PLU emergency license for AutoCAD

With the Portable Licence Utility there is an "emergency license". It is not to be misused and cannot be used every day.  How long it takes before you can use it again is not documented or revealed by Autodesk.

When can this be useful? Say you have exported a license to your home PC and in last minute find that you need to work overtime. There is no need to panic, having to go home and back to work again. In a case like this you can use the emergency license.

Standing Seam on roof in plan view in ACA

I got a question on how to show the roofing material in plan view. If you want to achieve the result showed at the lower image to the right here is one way. 

Select the roof, right click and select Edit Object Display.

On the Materials tab click on the Add New Material button and add "Standing Seam" or whatever you want to name it.

Click on the Edit Material button.

Click on the current display representation in the Style Override column.

On the Layer/Color/Linetype tab make the Display Component "Surface Hatch" visible.

On the Hatching tab set appropriate pattern for the Surface Hatch Display Component.

On the Other tab make sure Top is selected on Surface Hatch Placement.

In Display Manager edit the current Configuration and the Plan View Direction.

On the Display Representation Control find the Roof object and make sure the Model Display Representation is checked.

Find also the Plan Set and in Display Representation Control find the Roof object and make sure the Model Display Representation is checked.

I used AutoCAD Architecture 2008 in this example. If you have a better way or another way please share it in the comments. 

Add a comma to the sheet title of a sheet in AutoCAD

I got an email with the following question:

I was Google searching for a way to add a comma to the sheet title for ADT2007. ... However I did not find any way to do such, just a comment by someone that it was impossible.
I have figured ways to add formatting code to other text fields (like capitalizing the date and doing a shortened month)…and was wondering if you knew a way to use escape characters and/or ASCII codes to include commas and other special characters in sheet tiles?

The error message can say something like Invalid characters in the name: test , with comma. The following characters are not valid: <>\/":;?*|,=`

This reply helped this user. It works in Sheet Set Manager (SSM) in AutoCAD as well as in the Project Navigator in AutoCAD Architecture (ACA) / Architectural Desktop (ADT).

Run the program CharMap.exe found in Windows Accessories>System Tools and there you can find special characters and copy them to use.

But you cannot use the real comma , but you can use something similar like ‚ that is U+201A or Alt+0130. You can enter it by holding down Alt on the keyboard and then on the right part of the keyboard enter 0130 and release Alt. Or you can copy it from the Character Map program.

Hopefully Autodesk does something about this in a future release.

Autodesk products on Vista white paper

More companies starts to consider to upgrade from XP to Vista and then this Autodesk and Windows Vista white paper can come handy.

Some highlights are:

"companies that run AutoCAD 2008 64-bit on Windows Vista can speed up their work."

"AutoCAD Architecture 2008 users should experience the same high performance. Benchmark testing shows no degradation or enhancement to performance on Windows Vista."

"Autodesk has found that the performance of AutoCAD Civil 3D 2008 undergoes some changes when run on Windows Vista. Benchmark testing shows that while some processes perform the same when run on Windows Vista and Windows XP, some are slower on Windows Vista. Autodesk has found that the more RAM a system has, the less perceptible the slowdown. Conversely, processes leveraging the .NET framework, such as corridor processing, are up to 10 times faster on Windows Vista."

"Autodesk’s benchmark testing shows neither degradation nor enhancement of performance when AutoCAD Map 3D 2008 is run on Windows Vista."

"With 64-bit, users can handle larger and more complex scenes and experience improved large model and data set performance. With 3ds Max 2008, users can start in either Direct3D or OpenGL modes. If they run the application in Direct3D model, they will experience additional performance improvements."

"the software client version of the Autodesk Buzzsaw 2007.3 is not Vista compatible."

Inventor - "Autodesk has found that by leveraging Direct3D, Inventor implementation on Windows Vista shows performance gains of approximately 5% when compared with Windows XP."

Revit Architecture 2008 - "Benchmark testing shows no degradation or enhancement to performance on Windows Vista."

