SketchUp: The right way to use Follow Me

When it comes to using the Follow Me tool, most folks have it wrong. There are actually two different ways to use Follow Me, and one works way better than the other.

Follow Me: The Hard Way
The wrong way to use Follow Me is to activate the tool, click the face you want to extrude, and attempt to drag it along a set of edges. This method barely works; it’s painfully inefficient in all but the very simplest of circumstances. Save yourself a bunch of frustration and never use Follow Me this way again.

Follow Me: The Right Way
Next time you need to extrude a face along a path, use Follow Me this way:

  1. Make sure your extrusion profile (a face) and your extrusion path (one or more edges) are set up the way you want them to be.
  2. Select (with the Select Tool) the edges that make up the extrusion path you want to use.
  3. Activate the Follow Me Tool by clicking its icon or choosing Tools > Follow Me.
  4. Click (with the Follow Me Tool) the face you want to extrude.
  5. Everything happens in a flash. Voilà!





That’s all there is to it. You can take your time selecting exactly the edges you want. You can orbit, zoom and pan in order to select a complex three-dimensional path. No more cussing and sweating while you try to get the extrusion to go exactly where you want it to. Sometimes a little knowledge can save a lot of headache.

Bing Maps v7 AJAX control Infobox positioning

In the Bing Maps v7 AJAX control, when you open an infobox it will open up where it is positioned. If you are near the edges of the map it will go beyond the edges and end up getting cut of, out of view as the infobox is within the map div which hides any overflowing elements. Here is an example.

infobox1

This might not be the ideal default case, but Bing Maps is developed in such a way that it tries to give you the basic use case and all the tools needed to create the experience you want. One way around this is to use the Custom Infobox Control module for Bing Maps that will change the direction of the infobox so that it appears towards the center of the map. This works well in some cases, but completely ignores the built in infobox control and requires jQuery.

For those migrating from Multimap you may prefer the map to reposition so that the infobox comes into view. This is a user experience that others would prefer as the infobox will always render in the same way. The following code uses the built in infobox properties to determine if the infobox needs to be repositioned and if it does it moves the map so that the infobox comes into view.

[php]
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html>
<head>
<title></title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://ecn.dev.virtualearth.net/mapcontrol/mapcontrol.ashx?v=7.0"></script>

<script type="text/javascript">
var map = null;
var pinLayer, pinInfobox;

function GetMap() {
// Initialize the map
map = new Microsoft.Maps.Map(document.getElementById("myMap"), { credentials: "YOUR_BING_MAPS_KEY", zoom: 5 });

//Create two layers, one for pushpins, the other for the infobox. This way the infobox will always be above the pushpins.
pinLayer = new Microsoft.Maps.EntityCollection();
map.entities.push(pinLayer);

var infoboxLayer = new Microsoft.Maps.EntityCollection();
map.entities.push(infoboxLayer);

// Create the info box for the pushpin
pinInfobox = new Microsoft.Maps.Infobox(new Microsoft.Maps.Location(0, 0), { visible: false });
infoboxLayer.push(pinInfobox);

//Create a test pushpiin
var pin = new Microsoft.Maps.Pushpin(map.getCenter());
pin.Title = ‘This is pin 1’;
pin.Description = ‘Pan map so pin is at edge and then click on pin.’;

Microsoft.Maps.Events.addHandler(pin, ‘click’, displayInfobox);
pinLayer.push(pin);
}

function displayInfobox(e) {
if (e.targetType == "pushpin") {
pinInfobox.setOptions({ title: e.target.Title, description: e.target.Description, visible: true, offset: new Microsoft.Maps.Point(0, 25) });
pinInfobox.setLocation(e.target.getLocation());

//A buffer limit to use to specify the infobox must be away from the edges of the map.
var buffer = 25;

var infoboxOffset = pinInfobox.getOffset();
var infoboxAnchor = pinInfobox.getAnchor();
var infoboxLocation = map.tryLocationToPixel(e.target.getLocation(), Microsoft.Maps.PixelReference.control);

var dx = infoboxLocation.x + infoboxOffset.x – infoboxAnchor.x;
var dy = infoboxLocation.y – 25 – infoboxAnchor.y;

if (dy < buffer) { //Infobox overlaps with top of map.
//Offset in opposite direction.
dy *= -1;

//add buffer from the top edge of the map.
dy += buffer;
} else {
//If dy is greater than zero than it does not overlap.
dy = 0;
}

if (dx < buffer) { //Check to see if overlapping with left side of map.
//Offset in opposite direction.
dx *= -1;

//add a buffer from the left edge of the map.
dx += buffer;
} else { //Check to see if overlapping with right side of map.
dx = map.getWidth() – infoboxLocation.x + infoboxAnchor.x – pinInfobox.getWidth();

//If dx is greater than zero then it does not overlap.
if (dx > buffer) {
dx = 0;
} else {
//add a buffer from the right edge of the map.
dx -= buffer;
}
}

//Adjust the map so infobox is in view
if (dx != 0 || dy != 0) {
map.setView({ centerOffset: new Microsoft.Maps.Point(dx, dy), center: map.getCenter() });
}
}
}
</script>
</head>
<body onload="GetMap();">
<div id=’myMap’ style="position:relative; width:600px; height:400px;"></div>
</html>
[/php]

When you load this code into a browser a pushpin will appear in the center of the map. Pan the map so that the infobox is near one of the edges. When you click on the pushpin to open the infobox you will see the map reposition such that the infobox comes into view. The example below is the result of opening the infobox when the pushpin was in the top right corner of the map.