Title Block Border Settings Tab Between Fields

[Wesley Burrows 99]

Can someone explain to me why in all of the <insert your favorite swear word(s) here> can't I tab between fields in the title block manager other than the default uneditable fields?     Like you can in nearly every other program on earth?

 

Edited October 10, 2018 by Wesley Burrows

[Kevin McAllister 1,103]

I'd be very surprised if it isn't related to this -

 

and  this -

 

 

These custom fields act the same way as the text mode used for Callouts so tabbing isn't possible and Return generates a line return instead of exiting the dialog. Its super frustrating that these decisions were made in this way.

 

Kevin

 

 

Edited October 10, 2018 by Kevin McAllister

[Nikolay Zhelyazkov 157]

Hello Wesley, Kevin,

 

Check out this answer, its about the same question

If you still have troubles tabbing using the workaround or in Service Pack 1, let me know.

 

Best Regards,

Nikolay Zhelyazkov

[Kevin McAllister 1,103]

5 hours ago, Nikolay Zhelyazkov said:

Hello Wesley, Kevin,

 

Check out this answer, its about the same question

If you still have troubles tabbing using the workaround or in Service Pack 1, let me know.

 

Best Regards,

Nikolay Zhelyazkov

Hi Nikolay,

Thanks for the info. The original problem is not fixed in SP1. You can tab between single line fields but not into any of the multiline fields. Making all of the custom text fields multiline has created a huge handicap. The drawbacks far outweigh the limited benefit. We need to be able to tab and we need to be able to exit a multiline field/the dialog using the Return key. The inconsistency with the VW interface is hurting productivity.

Kevin

 

[Nikolay Zhelyazkov 157]

Hello Kevin,

 

42 minutes ago, Kevin McAllister said:

The original problem is not fixed in SP1.

- Strange, I have just tested this to confirm and it is working fine for me in SP-1 for all controls. Make sure you have the option mentioned in the topic I have mentioned above set to "All Controls".

 

Let me know if the issue persist even with this option on.

 

Best Regards,

Nikolay Zhelyazkov

 

[Kevin McAllister 1,103]

1 hour ago, Nikolay Zhelyazkov said:

Hello Kevin,

 

- Strange, I have just tested this to confirm and it is working fine for me in SP-1 for all controls. Make sure you have the option mentioned in the topic I have mentioned above set to "All Controls".

 

Let me know if the issue persist even with this option on.

 

Best Regards,

Nikolay Zhelyazkov

 

Hi Nikolay,

I should clarify my response. The workaround works (all controls) but the original problem is not fixed.

Kevin

[Wesley Burrows 99]

4 minutes ago, Kevin McAllister said:

Hi Nikolay,

I should clarify my response. The workaround works (all controls) but the original problem is not fixed.

Kevin

 

My experience mirrors that of Kevin's.

[Nikolay Zhelyazkov 157]

Just to bo be sure, you have this option checked?

 

 

If so, could you tell me the specifications of your computers?

 

Thanks,

Niko

[Wesley Burrows 99]

1 hour ago, Nikolay Zhelyazkov said:

Just to bo be sure, you have this option checked?

 

 

If so, could you tell me the specifications of your computers?

 

Thanks,

Niko

 

To be clear,  yes.   With that option checked it does work.   SP1 however on it's own does not fix it.

[Nikolay Zhelyazkov 157]

Kevin, Wesley,

 

This option is required for the TBB tabbing to work, as, apart from the visible Text Box fields, we have groups and other controls that are not visible and this is blocking the tabbing, if the option is not set to "All Controls". Setting this option to "All Controls" is not a workaround, it is required by design.

I hope it is not a problem to have this option set to "All Controls".

 

Best Regards,

Niko

[Kevin McAllister 1,103]

On 10/12/2018 at 12:08 AM, Nikolay Zhelyazkov said:

Kevin, Wesley,

 

This option is required for the TBB tabbing to work, as, apart from the visible Text Box fields, we have groups and other controls that are not visible and this is blocking the tabbing, if the option is not set to "All Controls". Setting this option to "All Controls" is not a workaround, it is required by design.

I hope it is not a problem to have this option set to "All Controls".

