"Active Tools" is an unfinished concept

Active tools have a lot of potential. Especially for tablet users. However, in almost every mode and almost every editor, active tools feel like a very unfinished concept, and using them, as they are now, is mostly pointless. I recommend my students to never use them for modelling, or in object mode, and I don’t ever use them either. I teach them hotkeys for operators because that functionality is complete, straightforward, and fast. No power user should be clicking around for toolbar buttons.

I think the “Active tools” concept needs a lot more care and thought to truly become an accepted huge part of blender, which is fast to use and convenient.

So, here are my ideas:

Do not overlap active tools

Tools, such as “Knife”, or "loop cut" should only work as active tools. In this case, a tool wouldn’t have two independent versions of it (One Active, and One as a singular operator) that overlap each other and do the exact same thing: Currently, you can use "knife", as an operator that feels like an active tool, while still holding the "bevel" active tool… This is a mess. To fix this, Pressing "K" should drop the "Bevel" active tool and call up the "Knife" active tool.

Global Active/Quick tool switch

For some worflows, you need "G" to move an object instantly. In other workflows, you need a hotkey to call up a move gizmo, so you can interact with the movement with only the mouse or a stylus (for example) The same hotkey could be used for both. To achieve that, there could be a simple global switch.

Whether "Extrude" or "move" or "Rip" or whatever, is an active or a single operator could be set by a checkbox in the "Edit" menu called "Quick Action tools" or "Quick Action hotkeys" or "Active tool hotkeys" or something like that.

If this checkbox is set to ON, then pressing the "E" hotkey would instantly Extrude the selection. If "Quick tools" is OFF, then it would call up the Extrusion active tool. This way, the user can easily change workflows, or go from keyboard and mouse to a Stylus without changing any keymaps, or needing to use different hotkeys for each version. That current "Shift+Space+E" way to call the extrude active tool is basically unusable, to put it lightly.

There could also be an option for specific tools to ignore that checkbox and stay always active or always as a singular operator.

This checkbox switch would only work on tools that can either be quick or active. It wouldn't work on actions such as "Join objects", which can only be quick, or "Knife" which can only be active.

Selecting a tool from the palette with the mouse would always call up the active tool, not an action. That's because operators are often dependent on the initial mouse position.

Speed and comfort. Seperate selection from action

Currently, active tools, such as "extrude" (and others) require two steps: Select, then press on the handle to affect. This is slow. It would be a lot faster and would feel a lot more natural if you could just click and drag on any face, and it would instantly extrude that particular face. And, if you needed to select more than one face for extrusion, you would specifically use the selection active tool for that. If a selection was made before using the extrusion active tool, the extrude active tool would only work on the selection, no matter where you click and drag. Remove those slow yellow handles!

In the current way, you kinda have two active tools at once with their own settings, overlapping, selection and Extrude. This feels very awkward.

Click and drag, versus two clicks

If you click and drag to extrude (for example), it would confirm on release. if you just quick click, it would confirm on the second click. This is how it should work on all active tools. This gives comfort for both, precision modelling, and organic dragging stuff around. This is helpful, For example, if you want to input a precise measurement for an action, it's better if you're not holding a mouse button.

"Tweak" shouldn't be a selection tool mode. And it never made sense as a selection tool mode. This is how the "Move" active tool should naturally behave when all the changes in this proposal are applied.

Hold a hotkey, vs tap a hotkey If you hold a hotkey, instead of tapping it, for example "E", the extrusion active tool would be active till you let go of "E", then it would return to the previous active tool. This is a fast way to do a single other action, while not losing the current active tool. Tapping a hotkey, such as "E", would bring up and keep the extrusion active tool.

Add more Useful tools

For example, Object mode currently has only a few useful active tools. Perhaps "Draw Cube" can be somewhat useful, but without the ability to input precise measurements during drawing, it's kinda pointless... Object mode could really use an “Asset draw/scatter” tool… This would be amazing. In edit mode, why is there no "Draw Edge" and "Draw polygon" or "Draw Rectangle", "Arc", "Circle", so on? "Material paint bucket? These kinds of tools just make sense...

Pre-action Highlighting consistency

Here's what we have currently: "Loop cut" active tool shows you where you will add a loopcut before you add a loopcut. "Measure" will show you where you will place a ruler before you place a ruler. But "Selection" won't show you what you will select before you make a selection. "Knife" will show you where you will cut before you cut, but only after you make the first click... (Weird!).

Also, each tool has it's own highlighting colors and sizes ("Visual language")... Make it all consistent in highlights, symbols, sizes and color! For example: Selection/snapping can be magenta. Addition can be green. Deletion can be red.

Snapping consistency

Some tools, such as "knife" or "Measure" has their own built-in snapping system, instead of using the one on the header. That's silly. Make it consistent!