Sketchup question on rectangles and components

To start drawing a Sketchup item, I wanted to make a rectangle that stood upright.

I selected the rectangle tool, and it would only make a rectangle flat, on the floor.

How can I make the standing rectangle?


Also, I made a side "on the floor" and rotated it 90 degrees.

I made a component of that standing side. The icon in the component frame, though, showed it lying flat.

When I later selected that component and dragged it out, sure enough it was flat on the floor, not standing.


I repeated this in other files and the component always came out flat.


How can I solve these two problems?

One way is to change the view so that you are looking directly at the plane on which you want the rectangle. So if you want the rectangle in the blue-red plane (standing up...). Select Front view and draw your rectangle. If you need to orbit a bit to place it correctly, you will be OK as long as the blue-red plane is mostly aligned with the screen.

Can't answer your question about the component; I don't see that behavior. Do make sure you have camera set to parallel perspective or components may appear slanted with respect to each other.

Bingo. The first problem solved.

Thanks, Paul.

Another way to make a standing rectangle is to give the rectangle-drawing tool a hint about where you want it to draw. I usually draw two lines which will become adjacent edges of the rectangle. Or you can draw guide lines with the tape measure tool.

Agreed. Start with lines for the rectangle. After the first two lines, it will help set the last two.

The up, right and left arrow keys can often be used to guide the inference engine, but they don't help with rectangles. I wish they would as it's fairly common problem and the arrow keys don't do anything else for rectangles (AFAIK).