 

Best Regards,

Niko

 

I've set the "All Controls" setting on and worked with it today. If this is considered the long term, permanent solution for tabbing through all the fields in the Title Block Border dialog then it needs to be rethought. Changing the Mac OS setting to "All Controls" affects how a user interacts with EVERY dialog in Vectorworks. For example, now if I use Move (Command M) instead of being able to tab to switch between just X and Y I now have to tab through X, Y, OK and Cancel. Given that it affects every dialog in VW (and the rest of the Mac OS) the implications of this could be HUGE to the average workflow.

 

@Jim Wilson NV needs to hear this is not a viable long term solution. For now I will sacrifice the usability of the Title Block Border to preserve 25 years of tabbing between X and Y.

 

Sorry to be so blunt, but it has to be said and heard.

 

Kevin

 

Edited October 13, 2018 by Kevin McAllister

[PVA - Jim 2,356]

On 10/13/2018 at 2:14 PM, Kevin McAllister said:

@Jim Wilson NV needs to hear this is not a viable long term solution. For now I will sacrifice the usability of the Title Block Border to preserve 25 years of tabbing between X and Y.

 

Sorry to be so blunt, but it has to be said and heard.

One of the many, many, many reasons we need to dramatically alter the UI both on top and behind the scenes.

[Andy Broomell 859]

To tag onto Kevin...

 

Changing the System Preferences option to "All Controls" is absolutely not a solution. Another example reason to not change this setting is that when you double-tap the "4" key to quickly insert a rectangle at a specific size, the dialogue box's focus now defaults to a non-existent field at the top, and you have to tab 3 times to get to Width. Compared to leaving the setting as it was, double-tapping "4" would default to "Width" (as one would expect, and which allows for the fastest entry of data).

 

 

Blue rectangle at top is result of changing the tab setting as described above.

 

[Kevin McAllister 1,103]

This all started when custom text fields in Title Block Borders became multi-line instead of single line. This happened during the transition from the old title block to the new title block. I'm not a programmer but there are two interim solutions I can imagine -

1. Force all custom text fields back to single line for Title Block Borders for the time being and place any remaining multiline fields at the top of the Title Block Border edit dialog so its possible to tab through the fields below them.
2. Or add a new field type, so that there's a single line text field and a multi-line text field. Then those of us that don't need multi-line fields can avoid this problem entirely. (Wish listed here - link)

@Andy Broomell's post brings to mind an entirely different question - would you file the phantom field as a bug??? I think if I saw that normally I would but the "All Controls" workaround puts us in uncharted territory.

 

Kevin

[cwojo23 0]

It would be great to Tab between the fields on the Project Data within a Title block - could be made universal throughout all settings for Title block but the one I use multiple times daily are my Titleblock Project Data and always find myself thinking I can tab between field to enter the next data field 

[Nikolay Zhelyazkov 157]

Hello @cwojo,

 

You should check out VectorWorks 2019 ;).

 

Best Regards,

Nikolay Zhelyazkov

[cwojo23 0]

Yes I am referring to using 2019 

[Nikolay Zhelyazkov 157]

Then, you should check out this thread -

 

There is a bug for tabbing on mac, which has a workaround.

[cwojo23 0]

Yes bug = not working so add it - SP1 did not add it to the Mac version - read your thread still does not work - shouldn't have to do a workaround 

[Nikolay Zhelyazkov 157]

As I said, it is a bug and we are working on finding a solution for it. Tabbing is working perfectly fine on Windows. As of now, for Mac you could use the workaround, which is to simply turn on the tabbing option on Mac to be for All Controls.

[PVA - Jim 2,356]

1 hour ago, cwojo said:

Yes bug = not working so add it - SP1 did not add it to the Mac version - read your thread still does not work - shouldn't have to do a workaround 

He just meant that it doesn't need to be filed as a wishlist item because it's already being tracked as a bug. No worries, combining threads now.

[trashcan 49]

Still an issue in Vectorworks 2020. Has been driving me nuts! Glad to see I'm not the only one. 

 

Any hope for a solution? 

 

Kudos @Wesley Burrows for creating the exact screenshot I was about to make. 

[Andy Broomell 859]

Same here in 2020 - still irks me every time...