I have been requested to update my blog entry Personalizing Your SketchUp Settings, dated November 2007, and still accessible in the archive. Since that date, there have been new versions of SketchUp, and I have changed some of my preferences. Note also that Dave Richards provided his setup instructions in an old archived entry of April 25, 2007.

When you download SketchUp, you are asked to select from several included templates such as; Simple Template, Architectural Design, Engineering, Product Design and Woodworking, Plan View, and Beginning Training. Woodworkers naturally select Product Design and Woodworking and this is a good starting point. Although this template has been improved in recent SketchUp 7 updates, it requires some tweaking to suit my tastes. In the following outline, I will show my settings which are also saved as my personal template.

Be sure to save your preferred settings in a template file, otherwise you are faced with tedious multiple setting changes every time you start a new file.
   
To make your Template follow the steps below:

I. Click on the Window tab

II. Select Model Info
     a. In the pop-up menu, select Units
         i. Check that Fractional units are selected
         ii. Use 1/64″ Precision. Place checkmark in Enable length snapping
            1). Replace 1/64″ with 1/16″ (while doing arcs, I switch this off)
     b. In the pop-up menu, select Dimensions
         i. I change Text Fonts to 10
        ii. Change Leader line Endpoints to None
       iii. In Dimension, change Align to dimension line, Outside
     c. In the pop-up menu, select Text
        i. Change Leader Text to Font size 10

III. Close dialog box and again click on the Window tab
      a. In the pop-up menu, select Styles
      b. Click on the little home model icon to display the Style
      c. Click on the Edit tab
      d. Click on the Edge Setting icon (there are 5 small cube icons and the Edge Setting is the first)
          i. Check that the Profile setting is unchecked, or set to 1
      e. Click on the Background Setting icon (this is the third cube from the left) 
         ii. Make sure that Sky and Ground are unclicked
         iii. Click on the Background color square
              1) Set the RGB values to 255, 255, 255 which is full white background
       f. Click the Update Styles with Changes icon (this is a circular icon, with two half-circle arrows chasing each other)
       g. Close dialog boxes

IV. Click on the Window tab
      a. In the pop-up menu, select Layers
      b. Add the following Layers
          i. Perspective Text/Dimensions
         ii. Front View Text/Dimensions
        iii. Side View Text/Dimensions
        iv. Top View Text/Dimensions
         v. Detail Text/Dimensions
       c. Close dialog box

V. Click on the File tab
    a. In the pop-up menu, select Save As Template
    b. In the pop-up menu, name your template and provide a short description
    c. Make sure that Set as default template is checked
    d. Click on Save
 

Now when you open SketchUp your personal settings will automatically be in place and ready for you to begin designing.

Tim

http://killenwood.com