30 Replies Latest reply: Sep 6, 2011 8:19 AM by P Spier RSS

    CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?

    bpylant Community Member

      Maybe I'm missing something, but I can't seem to turn off the smart guides in CS5. The menu item is unchecked; turning them on and then back off again does nothing.

       

      Is this a known issue? Operator error? Something else?

        • 1. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
          BobLevine CommunityMVP

          View>grids and guides.

           

          Turn them off there.

           

          Bob

          • 3. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
            bpylant Community Member

            As I said, I already checked and unchecked the menu item, nothing changes.

             

            Just trashed the prefs, same behavior. The smart guides are always active.

             

            EDIT: I just checked all the other machines we have here with CS5 installed, and they exhibit the same behavior. If it makes any difference, we're all running Snow Leopard.

            • 4. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
              bpylant Community Member

              OK, so apparently this issue isn't Smart Guides, butFrame Edge Highlighting, and as far as I can tell you can't turn it off.

               

               

              Frame edge highlighting
              InDesign now temporarily draws the frame edges as you use the Selection tool to hover over items on a page. This method makes it easier to find the item you want before you select it. The color of the frame edge drawn matches the color of the layer the object is on. Groups are drawn with a dashed line. This feedback is especially helpful when working in Preview Mode or with Hide Frame Edges selected.
              • 6. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                Brown Printing PDX Community Member

                There is one thing I've found helpful with this problem. You can hit Control-Command-H (the Hide Frame Edges keystroke) and as long as you don't move your mouse, you will see you art without this bothersome feature. It's not a good solution, but it can help in a pinch!

                • 7. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                  CMYKLA Community Member

                  This is ruining my life.  Glad I paid all that money so I can continue to use CS4.  *sigh*


                  • 8. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                    bpylant Community Member

                    Talk about hyperbole... it's annoying, but it's not a "life-ruiner" or such a huge issue that the program is unusable...

                    • 9. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                      svensonx Community Member

                      Thought I'd say something. The more complaints the more action might ensue. There definitely needs to be an option to turn it on or off. I find it more annoying when you are trying to make a deadline, you've had way too much coffee and you are in the creative process where you are quickly moving text and graphics around in a random fashion trying to get it right. When you are working fast, its too easy to accidentally select a wrong selection.   Ive given it 2 months to see if my brain would turn this feature into an auto function but its not happening. If I worked in a government office or a library where I had all the time in the world it maybe a good thing, but if you have to work fast its painful. For a person who knows indesign there is no need for this training wheel function.

                      • 10. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                        BobLevine CommunityMVP

                        You can complain all you want here, but it won't do a thing.

                         

                        Post your suggestion here: https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/mmform/index.cfm?name=wishform

                         

                        That said, barring something unforeseen, you'll have to wait for CS6 for that to be an option in the interface. Features don't get added with a dot release.

                         

                        Bob

                        • 11. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                          P Spier CommunityMVP

                          What Bob said...

                           

                          And how do you figure turning off frame edges is going to make it LESS likely that you'd move the wrong object? I just don't see the logic in that.

                          • 12. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                            CMYKLA Community Member

                            What Bob said...

                             

                            And how do you figure turning off frame edges is going to make it LESS likely that you'd move the wrong object? I just don't see the logic in that.

                             

                            Because you think you have the highlighted object selected, when really it's just highlighted and NOT selected.

                            • 13. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                              CMYKLA Community Member
                              "Talk about hyperbole... it's annoying, but it's not a "life-ruiner" or such a huge issue that the program is unusable..."

                               

                              Well, it sure as hell makes me a lot less productive trying to figure out all of the blinking objects.  For someone who has never used the feature (who purposely turned it off) it's pretty annoying to say the least.  Plus spending a lot of money for something that I assumed would HELP my productivity and not hurt it makes me a bit irritable, that's all.

                              • 14. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                svensonx Community Member

                                Wow that was quick.

                                In reply to:

                                 

                                And how do you figure turning off frame edges is going to make it LESS likely that you'd move the wrong object?

