Let Objects be Smart Guides again ?

Hi !
In CS3, the smart guides also included any object as a magnetic guide. In CS4 and CS5, this feature was removed. Of course you can turn objects into guides, but that's not as easy as it used to be. Could it be reinstated again, or at least become an optional preference ?

Pressing and holding down Ctrl will prevent snapping of any kind in InDesign.
On a Mac you must press it after starting to drag.
On Windows I believe you have to press it before you drag. Can I have someone confirm this?

Similar Messages

Smart Guides overrides Shift-to-Constrain

I love Smart Guides. I'm very glad they've been added to InDesign. I had even put in a feature request years ago. However, there is a flaw. When I am Option-dragging to drag a copy of an object, and holding Shift so that the new object is horizontally aligned to the old object, sometimes Smart Guides forces my new object a bit up or down. Seemingly over-eager to please, it is trying to align to something else; in a recent instance, being evenly distributed with some other objects.
I contend that holding Shift to constrain should override Smart Guides. I don't expect to hear a solution here (beyond temporarily disabling Smart Guides when needed), just seeing if anyone else has the same issue. I'll be putting in a feature request.

Just tried that and it makes no difference whether I hit shift before or during. Oddly enough, if I just let the Smart Guides do the work instead of shift, it will work, but adding shift makes it decide to try to evenly distribute to some other objects instead.
My personal issue with letting Smart Guides do my shift-constraining is that it's a lot more finnicky to make sure it's snapping to the right thing. It might be aligning to a nearby object; it's not always crystal clear based on the lines that are appearing. Using shift is supposed to ensure that, hey, it's just dragging along the horizontal or vertical axis, without having to be very careful or look too closely. Shift constraining is such a firmly established tool that it's throwing me for a loop that it doesn't always work like it should anymore. It should have seniority!
Not losing any sleep over it. I'm just saying.

Smart Guides without the snapping

I would want to see them but without the snapping.
Ben

At least up to Illustrator 13, there is a trick or rather a lousy hack that involves the Snap to Grid command and its talent to temporarily disable any Smart Guides functionality. The following has to be prepared in case you're going to execute the hack as an action:
1. In the Actions Palette, create a new Action set. Call it 'Disable Smart Guides'.
2. Within the Action set, create a new action. Call it 'Disable Smart Guides', assign an F-key to the action, let's say F3, and hit Enter.
3. In the Actions Palette menu, select the Insert Menu Item command and go to View > Snap to Grid
4. Stop recording the action
5. Go to Edit > Preferences > Guides & Grid
6. In the Gridline Every text box, enter 0,01 mm. It's the minimum value you can set here.
7. In the Subdivisions text box, enter 1000, the max. value accepted here.
Now, take any document, turn on Smart Guides, make sure Snap to Grid is turned off, and start drawing a path. Hit F3 and continue drawing the path. Hit F3 again as soon as you need your Smart Guides again.
As you can see, after hitting F3 to enable Snap to Grid, the path will not be interrupted when placing the next point. And as you've got a kind of microscopic Grid settings, Snap to Grid has almost no influence on where the points are placed. In fact, it still snaps, but due to the absurd Grid settings it's rather negligible.
This palpable workaround was originally invented by a young lady located around Edmonton in Canada.

Any way to temporarily ignore smart guides while using the pen tool?

I'm having a hate and love relationship with Smart Guides. When I want them they're bad; when I don't they're good.
While trying to do some things with the pen tool, I am frequently faced with the smart guides snapping my tool around without my wanting it snapped. I'm not really that good with the pen tool yet, so it's making an uphill climb even harder when they interfere.
Now I know that I can disable smart guides by doing Ctrl-U, but this has the side effect of releasing my pen from the current curve I'm working on. When I click the end of that curve to start where I left off it changes the anchor to a corner instead of curve and messes up what I was going on. This wouldn't be such a problem except that I sometimes want the guides while I'm still on the same curve so I don't want to fully disable them as I'm working and then have to re-enable to fix a spot, know what I mean?
So, is there a key I can hold down to temporarily turn disable smart guides or ignore them in some way? I've hit quite a few keys trying this out so I'm guessing no. This probably indicates I just need to improve my skill to learn how to work with this best.

