SpaceMouse "sketch lock" feature can't be overridden on Mac

[GRSnyder]

This is an offshoot of the thread Since last update Connexion devices not working properly, but there the OP complains of intermittent, unpredictable behavior and seems to have several complaints. I am seeing a much more specific and reproducible version of one of the issues mentioned in that thread. 

With "SpaceMouse driver" set to Latest in the Fusion 360 preferences panel, my SpaceMouse automatically turns off rotations whenever Fusion 360 begins editing a sketch. That is, you can pan and zoom with the SpaceMouse, but you cannot orbit. This is great!! It's a feature I've wanted for a long time. And as expected, when you exit the sketch, SpaceMouse rotations automatically return.

The problem is that there doesn't seem to be any rational way to disable this rotation lock feature while editing a sketch. For example, if you're working on a 3D sketch, you certainly don't want to be trapped on the original sketch plane. It's also useful to rotate sometimes even in a 2D sketch. For example, to expose an edge or face that would otherwise be hidden and that you want to project onto the sketch plane.

In the past, you could set your SpaceMouse's Rotations On/Off button to activate 3DConnexion -> Rotations On/Off in the driver control panel. This command no longer does anything at all within a sketch, although it continues to toggle rotations on and off normally when not in sketch mode.

It was brought up in the thread mentioned above that Windows users can turn off a "Sketch lock" option in the 3DConnexion driver to disable rotation locking when editing sketches. But a) the Mac driver doesn't seem to offer this option, and b) I don't want to disable it; I want it to work correctly.

My idea of correct behavior is:

• Editing a sketch has the side effect of disabling SpaceMouse rotations. When you finish editing, rotations are automatically re-enabled. (So far, Fusion 360 does exactly this.) For bonus points, disable rotations when editing a sketch only if all sketch curves lie on the sketch plane: 2D sketches lock, 3D sketches do not.

• When editing a sketch, you can use the 3DConnexion Rotations On/Off driver command, bound to whatever button or trigger you prefer on your SpaceMouse, to toggle the rotation lock. If rotations are enabled, disable them and vice versa. This is the part that there's currently no way to do.

• There should be a check box somewhere, either in the driver or inside Fusion 360, that disables automatic sketch lock completely. This is currently true for Windows but not for Mac. 

A couple of other, peripheral comments...

The 3DConnexion driver now seems to be aware of multiple design "environments," namely SOLID and SKETCH. Apparently you can bind different SpaceMouse behaviors in different environments, which sounds very promising. But I don't think this feature has anything to do with the problem outlined above. By default, the environments all have the same bindings and the Rotations On/Off command is indeed the default for the Rotations On/Off button in both environments.

It was mentioned in the other thread that you can reenable rotations by jogging the ViewCube with your mouse. This works, and in fact it leads you to a situation where you can freely toggle rotations on and off while remaining in sketch mode. But if you use the Look At button on the Sketch palette, you once again go back to total lockdown with no natural option to reenable rotations. I'm glad this work-around exists, but it's exactly that, a work-around. It's not an actual, reasonable solution to the problem.

[Phil.E]

Thanks for posting. I'm finding the same thing, with the latest drivers and Fusion builds. 

The solution mentioned in that other post was to use the Legacy driver setting in Fusion preferences. Does doing that make a difference for you? You mentioned using the "latest" driver setting. This solves the sketch lock problem for my devices.

The intention is for the 3dconnexion experience to be the same for both windows and macOS. I need to look into why there isn't the option yet to turn off sketch lock on macOS.

[lance.carocci]

Hi @GRSnyder - we will work with 3DC to ensure a future Mac driver release supports disabling Sketch Lock. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.

[GRSnyder]

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@Phil.E wrote: The solution mentioned in that other post was to use the Legacy driver setting in Fusion preferences. Does doing that make a difference for you?

That returns to the previous behavior, which is fine if that's what you want. But as I said above, I like sketch lock. I just want it to work correctly. In the interim, I just prefer to use the ViewCube work-around rather than reverting to the old behavior.

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@lance.carocci wrote: we will work with 3DC to ensure a future Mac driver release supports disabling Sketch Lock. 

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@Phil.E wrote: The intention is for the 3dconnexion experience to be the same for both windows and macOS. I need to look into why there isn't the option yet to turn off sketch lock on macOS.

You both mention adding, or encouraging 3DConnexion to add, a control to disable sketch lock. That seems like something that should exist, but it's peripheral to the problem I described above.

Based on your responses, I have the impression that my main point was kind of lost in that long OP. So let me summarize more briefly: Sketch lock is a great feature and one that I want to use. But it's incomplete because there's no way to manually release the lock while sketching, which ruins the whole feature. (I can only speak for macOS; maybe Windows behaves more reasonably.)

I do not want to disable sketch lock, so from my perspective it's irrelevant whether the macOS driver eventually gains a way to disable it. What I want is for the old Rotations On/Off function to work correctly once again. 

[lance.carocci · Accepted solution]

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@GRSnyder wrote:

My idea of correct behavior is:

• Editing a sketch has the side effect of disabling SpaceMouse rotations. When you finish editing, rotations are automatically re-enabled. (So far, Fusion 360 does exactly this.) For bonus points, disable rotations when editing a sketch only if all sketch curves lie on the sketch plane: 2D sketches lock, 3D sketches do not.

• When editing a sketch, you can use the 3DConnexion Rotations On/Off driver command, bound to whatever button or trigger you prefer on your SpaceMouse, to toggle the rotation lock. If rotations are enabled, disable them and vice versa. This is the part that there's currently no way to do.

• There should be a check box somewhere, either in the driver or inside Fusion 360, that disables automatic sketch lock completely. This is currently true for Windows but not for Mac. 

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From your initial thread, it sounds like the driver level toggle would check point 3, and an on-the-fly toggle on the Spacemouse would check point 2 - is that correct? Both of these would be handled on the driver side.

That leaves point 1:

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For bonus points, disable rotations when editing a sketch only if all sketch curves lie on the sketch plane: 2D sketches lock, 3D sketches do not.

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This one might be on our end, I need to confer with the Sketch teams. It is probably relatively easy to tie the function to whether or not 3D Sketching is enabled or not, we just need to make that information available to the driver.

Sketch Lock is driven by the Spacemouse driver, and is not technically a function of Fusion 360 - it's the driver choosing to ignore certain inputs while passing others to Fusion. But, the lines get blurred as I'm unsure if your request is more related to the Spacemouse side of things, or more to do with Fusion's Sketch or Pan commands.

I'll see what we can do, but also, please don't hesitate to share your feedback on Sketch Lock with 3Dconnexion directly, because those folks are quite responsive and wonderful at what they do.

[GRSnyder]

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@lance.carocci wrote: From your initial thread, it sounds like the driver level toggle would check point 3, and an on-the-fly toggle on the Spacemouse would check point 2 - is that correct?

Yes, that's right.

Both of these would be handled on the driver side...Sketch Lock is driven by the Spacemouse driver, and is not technically a function of Fusion 360 - it's the driver choosing to ignore certain inputs while passing others to Fusion. But, the lines get blurred as I'm unsure if your request is more related to the Spacemouse side of things, or more to do with Fusion's Sketch or Pan commands.

Ah, thank you for explaining that. It's a bit difficult to tell from the outside exactly where the boundary between the driver and the application actually lies. They seem to handle a number of issues cooperatively, at least from the user's perspective. 

I will indeed sniff around 3DConnexion and see what I can turn up. And I'll redirect my harrassment to them as well. 🙂

[GRSnyder]

https://forum.3dconnexion.com/viewtopic.php?t=53575