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Turning OFF screen tips


pgym

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It's in the Snaps preferences General tab

That turns off smart cursor screen tips, but not globally, at least on our hardware. We'd like to turn off ALL screen tips globally.

there might be some confusion here between screen hints and tool tips. Screen hints are the things that tell you when you are at the end of the line, or corner of a rectangle.

Tool Tips appear when you leave your cursor on a tool, mode, etc.

Thanks for the clarification.

Is there a way to turn off tool tips, too?

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Is there a way to turn off tool tips, too?

Why would you turn off tool tips? They only appear when you wait over a tool. When just usng it, they don't appear. I almost never see one, unless I want them to appear. So I'm really curious to why you would do it.

We've customized our tool pallets to match the layout we've been using since VW 9, so we have a lot of pop-out pallets (see attachment).

For us, the tool tip appears virtually simultaneously with the pop-out pallet, and persists approx 1 sec after the pointer moves off of the tool. That's the case in both Mac and Windows.

Most (90% plus) of the time, part of the pop-out pallet gets hidden behind the tool tip (see attachment), so we end up wasting A LOT of time and motion if we need one of the tools that's hidden behind the tool tip: either we have to move off the tool, wait for the tool tip to disappear, and try again, or click and hold on the main tool and hope we time it just right to drag the pointer clear of the pop-out pallet (the tool tip appears at the pointer location; see second attachment) right before the tool tip appears, then move the pointer back to the pop-out pallet and select the desired tool (of course, if we miss on the timing, we have to start over again).

It's a tremendous waste of time and energy, and a massive pain in the arse.

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With all due respect, we have found that the layout we use to be more efficient to have commonly used tools immediately available, especially if you're regularly switching between tool sets, e.g. we need only one click to switch from tools in the building shell pallet to tools in the visualization palette instead of two (one to change the pallet and one to select the desired tool).

We also save time by having the commonly used tool pallets in a fixed place on screen, so we don't have to find for the correct tool pallet symbol, click on it, then find the desired tool.

Fewer clicks = less wasted motion and energy. Over the life of a project, the cumulative time adds up.

Edited by pgym
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I understand your reason, but you could also make one big palette to show all the tools you want with the new system.

The layout of our tool pallets is based on close analysis, conducted over several years beginning with VW 8.0, of how we actually work.

The tools that appear on the "top level" of a pallet are the ones that are used most frequently. Tools that are related, either by type or by function, are assigned to pop-up pallets, and are arranged hierarchically within the pop-up pallet, based on the frequency with which they are used, with the most frequently used at the top and the least frequently used at the bottom.

This arrangement provides us with immediate access to the most frequently used tools and one-click access to related commonly, but less frequently, used tools, without having to sacrifice screen real estate for the related but less frequently used tools.

With the "one big pallet" approach, either you end up sacrificing screen real estate to have one-click access to those commonly, but less frequently, used tools, or you end up with tool tips blocking part or all of the pop-up pallets (depending on how many tools there are in a sub-pallet).

Sacrificing screen real estate is fine if you have 27" or larger monitors or multiple monitors. It's NOT ok if you're working with a 20" or smaller single monitor or a 17" or smaller laptop screen.

So for us, tool tips are not simply a minor inconvenience; they are a major impediment to our current workflow.

More importantly, if tool tips can't be turned off, NV is effectively forcing us to change how we work (and have been working since VW 8.5) to the way NV thinks we should work.

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More importantly, if tool tips can't be turned off, NV is effectively forcing us to change how we work (and have been working since VW 8.5) to the way NV thinks we should work.

The tool tips might be generated by Vectorworks, but the timing and control of these tool tips is part of the windows operating system. What you can do it go edit the RegEdit and adjust the time delay before the Tool tips appear.

I suggest that you do a google search for this and see what you can find. I found this article...

Edited by Jonathan Pickup
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I don't want to be rude, but from what I can see on your palettes and from my own experience as cad manager who wants to better everything, You can easily use the new system:

All your commenly tools will go in the top palette for direct acces like you now have the tools visible.

All tools you now have 'under' other tools can go in the other palettes, so when you need them, they can be accesed very easy and fast.

I tested this again, and for tools 'under' other tools to show, you have to right-click or long left-click on the main tool, Then click again to be able to use it. But VW then sets the top to the one just used, so you'll need to do those 2 clicks again to set the most commenly tool on top again. So in your workflow you have 4 clicks to use a tool.

If you use the method I describe in the two first paragraphs, then you only need to click once for all commonly used tools, and click only once or twice, depending on the active palette, for tools not commonly used.

