Bounding boxes not visible on objects unless they are actively selected

[HaileyLorraine]

My office likes to design using Powerpoint (yuck) so that the field marketing team can adjust information easily and on the fly if needed. I despise Powerpoint, so I design layouts in Illustrator, then export them to an editable Powerpoint file; before this job, I used InDesign for anythng layout related and soley used Illustrator for illustrative purposes. Because of my lack of use, I could be remembering wrong, but I thought that Illustrator allowed you to view inactive bounding boxes the same way InDesign does. As the title suggests, I cannot see bounding boxes on objects unless they are actively selected. I have poked around my settings and whatnot and have been unable to find what is causing this. I have tried to find solutions online, but I haven't been able to get any answers.

I have attached some screen shots to try and give a visual representation of what I am talking about. One is of a box that has no fill or stroke being selected in preview mode, one is of what I see when the same box is not selected in preview mode, and one is of the box, again, unselected, in outline mode.

I am marking this as a performance issue, a bug, and a feature request because this situation may fall into any of those issues depending on if my memory is serving me right or not. Thanks in advance for the help!

[sishamIAGD]

If what I think you are talking about, the only way to see unselected items that have no fill or stroke would be to view via the outline view..?

[Brad @ Roaring Mouse]

"I cannot see bounding boxes on objects unless they are actively selected."

That's normal behaviour, and I believe you are in the extreme minority of users that would want it otherwise.

The difference in your analogy is that what you are seeing in InDesign are frames (be they text, graphic or other), not bounding boxes.

I understand your desire to do that in Illustrator but that would quickly become a cacophony of "bounding boxes" as each object you draw would have one. That would quickly get messy. Just my opinion, though.

[Anubhav M]

Hello @HaileyLorraine,

Thanks for reaching out. As suggested by sishamIAGD, switching to Outline View should help with your workflow. Additionally, you may create a UserVoice for this feature request (https://illustrator.uservoice.com) and add your comments there. Doing this will help us prioritize this feature request, and you will keep getting all the related updates.

Feel free to reach out if you have more questions or need assistance. We'd be happy to help.

Thanks,

Anubhav