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Teaser Tuesdays - Mac Touch Bar Support


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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee

As of the release of Vectorworks 2018, we will introduce compatibility with the Mac Touch Bar, a contextual touch interface recently added to the Apple hardware line.

 

Screen Shot 2017-08-22 at 10.51.54 AM.png

 

We want you to be able to work the way you want, with the tools you have available to you, so we’ve left the majority of the customization options completely up to you rather than dictate which buttons you do and don’t see. From the Vectorworks menu on any Mac sporting a Touch Bar, you can access and configure your buttons via Vectorworks > Customize Touch Bar.

 

Screen Shot 2017-08-22 at 10.52.02 AM.png

(Note: the placement of this menu option may change by release.)

 

Rather than leave it blank to start, we’ve set up the default options to list a number of commonly used tools and options, namely the Basic Tool Palette as well as the Standard Views list.

 

Active tool indicated with white rounded rectangle, if present on Touch Bar.

Screen Shot 2017-08-21 at 10.33.05 AM.png

 

We have also retained a few of the standard Mac system controls on the right, but these can be removed as well if you’d like to use all of your bar’s real estate for Vectorworks related items. To add these items, when in this editing mode, simply drag them from your regular screen downwards toward the touch bar, and you will see your new addition appear.

 

Items like standard Views can be added either as a single button that tapping will expand to expose the various options, or as a constantly present bar that you can scroll left and right in to quickly find the view you want.


Screen Shot 2017-08-21 at 10.38.11 AM.png

 

Other toolsets can be added as a button that when tapped will expand to fill the entire touch bar, offering the contained tools in the order they have been assigned in the palette via the Workspace Editor.

 

Tapping Building Shell Toolset icon will expand to show all the contained tools:
Screen Shot 2017-08-22 at 11.02.56 AM.pngScreen Shot 2017-08-21 at 10.05.18 AM.png

 

If you create any custom tool sets, they will be shown here as well and can be added, giving you very quick access to your most used items.

 

Screen Shot 2017-08-21 at 10.15.12 AM.png

 

This feature was brought about in a nice moment of serendipity where we could quickly add functionality and value without delaying any other areas of development, a great opportunity to pounce on.

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee
4 minutes ago, bcd said:

Yes, it should probably be located in the 'new' UI customizer /Workspace Manager thingy !!

 


This location might be something Apple wants to control the location of? Not positive, if it ends up moving I'll update the location. You have the ability to map tools in the Touch Bar directly from Vectorworks, but the rest of it on the far right (Shown in the Default layout in the first image) is customized in System Preferences.

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee
7 minutes ago, bcd said:

But not working on a mbp makes it all a curiosity.


Hopefully apple doesn't just let this become a one off. This tech could be added to the standard keyboards easily, I'd be stunned if they spent so much obvious development time on it to keep it only on a single product line as an option.

 

(This is still very rumor-mill-ish territory but: From their patent filings it seems they plan to bring it to additional hardware lines.)

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee
1 minute ago, barkest said:

We are talking about Apple here

 

2 minutes ago, Tom Klaber said:

You mac people!.... Don't get it. ¬¬ 


Right? Gives me a headache thinking in circles about it. Fortunately since on the Mac side a lot of our guts adhere to the standard Mac rules, this was relatively easy to implement and it didn't need to risk/delay anything else. I'm all for low hanging (Apple?) fruit as long as we keep going for the rest of the fruit at the same time.

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Just now, JimW said:

 


Right? Gives me a headache thinking in circles about it. Fortunately since on the Mac side a lot of our guts adhere to the standard Mac rules, this was relatively easy to implement and it didn't need to risk/delay anything else. I'm all for low hanging (Apple?) fruit as long as we keep going for the rest of the fruit at the same time.

 

Fair enough.  I figured (hoped) as much.  

Good to pre-debunk those "I can not believe you spent dev time supporting touch bar when XXX is still not working right" complaints.    

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee
Just now, Tom Klaber said:

Good to pre-debunk those "I can not believe you spent dev time supporting touch bar when XXX is still not working right" complaints.    


My habits are constantly reforged and revised in the crucible of user feedback.  ^_^

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1 hour ago, JimW said:

Hopefully apple doesn't just let this become a one off. This tech could be added to the standard keyboards easily, I'd be stunned if they spent so much obvious development time on it to keep it only on a single product line as an option.

 

I was surprised it didn't appear on the new "wireless" keyboard with the numeric keypad (the one that can technically be tethered using the lightning cable). If the touch bar doesn't appear in some form on the new iMac Pro I'll begin to wonder about its future. Clearly they think its a pro feature. It could be as simple as a linked iPad app to start or a Magic Trackpad that was a touchscreen too.

 

Glad to see its getting a tryout in VW, if even for the simple access to tools and views. Finally being able to access the standard views from a keyboard without a numeric keypad is a great addition.

 

KM

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Not sure what the split is for the mac/windows users@JimW, but what about the teaser for those of us on windows? I get excited when loading into this forum on Wednesday mornings, but then I saw "Mac' in the title and got disappointed, not sure how I can continue on with my work for the day...

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee
1 minute ago, Itchy said:

Not sure what the split is for the mac/windows users@JimW, but what about the teaser for those of us on windows? I get excited when loading into this forum on Wednesday mornings, but then I saw "Mac' in the title and got disappointed, not sure how I can continue on with my work for the day...


60/40-ish Mac/Windows, flexes up and down. I'll ask for approval to let loose something else, but might have to wait.

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Any news on minor tweaks and upgrades to existing features? We like those too!

Last years pre-release news had us all excited about lots of things. So far, and I'm so sorry if I sound cynical, the multi-view and live section editing are the only work flow improvements we'll see, but they're not critical as our individual workflows have long since adapted to live without these features.

 

It was the little tweaks and exsisting tool improvements that really got us going. I myself would love to see a leap in contextual menus. At the moment, we have to go into dialogues and sub dialogues to make some changes that could be super-quick with intelligent context menus. Chaning the call-out direction on a detail viewport involves a lot of menu opening.

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  • Vectorworks, Inc Employee
Just now, RussU said:

Any news on minor tweaks and upgrades to existing features? We like those too!

 


I am not sure if I will be able to pick those for Teasers, my list has to get quite a bit of approval and a lot of the approvers like the big stuff.

HOWEVER! I am keeping an active list of the tiny no-video items that I really like that I think will really please folks and will be spilling the beans on them as soon as possible. I'll do what I can to speed this up but no promises, it's a very busy time here.

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On 2/20/2018 at 10:57 AM, Gaspar Potocnik said:

Not sure if this should go in this post or the wishlist so feel free to move it.

 

Could we have the tool mode on the touchbar? Honestly, I'm only using the standard views since I don't have numpad everyday and tools already have shortcuts, so maybe this would be more useful for some users.

Exactly so!  You speak my thoughts.

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