At least up to Illustrator 13, there is a trick or rather a lousy hack that involves the Snap to Grid command and its talent to temporarily disable any Smart Guides functionality. The following has to be prepared in case you're going to execute the hack as an action:
1. In the Actions Palette, create a new Action set. Call it 'Disable Smart Guides'.
2. Within the Action set, create a new action. Call it 'Disable Smart Guides', assign an F-key to the action, let's say F3, and hit Enter.
3. In the Actions Palette menu, select the Insert Menu Item command and go to View > Snap to Grid
4. Stop recording the action
5. Go to Edit > Preferences > Guides & Grid
6. In the Gridline Every text box, enter 0,01 mm. It's the minimum value you can set here.
7. In the Subdivisions text box, enter 1000, the max. value accepted here.
Now, take any document, turn on Smart Guides, make sure Snap to Grid is turned off, and start drawing a path. Hit F3 and continue drawing the path. Hit F3 again as soon as you need your Smart Guides again.
As you can see, after hitting F3 to enable Snap to Grid, the path will not be interrupted when placing the next point. And as you've got a kind of microscopic Grid settings, Snap to Grid has almost no influence on where the points are placed. In fact, it still snaps, but due to the absurd Grid settings it's rather negligible.
This palpable workaround was originally invented by a young lady located around Edmonton in Canada.

Smart guides OFF pasteboard

Does anyone know if it is possible to utilize the smart guides OFF the pasteboard? Should it work? It doesn't appear to do so for me. Thanks for any insight anyone can provide.

So you are saying you want to either snap objects on the pasteboard to other objects or snap page objects to pasteboard objects using smart guides? As you've seen, it doesn't work that way. file a feature request, and be sure to make a case for how this will improve your workflow. Adobe - Feature Request/Bug Report Form

Problem with smart guides in CS5 with converting type object to outlines.

Hi There,
I recently upgraded to Illustrator CS5, and am having some issues with the smart guides. I create some type with the text tool, then convert that type object to outlines. Now, when I want another graphical object to "snap" to any of the anchors of the outlined text graphic, the smart guides don't kick in! The problem does not seem to occurr if I make a standard graphic with other tools, only when I create a graphic from a type object. I need to be able to snap to graphical objects that are created via the convert type to outlines command. Has anybody experienced this issue before? It's kinda frustrating.
The issue didn't seem to happen in CS3, and I've noticed the design of the smart guides is a bit different in the CS5 version as well. Am I missing something?
Any tips would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

When you switched to CS5 did you turn on view >> snap to Point
If your snapping tolernace is set to a small value, you may need to zoom in more to get snapping to work, or just increase the value. Also make sure you have the appropriate items checked (eg:Anchor Path Labels)
Edit Preferences >> Smart Guides >> Snapping Tolerance

Smart Guides, Constrain Proportions and Resizing an Object.

When I have Smart Guides on and I'm trying to resize an object while holding shift (to constrain) Indesign seems to ignore the shift key. Usually when there's other objects in close proximity, or just closely aligned, vertically or horizontally. The image I posted is a good example. Trying to resize the bracket object while near all those other objects results in a lot of skipping around, and constrain not working. You can see in the image the outline is not constrained, even though I'm holding the shift key. It just wants to jump to those Smart Guides regardless of what I'm trying to tell it to do.
This isn't much of an issue, but basically I'm wondering if this is a bug, or if the Smart Guides, just take priority. It's bit annoying turning smart guides on and off constantly to accomodate this odd behavior. Does anyone have any insight on this?