Via the Autodesk Labs Blog and Microsoft Vista Compatibility

AutoCAD 2008 startup errors

This Autodesk Knowledge Base document: Errors during program startup includes a lot of great tips how to find a solution to problems to start AutoCAD 2008 or AutoCAD LT 2008.

In addition to this I can mention that yesterday something happened with my AutoCAD Architectural 2008 and I could not start it no matter what I did. The solution was simple though. All I had to do was to restart the computer.

Calculate surface area of a Mass Element in AutoCAD Architecture

I got an email with the question how to achieve this on a very complex Mass Element and here is one solution how it can be done.

To get the surface area of a Mass Element use ConvertTo3dSolids (or select the Mass Element, right click and select Convert To>3D Solid) to convert to a 3DSolid and then use the Area command with the Object option and select the 3D Solid.

AutoCAD Architecture 2008 crashes during startup - FATAL ERROR

On the command line you might see the command aecprojectbrowserstartup and then you get a crash. It says something like: AutoCAD Error Aborting - FATAL ERROR: Unhandled Access Violation Reading 0x0000 Exception at cf77528h. The address cf77528h can be different each time.

Knowledge Base document: AutoCAD® Architecture crashes during startup

There is no need to uninstall SP1 as suggested in the KB unless you find other reasons that SP1 is trouble for you.

Use REGEDIT.EXE (be careful though)

Locate the following key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Autodesk\MC3

Set MC3OptIn to 0

This is the same as opting-out from Customer Involvement Program (CIP)

Either you can continue to not opt-in for CIP or you can select to not Show Project Browser at Startup.

1. Start AutoCAD Architecture 2008.
2. Click Tools menu > Options.
3. In the Options dialog box, click the AEC Project Default tabs.
4. Select the Show Project Browser at Startup option.
5. Click OK.
6. Click Help menu > Customer Involvement Program.
7. Select Yes.
8. Click OK.

Update: This is now fixed in a new update Project Browser Startup Hotfix Readme - English Only

Run a script when changing workspace in AutoCAD

Did you know that you can run a script (.SCR) file automatically when changing workspace in AutoCAD?

Using the Customize User Interface (CUI) it's not possible. You can only specify LISP files to be loaded together with the customization file.

But here is how it can be done. It's undocumented (and probably not supported) but can still be very useful. And with the script file you can also load AutoLISP (.LSP) files when the workspace changes. It is supposed to work with AutoCAD 2007 and I have confirmed it works in AutoCAD 2008. Verticals should also work. Notice that the script is not run when you start AutoCAD. Only when the workspace is changed. But it is not run if it is changed using AutoLISP like this: (command "WSCURRENT" "2D Drafting & Annotation")

Locate the CUI file you want to change. For example:
C:\Users\JTB\AppData\Roaming\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2008\R17.1\enu\support\acad.cui

If you have hard to locate the CUI file you can just run the CUI command and you will find the file path and name.

Using XML Notepad 2007 locate the Workspace that you want. The UID has the name. In this case WS_Anno2DDraft.

 

Right click on UID and select Attribute>After and enter Script and then enter the script file to be loaded.

Or you can edit using Notepad or the like. Search for "<Workspace ". Notice the space after Workspace and don't include the quotation marks. Then add what is marked as bold below changing the path and name of course.

<Workspace StartOn="ignore" ScrollBars="ignore" ScreenMenus="off" LayoutModelTabs="ignore" DefaultWorkspace="true" UID="WS_Anno2DDraft" Script="C:\Users\JTB\AppData\Roaming\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2008\R17.1\enu\Support\test.scr">

Thanks for the tip Chris Dodge, Microdesk.com.

SmartPurger 2.7 released

A minor update of SmartPurger that makes sure to close some more popups like "Previous Version MEP Objects Detected" and the Customer Error Reports when needed.

An issue with AutoCAD Architecture 2008 is that it crash when starting and closing it with the use of a script file.

The error in acad.err is: "INTERNAL ERROR:  Attempt to access AecUiBaseServices after shutdown!"