                                 

                                Well it wasn't in previous versions and now it is. Therefore I can gauge my performance based on previous versions.

                                 

                                 

                                For example at this moment I have a 2 sided A4 brochure that has to be at the printer by the morning. The job is for a surf company. The file contains a place illustrator file of a pretty complex illustration. There are photos and text boxes and on top of that I have several cut and pasted vector files from Illustrator as part of the theme that I need editable so I can change colours, gradients and transparencies. So all up there is a lot going on. I have quite a few more layers than usual, so that I can lock layers to prevent the "smart highlighting" happening. But in the design process I need a lot of elements active to be tweeked to get the file the way I want it to look.

                                 

                                Now I have a new mac with lots of RAM, but still when you have a complex file with lots of stuff going on, and you want to zoom in and change something quickly because the client who is sharing screen with you on skype wants to put a gradient fade behind a some text to give it some pop... which then makes a millisecond of redraw time happen and your mouse is also loaded to place an image at the same time into a frame, I have found that when you are moving your mouse across the page, while the "smart frame edges" function is occurring, the highlighted frame sometimes will dump the loaded image or eye dropped colour into an unintentional frame or element. It doesnt happen all the time but it is enough to make you want to write in a forum like this. I do this kind of work enough to know it is stifling the creative process. If I was designing a catalogue with a photo on one side and a description on the other there wouldn't be as much of a concern.

                                 

                                Sorry if the spelling is bad its almost 2am and I still have about an hour to go.

                                • 15. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                  designerdave72 Community Member

                                  Personally, I would make sure my time is soley dedicated to the job in hand and not bother to post long explanations on a forum about something that Adobe probably won't change. Especially, as you quote, if it's "2am with an hour to go". Just sayin'

                                  • 16. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                    svensonx Community Member

                                    You are right....

                                    • 17. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                      P Spier CommunityMVP

                                      I've never seen a loaded crsor or eyedropper dump anywhere that I didn't actually click, so my bet is that it's 2 a.m. and you're gertting sloppy in your haste.

                                      • 18. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                        Richard.Gonzo Community Member

                                        Help Please! I too, am having problems with the frame edge highlighting feature that extends beyond just persona ally not appreciating the feature. When I have multiple objects/layers on the page and move between them, the highlighting feature causes my cursor to pause for a split second. When there are multiple objects it makes it almost impossible to work as the cursor is constantly trying to highlight different frames. It gets to the point where the cursor basically freezes up completely, especially when I zoom in closer to work with paths on objects. I have tried trashing my preferences, uninstalling the whole CS5 suite and turning off live drawing. I have a new top quality machine just in from HP and previously had CS5 installed on a lesser PC without these issues. Does anyone have any advice? So far this issue seems to ONLY be in Indesign, as when I go into Illustrator, the frame highlighting works as normal with no lag in between rolling over the object and its frame being highlighted.

                                         

                                        -Rich

                                        • 19. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                          ASBT2010 Community Member

                                          The smart guides thing is annoying as hell! Annoying enough to have to search through the forums.

                                          • 20. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                            BobLevine CommunityMVP

                                            If you're referring to smart guides they can be turned off easily. Frame edge highlighting cannot be.

                                             

                                            Bob

                                            • 21. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                              ASBT2010 Community Member

                                              Thanks Bob,

                                               

                                              Must be the frame highlighting.

                                               

                                              Thanks also for the link that you posted for making suggestions to adobe.

                                              • 22. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                                Dave Allen @ AT Community Member

                                                Trying seeing if Snap to Document Grid is checked (View > Grids & Guides) If it is, uncheck it and you should get control of smart guides back.

                                                • 23. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                                  WillIevergetascreenname Community Member

                                                  After researching this topic it seems that the "lag" that one now has to live with in CS5 and later dot releases, is not related to the Smart Guide issue. That is another whole problem by itself!

                                                  But what did help with the annoying highlighting that seems related to Smart Guides and frame edges, was going to preferences>interface and uncheck "highlight object under selection tool"

                                                  I now work unhighlighted.