Hi,
I'm on a Mac Snow Leopard/CS5, and there actually is an update I haven't installed yet. I'm on 7.0.3, so I'll try that out.
If it is a bug it's certainly not the end of the world, but I was curious if anyone else had been dealing with it as well. I love the Smart Guides, except for that.

Can't align objects or paths to guide intersections with smart guides (or at all)

In AI, smart guides indicated "intersection" when I am drawing a path or moving an object to align to the intersection of two guides, when I release the mouse, the object I am moving/drawings jumps slightly off the intended alignment intersection. IfI continue to try to move it to align, it jumps to the other side or back to where it was but will mot match the intersection. What am I doing wrong?

Lightgeist,
In addition to what Lutz said, is Align to Pixel Grid ticked in the Transform palette? If it is, you may select everything and untick it, and untick Align New Objects to Pixel Grid in the Options (and choose another document type or change the defaults).

Smart Guide/Snap to point not working

Hi
I am trying to remove a circular shape from a rectangle in illustrator, the retangles width is 10px and the diameter of the circle is 13px, I centre the circle ontop of the rectangle ( or I appear to) but when I use the Shape mode tool minus front, the circle is no longer centred ( see images)
I have tried switching off smart guides and snap to grid and am still having the same problem.
In the above image you can see once I have divided the 13px circle from the rectangle it has moved off to one side.
Also when I am trying to manually place the circle ( rather than using the centre guides ) I can only move it by a large degree it alway moves further than I move the mouse, could this be because of a pixel grid? I do not think I am using this. ( can see in the above image where I am trying to place the circle and when I let go of the mouse, the grey circle is where it lands
From the 2 images below you can see that there is a 1px difference on either side of the extracted circle I was trying to get centred
I should mention that the 'Align to pixel grid' in the transform menu is inactive when I am trying to do this, as I initially thought that this may be the cause of my problems, but it made no difference

Rebecca,
So why does the minus front tool mess up alignment so much?
No clue. I believe this issue has never been reported.
At a first glance, it really looked like an Align to Pixel Grid issue, and also the fact that it works when both object widths have an odd (or even) number of pixels.
But that is apart from the fact that you stated that it was off. If it were on, Align to Pixel Grid would apply to the circle, to the rectangle, or to both.
Obviously, it is possible to (direct) select each and check. It is also possible to check the Y value of the centre for both in the Transform palette and see that they are actually identical before applying the Pathfinder.
And if on, Align to Pixel Grid should also affect/destroy the Object>Path>Divide Objects Below way. And it should make it impossible to even place both objects centre aligned when one is an odd number of pixels wide and the other is an even number wide.
As the issue is described, it may indicate some Pathfinder>Minus Front malfunctioning.
It may be worth trying some of the following things (you may have tried/done some of them already) and see whether it helps (the following is a general list of things you may try when it is not in a specific file; 3) and 4) are specifically aimed at possibly corrupt preferences):
1) Close down Illy and open again;
2) Restart the computer;
3) Close down Illy and press Ctrl+Alt+Shift/Cmd+Option+Shift during startup (easy but irreversible);
4) Move the folder with Illy closed (more tedious but also more thorough and reversible);
5) Look through and try out the relevant among the Other options (Item 7) is a list of usual suspects among other applications that may disturb and confuse Illy, other items may also be relevant);
Even more seriously, you may:
6) Uninstall, run the Cleaner Tool if you have CS3/CS4/CS5/CS6, and reinstall.
http://www.adobe.com/support/contact/cscleanertool.html

Smart guides labels appears but sometimes NOT.