It seems like the SCR file is loaded and run before the palettes are loaded. And the problem is probably related to _aecprojectpalettestartup, _aecprojectnavigator or ProjectNavigatorOnce.

Here is the solution that also works with ScriptPro or other batch/script applications.

First start AutoCAD Architecture. Close the active project using the Project Browser and right click on the project in bold and select close current project. Close AutoCAD Architecture.
Now you can run SmartPurger without getting these crashes.

AutoCAD Architecture 2008 Service Pack 1

Get AutoCAD Architecture 2008 SP1 here. It also includes what is in the AutoCAD 2008 SP1.

I've used it for a while and can recommend to install it.

As a result of detailed information from customers who used the Customer Error Reporting Utility, a number of problems were identified and fixed in the following areas:

AutoCAD Architecture 2008

• AEC Details
• AModeler
• DesignCenter
• Drawing Management
• Export to AutoCAD
• IFC
• Keynoting
• Spaces
• External References (Xrefs)

Knowledge Base document: AutoCAD® Architecture 2008 Service Pack 1

PS. If you have the beta version of SP1 you would uninstall it first. Yes, the SP is uninstallable.

Classification Definition Tools released

ClassificationDefinitionTools is now available. With it you can import or export classification definition structures. It works for AutoCAD Architecture (ACA), Architectural Desktop (ADT) and their verticals.

Some classification structures can be very large and complicated and this tool can help to avoid the need to type everything manually. You can use existing lists in Excel and just copy and paste.

AutoCAD Palette Auto-hide Speed freeware v. 1.1 released

After my earlier post I got a couple of emails explaining how PaletteHoldopenDelay works and I have now made a new version available at:
http://www.jtbworld.com/PaletteAuto-hideSpeed.htm

The “holdopen” delay is an additional delay that keeps the palette open for a specified time when it is opened programmatically; if the mouse does not move over it in this time it automatically rolls back up.

PaletteHoldopenDelay does not affect all palettes though probably because not all development teams at Autodesk knows about PaletteHoldopenDelay. You can see the effect with the palettes Properties, Quickcalc, External References, Sheet Set Manager, Markup Set Manager, Visual Styles Manager set to auto-hide. Try for example CTRL+1 one or two times. But it seems to only affect External References when starting AutoCAD. This was found trying with AutoCAD 2008 SP1.

TimberTool 1.4 released

TimberTool news as result of user wishes:

• Alignment axis is automatically determined when possible. The longest side of a rectangle is selected as alignment axis.
• Negative extrusion depth is allowed and makes the mass element extruded the other direction.
• The layer checkbox remembers its setting between sessions.

Slow AutoCAD startup or performance

Here are some tips that might help.

Generally with antivirus software's try to disable them if you find that AutoCAD performance is slow typically during start as well as opening and saving of files. If it seems like it is the antivirus software that is the cause try to make exceptions for for example the install folders of AutoCAD, specific file types like DWG,AC$, SV$. Set to scan for write operations only for acad.exe should be safe.

If changing annotation scale in a viewport takes long time try resetting the scale list in  the drawing and its xrefs. Make sure to reset the scale from the bottom of the xref tree, one drawing at a time and last in the host drawing.

Knowledge Base documents worth looking at:

• Program slow to start when Microsoft® OneCare™ anti-virus software is enabled
• AutoCAD® freezes during startup
• Improve software performance
• Possible causes of slow drawing performance
• AutoLISP® and other types of routines run slowly
• Performance impact when toolbar transparency on
• Errors or performance problems when working with objects in large coordinate space
• Drawing takes long time to finish loading - when drawing contains a lot of 3D solids
• Performance problem when exploding multiple polylines
• Loading XREF drawings and inserting external blocks is slow
• Copying and pasting objects - When copying and pasting objects, you noticed that it takes a long time for the operation to finish.

Outside The Box also has a tip to disable the AutoCAD InfoCenter. It's related to seeing these dialog boxes and started after applying SP1.

Microsoft Visual C++ Runtime Library
---------------------------
Runtime Error!
Program: C:...
R6025
- pure virtual function call

Followed by this message.

