happened in MC6 or earlier, but it happens often enough in VW852, about once every day or so. I am on a Mac, so I am curious if the 'feature' is also on the PC.

If this solves your problem, the solution is painless and easy. Reset your view and don't look back.

HTH,Raymond

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I will check it out next time they disappear. I am working in top plan 2D workspace and only occassionaly do I accidentally toggle a different view. Wnen I do that I toggle turn it off. I think zero brings me back... more to follow.. thanks

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