Libraries & objects
About Archicad and BIMcloud libraries, their management and migration, objects and other library parts, etc.

Navigation and duplication conflict when pressing Alt/Option to zoom

furtonb
Advisor
Hi,

The new ,,macOS friendly" navigation in AC22 result in conflict: when using a Magic Mouse/touchpad the default setting is set to "Pan; Alt/Option to Zoom (macOS recommended)". So with this setting, anytime I move the drawing and zoom while copying/rotating an object, each zoom results in toggling the "copy mode". This is extremely annoying, as it can happen in accidental copies, which makes proper modelling a pain.

How to reproduce:
1. Under Work Environment/User Preference Schemes/Input constraints and guides set the mouse wheel scrolling as follows:


2. Go to any view (e.g. floor plan, section, elevation, 3D, doesn't matter really) and place a piece of wall/line/fill/etc.
3. Press Cmd+D to move it, then zoom out (as is the plan was huge, and it is faster to locate to new position this way), pan, and zoom in, possibly multiple times as you would do when adjusting a view.
4. Notice the appearing/disappearing "+" icon next to the cursor.

I know it's not possible to customize these (otherwise very handy) shortcuts – pressing option or cmd+opt (alt or ctrl+alt) when dragging/rotating to move a single copy or as many as wanted, but this way drafting requires extra attention.

I really love the newborn smoothness of the 2D navigation, especially when working with a touchpad, but can something be done to resolve this conflict? Like assigning a different shortcut for duplicating feature, or making the non-customizable ones customizable.
odv.hu | actively using: AC25-27 INT | Rhino6-8 | macOS @ apple silicon / win10 x64
10 REPLIES 10
Daniel Kovacs
Graphisoft Alumni
Graphisoft Alumni
Hi,

Good point, and a well detailed description! Thank you!

If you know how alt works, this can actually be avoided easily I think (just pressing alt one more time before placing, if the plus sign is there).

But if someone doesn't know that you can drag a copy by pressing alt, I can see this being really annoying to some people, so I let the designers know about this, maybe they can come up with a solution for a future version.

Thanks for bringing this to our attention.

Regards,
Daniel Alexander Kovacs

Professional Services Consultant

GRAPHISOFT



For Troubleshooting and useful Tips & Tricks visit
furtonb
Advisor
dkovacs wrote:
If you know how alt works, this can actually be avoided easily I think (just pressing alt one more time before placing, if the plus sign is there).

Yes, but it needs an unnecessary glance at the cursor – and yes, it can become second nature as I feel like I'm adapting already, but I don't feel like a should. It happened that I couldn't tell whether an element was moved or copied after placing and I had to navigate back to check. The main issue is the unwilling placing of model elements in a model, which is awkward.

Imagine this conversation:
- Hey John, did you place these 3432 columns 50m north of the building?
- No, I was editing them and moved them right back.
- Well, that's strange, as it's right there, since we doubled the amount of concrete in our schedules.
- ....

Usually I don't miss it that's true, but having a flaw like this in one of the most commonly used commands is unexpected.

I hope to see this fixed soon!

Thanks!
odv.hu | actively using: AC25-27 INT | Rhino6-8 | macOS @ apple silicon / win10 x64
James B
Graphisoft
Graphisoft
The keyboard modifier is the same as before in previous versions. I’m curious to know if this had been a problem (or noticeable) before as well?

Can you also confirm which device you are using? Mac Tackpad? Or Magic Mouse?

Thanks for your feedback.
James Badcock
Graphisoft Senior Product Manager
furtonb
Advisor
James wrote:
The keyboard modifier is the same as before in previous versions.

Yes, I'm aware.

James wrote:
I’m curious to know if this had been a problem (or noticeable) before as well?

I'm not sure, because I was using it the other way around: two finger swipes to scroll (and MagicPrefs to emulate middle mouse to pan). I have the same issue with AC21 INT b5021, if the navigation is set to "use wheel to pan and alt+wheel to zoom" – I just wasn't using like this before, because it was much slower than "click and pan", right now the speed is around the same.

James wrote:
Can you also confirm which device you are using? Mac Tackpad? Or Magic Mouse?

I'm using both.


Thanks!
odv.hu | actively using: AC25-27 INT | Rhino6-8 | macOS @ apple silicon / win10 x64
Brad Elliott
Booster
My question is why is this called Mac OS Recommended? I find zooming in and out to be much faster than panning. I can't imagine an OS reason for this to be recommended.
Mac OS12.6 AC26 USA Silicon
M1 Macbook Pro
Ralph Wessel
Mentor
Brad wrote:
My question is why is this called Mac OS Recommended?
The default for trackpad, magic mouse etc is for panning, with alt pressed for zoom (or pinch-zoom) almost universally for macOS software. ARCHICAD was previously an exception by defaulting to zoom. It's a huge relief to have ARCHICAD working the same way as everything else.
Ralph Wessel BArch
Software Engineer Speckle Systems
Eduardo Rolon
Moderator
Ralph wrote:
Brad wrote:
My question is why is this called Mac OS Recommended?
The default for trackpad, magic mouse etc is for panning, with alt pressed for zoom (or pinch-zoom) almost universally for macOS software. ARCHICAD was previously an exception by defaulting to zoom. It's a huge relief to have ARCHICAD working the same way as everything else.
Have not been able to get used to it.
Eduardo Rolón AIA NCARB
AC27 US/INT -> AC08

Macbook Pro M1 Max 64GB ram, OS X 10.XX latest
another Moderator

Ralph Wessel
Mentor
ejrolon wrote:
Have not been able to get used to it.
I guess it depends on how many other application you use alongside ARCHICAD. Everything else I used, from graphics and photo-editing through to word-processing and spreadsheets defaulted to panning with the trackpad/magic mouse/etc, and relied on alt or cmd to switch to zooming. Consequently I'm finding the new default perfectly natural.
Ralph Wessel BArch
Software Engineer Speckle Systems
Eduardo Rolon
Moderator
I use a lot and somehow I always want AC to behave differently. Not saying that you are wrong.
Eduardo Rolón AIA NCARB
AC27 US/INT -> AC08

Macbook Pro M1 Max 64GB ram, OS X 10.XX latest
another Moderator