                                                  • 24. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                                    alisoncattelona3 Community Member

                                                    The feature (also available in Illustrator) Object Highlighting, can be turned off as stated in the response before mine (Preferences>Interface) in CS5.5. That option is not available in CS5.

                                                    • 25. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                                      radiodept65 Community Member

                                                      Maybe someone suggested this already -- and this is clearly, clearly a case of Adobe overthinking something that already functions quite fine without over whistle-and-belling the damn thing -- but if you touch the H key which puts you into the Hand tool (something that's arguably obsolete what with the maneuverability of smart-mice and most other contemporary mice), you can then move the cursor about and over the document and all elements without the highly annoying edge highlighting that occurs de facto in CS5.

                                                      • 26. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                                        Eugene Tyson CommunityMVP

                                                        Still don't understand why a frame edge being highlighted would be a problem??? This is the most confusing complaint of CS5 ever.

                                                         

                                                        If you don't like it - then use a different tool than the Arrow Tools to navigate around pages. Like the Text Tool. Holding Ctrl or CMD (Mac) will temporarily switch to the selection tool.

                                                         

                                                         

                                                        If anyone cares, how this came about was that it was a largely requested feature by users of InDesign. And when they inserted the function in inDesign they agonised over whether to put the option into the program to turn it off. Unfortunately, they can't put an option for every little thing in InDesign, otherwise you'd just have a preference setting for absolutely everything. They made a judgement call and they got it wrong.

                                                         

                                                        This is arguably the most complained about issue, after the save backward compatibility.

                                                         

                                                        In CS5 they added this feature because it was largely requested. They didn't put a switch to turn it off because they didn't think it was necessary. The programmers made that call and unfortunately it wasn't the right one.

                                                         

                                                         

                                                        In CS5.5 it is now an option to turn it off.

                                                        • 27. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                                          bpylant Community Member
                                                          Still don't understand why a frame edge being highlighted would be a
                                                          problem??? This is the most confusing complaint of CS5 ever.

                                                           

                                                          Because it's incredibly annoying (especially on very complex documents), and prior to CS5.5 it couldn't be turned off. I don't deny that it's sometimes useful, but any feature like this needs to be able to be disabled and enabled at the users' whim. (Imagine if you couldn't show/hide guides? Or frames?)

                                                           

                                                          Omitting that functionality in CD5 was a mistake on Adobe's part, and I'm glad they fixed it.

                                                           

                                                          Edit: if they "agonized over whether to add the ability to turn it on/off," it sounds to me like they spent more time discussing it than it would've taken to actually implement. There's no downside to providing the option, just as there's no upside to not including it.

                                                          • 28. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                                            Eugene Tyson CommunityMVP

                                                            Of everyone that has ever told me that it's "annoying" nobody has ever convinced me of this. Convinced in the fact they explain in depth how it

                                                            hinders their workflow.

                                                             

                                                            All I ever here about this is that "it's annoying". Which doesn't help anyone understand your grievance with it, what you want to achieve and how better we can help.

                                                             

                                                             

                                                            Nobody to my knowledge has ever posted a screenshot or a video or anything that shows how this hinders their user-experience.

                                                             

                                                             

                                                            I can understand about the backward saving compatiblity. But I just never get why people find frame edge highlighting "annoying" because that description is so vague it actually makes me perplexed when people say it - and the fact that I actually find it a lot more helpful. I have not turned off this feature in CS5.5 and will never turn it off.

                                                            • 29. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                                              bpylant Community Member

                                                              I simply don't like all the frames flashing at me while I'm mousing over a document. It's annoying, visually distracting. I don't understand why that is so hard to understand.

                                                               

                                                              But I guess it doesn't really matter, because they did the (IMO) right thing and gave us the choice.

                                                              • 30. Re: CS5 Smart Guides: Can't Turn Off?
                                                                P Spier CommunityMVP

                                                                I don't see that anyone has anything particularly new or useful to add here, so I'm locking the thread.