The new way is sure to be much faster than the old one.

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With the "one big pallet" approach, either you end up sacrificing screen real estate to have one-click access to those commonly, but less frequently, used tools, or you end up with tool tips blocking part or all of the pop-up pallets (depending on how many tools there are in a sub-pallet).

That's not true. What I mean with the big pallet is like in my screenshot: All your commonly used tools will go on the top palette, which will Always be visible, the other tools go on the other palettes on th bottom part. You will not have any tool tips blocking the way, and you wil end up with fewer clicks.

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I tested this again, and for tools 'under' other tools to show, you have to right-click or long left-click on the main tool, Then click again to be able to use it. But VW then sets the top to the one just used, so you'll need to do those 2 clicks again to set the most commenly tool on top again. So in your workflow you have 4 clicks to use a tool.

Nope, one click.

Maybe I didn't explain things clearly.

You click-and-hold the top level tool until the pop-out pallet appears, then drag to the desired tool to select it, and release. That's one click.

The point is, we can access ANY tool in our pallets with AT MOST one click-and-drag.

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With the "one big pallet" approach, either you end up sacrificing screen real estate to have one-click access to those commonly, but less frequently, used tools, or you end up with tool tips blocking part or all of the pop-up pallets (depending on how many tools there are in a sub-pallet).

That's not true. What I mean with the big pallet is like in my screenshot: All your commonly used tools will go on the top palette, which will Always be visible, the other tools go on the other palettes on th bottom part. You will not have any tool tips blocking the way, and you wil end up with fewer clicks.

Then how do you explain this (there are 5 items in the pop-out pallet):

Edited by pgym
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Nope, one click.

You click-and-hold the top level tool until the pop-out pallet appears, then drag to the desired tool to select it, and release. That's one click.

I did not know this. It also works that way. But using it that way, here on windows, the tool tip dissapears as soon as the pop-out palette appears, so this is really a mac error. Still, the used tool becomes the top one, so you will need one extra click to set the most commonly used back on top. And click-drag is not faster then click-click here on windows.

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More importantly, if tool tips can't be turned off, NV is effectively forcing us to change how we work (and have been working since VW 8.5) to the way NV thinks we should work.

The tool tips might be generated by Vectorworks, but the timing and control of these tool tips is part of the windows operating system. What you can do it go edit the RegEdit and adjust the time delay before the Tool tips appear.

I suggest that you do a google search for this and see what you can find. I found this article...

Jonathan, thanks. That takes cares of Windows.

Here's what I found for OS X: Configure Tooltip Properties in Cocoa applications

If you want to change the delay just for VW, replace the -g with the name of the .plist file for your version of VW, which for VW 2012 is net.nemetschek.vectorworks.2012.plist

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Nope, one click.

You click-and-hold the top level tool until the pop-out pallet appears, then drag to the desired tool to select it, and release. That's one click.

I did not know this. It also works that way. But using it that way, here on windows, the tool tip dissapears as soon as the pop-out palette appears, so this is really a mac error. Still, the used tool becomes the top one, so you will need one extra click to set the most commonly used back on top.

No, because you leave a tool in its last used setting until you need to change it, at which time it's one click-and-drag.

And click-drag is not faster then click-click here on windows.

It is for us because we've been doing it for so long, we do it without having to think about it.

The larger issue for us is that by turning off tool tips, we can continue to use the same procedures and protocols we've been using since VW 8.5, which by this point have become habitual, instead of having to learn a new set of habits.

Yes, we could adapt; the point is, we should not HAVE to.

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More importantly, if tool tips can't be turned off, NV is effectively forcing us to change how we work (and have been working since VW 8.5) to the way NV thinks we should work.

The tool tips might be generated by Vectorworks, but the timing and control of these tool tips is part of the windows operating system. What you can do it go edit the RegEdit and adjust the time delay before the Tool tips appear.

I suggest that you do a google search for this and see what you can find. I found this article...

Jonathan, thanks. That takes cares of Windows.

Here's what I found for OS X: Configure Tooltip Properties in Cocoa applications

If you want to change the delay just for VW, replace the -g with the name of the .plist file for your version of VW, which for VW 2012 is net.nemetschek.vectorworks.2012.plist

Thank you for this.

We're migrating from 12.5 to 2012, and tool tips has been driving some of us crazy! We could live with it in 12.5, where it's only the tool name so it only partially covered up the tool the pointer was on, but these multi-line tool tips are just idiotic.

Yes, we could adapt; the point is, we should not HAVE to.

+1!

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