Originally posted in the forums:

I am aware that this has been asked before, but I have not found an adequate answer.

I have always disliked the methods used by Illustrator for pan and zoom functions.

I have been using a program called X-Mouse Button Control to remap the functions of the mouse wheel and middle click to pan and zoom operations. For panning, this works well: Middle click to pan. In X-Mouse, the middle click is replaced with a macro that will hold the space key, and simulate a click/hold of the left mouse button. This allows panning in a way that is similar to many other programs I use daily.

The zoom, however, is a bit more difficult. By remapping the mouse-wheel-up/mouse-wheel-down to include holding the 'alt' key, I can zoom in and out. The issue appears when I hover over the Transform dimensions and/or position of an object. Since the 'alt' key is held, it copies the selected object at each click of the wheel. While this can make for some very interesting geometric designs, it is no quite what I'm after.

I've recently acquired a 3Dconnexion Space Navigator for AutoCAD work. It has improved my workflow tremendously in AutoCAD.

I reached out to 3Dconnexion about support for Illustrator, and they placed the ball squarely in your court, Adobe!

What say ye? Can we get simple Pan/Zoom control for our 3D devices?

/end rant

Thanks for listening.

I work with a lot of parts that I need to keep separated for output. A simple example is a complex, compound shape with 20 elements. I have 10 on a "cut" layer and 10 on a "print" layer. If I copy and paste them, I can only paste them into one layer. I might want them to go back into the same layers or into 2 new layers. I never want them in the same layer. I now have to go in and separate them all into the proper layers.

This is important because the layers tell our output machines what to do with the files.

Currently, the Eyedropper Tool is an underutilized and often counter-intuitive tool that needlessly increases the complexity of a workflow because of its limitations. This- combined with Illustrator's poor color tools- often adds unnecessary time and effort to what should and could be more simplified tasks.

For example, a common situation is that I have a shape with a fill color that I like, and I want another shape that has a stroke to also use that color, except only for the stroke. Currently, if I use the eyedropper tool on the filled shape, it will completely remove the stroke and add a fill, although the desired result is neither action. The workaround, of course, is to create a new swatch of that color, then make sure the stroke is selected, and then apply the swatch color to that stroke (as the other color tools are essentially useless for matching colors, given no live preview).

This, of course, can get incredibly tedious when dealing with lots of colors and lots of fills and strokes, and it is not always desirable (nor, I would argue, should it be necessary) to always create swatches for working with colors.

This situation is of course not limited to shapes. Often I will have text that I want to have a stroke with particular cap conditions, but want the color from another stroke. However, the current process of using the eyedropper tool strips the formatting of the stroke (or whatever properties) and takes on the properties of the selected object, even though all that was wanted was the color.

A more elegant solution would be to make the eyedropper tool contextual, so that specific properties of the sampled object could applied without completely changing the selected object’s properties to conform entirely to the sampled object.

I would suggest the following that the eyedropper tool be modified to work contextually much like the Pen Tool works contextually.

The default state of the Eyedropper Tool would work as it currently does. However, there would then be different options that could be cycled through in the Eyedropper Tool, analogous to how there is the Pen Tool, the Add Vertex Tool, Subtract, Convert, etc.

In this usage, holding a modifier key or choosing a different function of the eyedropper tool would allow one to decide which aspects of the sampled object to apply to the selected object.

For example, if I have a circle with a red stroke and a box with a blue fill, and I want the circle to have the stroke be the same color as the box’s blue fill, I could hold Alt/Opt (as an example) to switch to the Color Sample Tool which would then sample only the color of the sampled object and apply it to either:

1. Whichever property is currently active (e.g., Fill or Stroke)
2. If the object has ONLY a Fill or ONLY a Stroke, it would automatically default to applying it to whichever is already extant.

This could be extended to sample the color of the pixel sampled, or the entirety of the fill or stroke (e.g., for gradients, styles, etc.)

Another option (perhaps by holding Alt+Cmd/Ctrl) would be the Stroke Style Sample Tool, which would sample the style of sampled object’s Stroke. This could even be given some further options (perhaps accessed by up or down arrows) to select only weight, weight and Caps style, Weight, Caps Style and Color, etc., all delineated by changes in the icon state.

I think that a contextual Eyedropper Tool would be a more elegant way of handling color and style sampling in Illustrator and eliminate the current workarounds necessary for an efficient workflow.

I realize this is a very specific request for a small piece of functionality that was probably never very popular, but it's part of a workflow I got used to using for years, and since upgrading to CC, it no longer works.

When creating a new path with the Pen tool, using the spacebar enables you to move the anchor point you've just created (before you release the click). Also, the Anchor Point tool allows you to do the same when you click on a point and drag the handles out.

My issue is that the Anchor Point tool doesn't retain this functionality when you access it by using the shortcut 'alt/option' while the Pen tool is selected. I'm not sure if this was simply an oversight, or if there is a reason for disabling it. I've searched for a way to enable this tiny feature, but don't think it's possible with preferences (please let me know if I am incorrect).

The ability use the 'alt/option' key to access the Anchor Point tool, WHILE retaining the ability to use the spacebar to toggle back and forth between moving handles and moving the point itself - makes for a very efficient use of the pen tool by minimizing clicks to switch back and forth between tools.

Since the Anchor Point tool still allows this functionality when selected directly, I don't see why it shouldn't act the same when accessed through the 'Pen tool + alt/option' shortcut, -like it did in CS5.

Please bring it back!!!
Thank you :)