When I am using smart guides in illustrator cs6 it is problem which makes me nervous.
When I select point, handles appear. When I move next to handle top the label appear. But SOMETIMES NOT appear, SOMETIMES APPEAR. It is terrible.
- It might be nice when labels ALWAYS APPEAR, WHEN I AM NEXT TO HANDLE TOP or NEXT TO THE ANCHOR POINT.
Because then I know, that when label appear, I can work with that concrete handle, or point.
I know, that it depends of the snapping tolerance, which I can set in Preferences. But when the snapping tolerance is too high, it is unpleasant to draw anything. When snapping tollerance is high i can draw objects on A4 leter which is usual, but my lines and handles are attached anytime when I do not want.
When I do not use smart guides it is unpleasant to draw lines too. Sometimes I grab handle when I want, but sometimes I fail.
I think it may be a good solution if you fix it so that the snapping tollerance will be lower, but labels will appear sooner and reliably.
I like Illustrator, InDesign and Photoshop. But this is the reason, why Illustrator makes me crazy, when I work there. Thanks

David,
I do not have align to pixel grid or snap to grid turned on
It sounds as if Illy thinks the former.
The following is a general list of things you may try when the issue is not in a specific file (you may have tried/done some of them already); 1) and 2) are the easy ones for temporary strangenesses, and 3) and 4) are specifically aimed at possibly corrupt preferences); 5) is a list in itself, and 6) is the last resort.
1) Close down Illy and open again;
2) Restart the computer (you may do that up to 3 times);
3) Close down Illy and press Ctrl+Alt+Shift/Cmd+Option+Shift during startup (easy but irreversible);
4) Move the folder (follow the link with that name) with Illy closed (more tedious but also more thorough and reversible);
5) Look through and try out the relevant among the Other options (follow the link with that name, Item 7) is a list of usual suspects among other applications that may disturb and confuse Illy, Item 15) applies to CC, CS6, and maybe CS5);
Even more seriously, you may:
6) Uninstall, run the Cleaner Tool (if you have CS3/CS4/CS5/CS6/CC), and reinstall.
http://www.adobe.com/support/contact/cscleanertool.html

[CS3 - Win] Smart Guides not showing up when Snap To Grid enabled

Has anyone else encountered this bug?
AI CS3 13.02
Smart Guides are turned on, but hovering over items does not show the cyan hints, snapping to anchor points / paths etc does not work. This only occurs when Snap To Grid is enabled. If you then go and turn it off, the Smart Guides start working again as expected.
Is this a known bug?
Tom

Thanks for the reply Mike. Smart Guides work perfectly for me provided Snap to Grid is turned off.
I can see there being a conflict between snapping to grid and smart guides in CS3 - which takes precedence? From a UX perspective, if these two snapping modes are mutually exclusive, there should be at the very least an alert letting you know the other mode is disabled; the menu item should be greyed out. Or if it's truly an either-or situation, then the menu needs to be revised such that both snap to grid and smart guides are within the same submenu, and only one can be selected at a time, toggle with CMD+SHIFT+OPT+U.
T

Cannot center Smart Guides exactly? CS6

Hello: Level: Newbie OS: Windows 7 64 bit Illustrator CS6
I am learning about Smart Guides but have found myself a bit perplexed.
I have drawn a Circle with the Ellipse tool by clicking and then entering the values: 432x432
Then I hover the mouse over the "center" square which reads: x:260 & y:259.5 which doesn't make sense to me ~ if it is the Center shouldn't the x & y values match? Any way, so then I manually type in the x & y value boxes 260.000 and they both stay at 260.
However, when I pull out the Smart Guides and place the horizontal guide over the center the x & y values also do not match and so I enter the number manually but the values will not stay where I set them.
e.g. The x value states: 259.5 and the y value: 260.000 and no matter how many times I reset the x value it always reverts back to 259.5 ... ???
The vertical smart guide is also off by rougly .5
Now, since I am attempting to make a symmetrical object ... won't this differentiation cause "eye sores" once the artwork is done?
I am (still) attempting to construct a compass with a rose, increments, needle etc. etc. and my first attempt ... and I quote the awesome Jacob ...
looks as if I have dropped it on the floor
So, after all that ramble'n ... I suppose I would like to know from others if this is just the way things are and rather I am suppose to just deal with things being a "bit" off??
Thank you for your time
hope you're having a great day/night

