Keyboard & mouse
Archeform tools behave the same way on purpose. Learn the conventions once and every tool — walls, slabs, roofs, beams, railings, pipes — answers to them.
Shared by every drawing tool
Section titled “Shared by every drawing tool”| Click | place a point |
| Double-click | finish |
| Click the first point | close the loop |
| Esc | step back one point |
| Shift | lock to an axis |
| Type a number + Enter | exact value for what you are drawing |
Esc steps back, it doesn’t cancel
Section titled “Esc steps back, it doesn’t cancel”Each press removes the last point. Keep pressing and you reach an empty chain; one more press exits the tool.
If you have typed a value that you haven’t confirmed, the first Esc clears the typed text rather than a point.
Points you clicked are snappable
Section titled “Points you clicked are snappable”SketchUp’s own inference can’t see points that aren’t real geometry yet, so Archeform adds its own snap to the points of the shape you are drawing. Move near one and it catches, with a marker at the cursor.
The measurement box
Section titled “The measurement box”Typing while drawing goes to SketchUp’s measurement box, bottom right. What the number means depends on the tool:
| Tool | What a typed number does |
|---|---|
| Wall, beam, railing, pipe | length of the current segment |
| Slab, zone rectangle | width;depth |
| Column, pad footing | rotation angle in degrees |
| Opening insert / move | gap to the reference edge |
| Stretch, offset | distance moved |
| Stair | total number of risers |
| Spiral stair | rotation in degrees |
Per-tool extras
Section titled “Per-tool extras”| ↑ / ↓ | justification, reference point, or height, depending on the tool |
| ← / → | cycle a variant — infill, reveal, corner style; rectangle ⇄ polygon in slab, roof and zone |
| Tab | justification in MEP |
[ ] |
previous / next size in the MEP catalogue |
| Option / Alt | in MEP, suspend the angle grid |
The status bar always says what the arrows do in the tool you have active.
Toolbar
Section titled “Toolbar”The Archeform toolbar carries the fifteen tools that draw something new.
| Single click a button | start that tool |
| Double-click a button | start it and open its defaults |
The button stays pressed while its tool is running, so what is active is always visible. Defaults are the values new elements get. To change something you have already drawn, select it and use the right-click menu instead.
Right-click
Section titled “Right-click”Everything Archeform adds sits in one Archeform submenu, so it doesn’t crowd SketchUp’s own items. What appears depends on what is selected — select two walls and you get Join Walls, select five and you get Wall Properties (5).
This is where the editing tools are. Right-click a wall and Wall Tools holds Join, Joint, Extend, Trim, Stretch, Stretch Endpoint, Offset and Outside Face; a slab, roof, beam, footing, pipe, stair or railing gets its own list the same way. They sit on the element they work on rather than on a toolbar, so the tool starts already pointed at what you clicked.
A wall also carries Openings — Edit, Move, Copy, Delete, Flip — and Insert Opening for custom windows and doors and curtain walls.
Tools that build something new from what you selected sit on the selection too: selected walls offer Slab, Foundation and Roof from Walls, and selected edges offer Wall from Lines.