Archicad style Pet Palette, quick access tools

[rohantheboat]

An Archicad style Pet Palette to access tools faster.  You Left click on an object twice (if it's a group you enter the group) but if it's no a group a small palette of appropriate tools pop up above your mouse click.  ie if you click twice on a line you get the options to rotate it, copy it, mirror it, mirror it with a copy etc.  I realise you can right click on objects in Vectorworks and find these tools and add tools that you want, this is still handy for changing the properties of things, but for simple drafting work having just drafting tools in this little palette helps.  

 

Instead of right clicking, scrolling down the list to find a drafting tool like rotate, then waiting for all the rotate options list to appear (not everyone has a fast computer there is a delay for these menu's to appear) then find rotate and left click to select it, then move the mouse back to the line to rotate it.  If you add every drafting tool you need to this right click list it gets even bigger and longer to find things.

 

I know there are hot keys, but that takes more co-ordination than I've got and my eyes need to drift off the screen and do a juggling act with Ctlr+Shift+R.

 

 

[markdd]

I saw a video from the last design summit that demoed this exact feature in Vectorworks. I think it may be on its way soon. Hopefully the next release.

[zoomer]

Screenshot looks similar to Bricscad's "Quad" floating Palette which

appears already when hovering the cursor over an object.

 

 

8 hours ago, rohantheboat said:

I know there are hot keys, but that takes more co-ordination than I've got and my eyes need to drift off the screen and do a juggling act with Ctlr+Shift+R.

 

But such Palettes will often make you wish for more tools and quickly

get too crowded to recognize the Icons without need to "read" the icons.

 

 

For now,

You can customize your right click option menu in workspace.

There are 2 modes, when something is selected or nothing selected.

 

I did this mainly be rearranging Tools and adding separators to make

it easier to read. Also I threw out things that I don't need that often

and added Tools that I often need but are usually deeply hidden

inside the menu bar. 

If you use it more often you will get some muscle memory and used to

where things are, without the need to read through all entries.

For me that customized RMB menu was a big improvement.

 

 

I prefer to click icons or press buttons over pressing shortcut keys or 

reading menu entries.

In such a case a 3DConnexion Space Mouse Enterprise, with tool display

for 12 tool buttons, may be helpful too.