Hey Jacob ...
So, I did the Move the Folder but ... dang'it I'm slow at times ... and so, I am unsure if I followed your directions right ...
I signed into my computer under admin and then when I searched my C drive for the Adobe Illustrator CS6 Settings folder ... two folders came up
One for the Admin account and one for mine
So, I right clicked on both of them and chose ... Move to Desktop ... placing both folders on the Desktop of the Admin
Then I restarted my computer and logged in under my user name not as the Admin & then opened Illustrator but I am still having the same problems.
The Align tool doesn't Align so I gotta eye things out. The first compass I showed you was a result of "listening" to illustrators X/Y/H/W settings.
And when I have the Align to Pixel Grid ON I still do not have integer values when they ought to very well be integers.
So, I just hoping I didn't go about things the right way.
I am now going to go log back into my pc as an Admin and undo the Moved folders and give things a go again.
Jacob ... you've been such a huge support to me that I cannot thank you near enough!!
PS. to check things I made a circle that's 300x300 > the W = 300 and H = 300 and the X = 250 and the Y = 250 < the Align to Pixel Grid is on
Then I choose the Line tool and make a Line of 20px > then directly below I make an other Line of 20px with the Align to Pixel Grid on ...
I select the top 20px Line and the Values are: X = 249.5 and Y = 132 H = < Align Pixel Grid is on
I select the bottom one and X = 250 and Y = 358 and H = 20 and W = 0 < Aliign Pixel Grid on
Then I Group them both and the values are: X = 249.5 and Y = 245 and H = 246 and W = 0
Then I Rotate by 20 degrees and the first set Values are: same as just above
The next set Values are: X = 249.5 and the rest is the same as above
The next set Values are: X = 249.5 and Y = 245 and H = 231.164 and W = 84.137
As I go around the H & W values keep changing. After all you've patiently taught me ... they shouldn't change? OR the H & W do change b/c the bounding boxes outline the Path and Not the line itself ... right?
The 5th copy Values change to: X = 249.5 and Y = 244.999 and so on from there. Not to beat a dead horse but is this how it ought to be?
Uhhh sigh ... ...

Smart Guides off by a tiny amount

I've recently been working on a project involving a large amount of stroked paths. I'm tracing a scan of a line drawing and have been using the Scissors tool a lot to trim where one path runs into another. When I do this I turn Smart Guides on and use Scissors to "snip" paths at intersections. I'm careful about only clicking when the intersection is highlighted, but occasionally I notice that the trim is a tiny bit off. Usually I'll spot a line's round cap extending a little past the line it "runs into" (as in the image here), and when I zoom in I can clearly tell that the anchor point I created with the Scissors tool is a little off. Often it's more obvious than the image example I've provided. I then have to use Scissors again, usually at max zoom, and I continue on with a slight queasy feeling in my stomach, knowing there are ones out there I haven't caught.
I can't even be sure if this issue is only related to the Scissors tool, it might just be a Smart Guides thing. This is obviously not a crushing problem, but I think this community can respect a desire for precision in vector artwork, not to mention the fact that when I start adding fills I may run into problems. Pathfinder might work better than Scissors here, but I don't need a workaround, there's no reason Smart Guides should be dysfunctional with Scissors.
I've searched past discussions pretty thoroughly and haven't found anything like this. Maybe it's something with my prefs? I've never messed with them -- just started using Illustrator on this machine several months ago. Also, for this project I'm currently working with pixel units with Align to Pixel Grid turned off, if that helps. Can't recall ever experiencing this issue before, although most of my work in Illustrator has been on different machines.
CS6, late 2013 iMac running 10.9.2. Thanks in advance if you have any ideas!

Tara,
You may be haunted by the Align to Pixel Grid ghost.
If so, select everything and untick Align to Pixel Grid in the Transform palette, and also untick Align New Objects to Pixel Grid in the options there.
To avoid it altogether, use a document type without Align to Pixel Grid as the default (RGB documents for web and the like), or change the default.