Microsoft Windows
---------------------------
Autodesk Communication Center has stopped working
A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Windows will close the program and notify you if a solution is available.

TimberTool 1.3 released

TimberTool by JTB World that is an add-on to ADT 2007 or ACA 2008 now supports imperial units as well as millimeter and the mass element can inherit the layer of the polyline.

• TimberTool makes it easy to convert closed polylines into mass elements and makes the bounding box width and depth correct for scheduling purposes.
• The product was initially created for usage with timber but works with structural steel or concrete shapes.
• See this short video on how it can be used.

TimberTool for AutoCAD Architecture

TimberTool is a program that I initially made after a request from one ACA user but that probably others can find useful as well.

TimberTool is an add-on to AutoCAD Architecture or ADT based products.

TimberTool makes it easy to convert closed polylines into mass elements and makes the bounding box width and depth correct for scheduling purposes.

The product was initially created for usage with timber but works with structural steel or concrete shapes.

See this short video on how it can be used. (I used Jing for that)

More about it at my website: http://www.jtbworld.com/timbertool.htm

Conversion using ExtrudeLinework (notice that the bounding box is not correct).

Result after using TimberTool

Using ExtrudeLinework notice that the Width and Depth is based on the bounding box not the actual mass element.

Notice that after using TimberTool the Width and Depth is correct as expected to be.

Another AutoCAD Architecture Customer Council teaser

I too have got the result from the latest survey from the AutoCAD Architecture Product Team.

I cannot share more but join AutoCAD Architecture Customer Council and you can raise your voice, vote and take share of the result.

Idea from RobiNZ

4 GB RAM for AutoCAD Architecture 2008?

Hardware requirements for AutoCAD Architecture 2008 (ACA 2008) and many other software's are quite high. For example RAM 3 GB (Recommended); 2 GB (Minimum). To work with 3D in Vista using AutoCAD 2008 also requires at least 2 GB.

Is it a good idea then to get 4 GB? Maybe not. Take a look at Coding Horror: Dude, Where's My 4 Gigabytes of RAM?

Uninstall AutoCAD 2008 silently

If you as are managing installations on many workstations you probably at some point want to uninstall software's easily. This is one way to do it. You can often find the uninstall string in the registry.

Uninstall AutoCAD 2008

• HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Autodesk\AutoCAD\R17.1\ACAD-6001:409\ProductCode
  The value can be something like this:
  {5783F2D7-6001-0409-0002-0060B0CE6BBA}

Uninstall AutCAD Architecture 2008

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Autodesk\AutoCAD\R17.1\ACAD-6004:409\ProductCode
The value can be something like this:
{5783F2D7-6004-0409-0002-0060B0CE6BBA}

Uninstall Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional

• HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\8.0\Installer\ENU_GUID
  The value can be something like this:
  {AC76BA86-1033-0000-7760-000000000003}

Uninstall Acrobat Reader 8

• HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\8.0\Installer\ENU_GUID
  The value can be something like this:
  {AC76BA86-7AD7-1033-7B44-A81000000003}

If you are using VBScript you can read the registry using WshShell.RegRead

Below is a sample code showing how it can be done. Save the text in Notepad with the file extension VBS.

on error resume next
Set WshShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
uninstallstring=WshShell.RegRead("HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Autodesk\AutoCAD\R17.1\ACAD-6001:409\ProductCode")
WshShell.Run "msiexec /x " & uninstallstring & " /q",1,true

Tired of DCL?

Chad Wanless sold his ObjectDCL to DuctiSoft some months ago.

You can find the latest version, release 3.5, on http://www.ductisoft.com.

It works for R16 and R17 (AutoCAD 2004-AutoCAD 2008).

There is also an alternative that is in Development Status : 3 - Alpha

OpenDCL is the new open source version of ObjectDCL for AutoCAD. OpenDCL is for AutoLISP programmers who want to replace AutoCAD's limited DCL (Dialog Control Language) user interface language with a rich set of modern Windows user interface elements.