Smart Guides- Not that Smart?

Problem: Can't snap a curcle's center to a multi-angled (45 and 90 degree) path
Device and Program details: Illustrator CS6 running on a 2009 iMac (3.06 Ghz Processer and 16 GB RAM)
I've worked with Ai for years but can't remember running into this problem but it seems so simple. When I click, hold and drag center of the circle over the angled path it pretends its not even there. But when I make a sigle straight line, the circle will snap to that path. So my question is, can smart guides even do this (and if so, how) or is this a glitch with the new CS6?
I've experimented with the Smart Guide preferences but nothing seems to work. If you have any feedback please let me know.
Here is a pic of the the object and path I'm trying to snap:

They changed the behavior of Smart Guides with CS5, I think. (Maybe it was CS4) In some circumstances, you need to hold cmd to get it to snap.
If that doesn't work, are there any compound shapes that encircle the area shown? Sometimes they can be an invisible block to clicks and snaps, even though there isn't anything visible...

Legacy Smart Guides in CS5?

Wondering if there is any talk of being able to opt for "legacy" Smart Guides in Illustrator CS5? I would upgrade for that feature alone. The Smart Guides in CS4 are infuriating. I know this is an old gripe. And, yes, I'm aware of tweaking preferences and holding down command key. It's still not the same...and not even satisfactory. I would love a simple one-click option in prefs that would allow for the user to abandon the new smart guides in favor of the good ol' pre-CS4 smart guides.
Anyone know?

I hesitated to try to explain the old behavior of the guides, but I wasn't confident that I could convey the idea without making it more confusing to those who don't know what we are talking about. But, you pretty much nailed it. It is infuriating when I am dragging an object and hovering over a point on another object, expecting to be able to constrain my angles of movement from that point (as in CS3), and it just doesn't work. And to make things even worse, sometimes the point that I want to align with seems to be the only point on the entire artboard that I CAN'T align with. It feels like a deliberate prank. "Smart" guide lines are lighting up all over the place like "Do you want to line up with this point? How 'bout now? No? This one? That one? Here? Here? Here? Here? Here? Here? Here?" NO GODDAMMIT! I want to line up with the point that I am hovering over....not every single other shape on the board.
That is the behavior that I was alluding to when I described this Adobe "improvement" to be Microsoft-Office-like. I don't know if any of you have had the misfortune of having to use Microsoft Word over the years, but if you have, then you know what I am talking about. You type in the word "Dear" and the program assumes that you are trying to type a letter and starts making all sorts of suggestions and formatting changes and pulling up names from your contacts. Or you type a bullet point and all of the sudden your margins and font point size and indentations and everything else changes because the "smart" program makes assumptions about what you are trying to do. 99.9% of the time the software is wrong and you spend 10 minutes undoing everything the program just did to "help" you. It used to not be that way.
I have grown to expect that sort of behavior from Microsoft and their bloatware. Now I fear that we will be seeing more and more of this from Adobe in the future. I think at some point certain software titles reach a point of maturity where the product works so well that the engineers and programmers resort to needless tinkering in order to justify their existence and put out a new and "improved" version when corporate says so. Bummer.
It would be one thing if it were a give-and-take scenario. If I found some of the new smart guide behaviors to be an improvement I would possibly accept the absense of the old behaoviors. But that is not the case. There is not one single new aspect to the smart guides that I find to be an improvement. That feature is now completely blown for me in Illustrator....and probably will be forever. It may seem like a tiny gripe to some people...but when you consider that I probably logged in over 2,000 hours on CS3 and grew to rely heavily on the behavior of its smart guides, these later versions of Illustrator have been like learning a whole new program in some ways.
If only I could convince all of my clients to upgrade from CS4/5 to CS3...

Let Objects be Smart Guides again ?

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