AutoCAD 2006 .NET documentation

Here you can find it. Extract the help files for 2006 and look for the file acad_mgd.chm. Here's what's new: "The ObjectARX managed wrapper classes now include sophisticated selection, jig, and prompt support; complete events coverage previously only available to C++ reactors; and an application object model to give you convenient and readily discoverable access to the properties of the application, document, editor, and window objects of AutoCAD software. .NET applications can easily create dockable palettes and Tool Palettes and extend tabbed dialogs. The geometry library now includes 2D curves and support for external references has been added"...

AutoCAD 2006 e-learning

I just checked my subscription account for AutoCAD and found that e-learning for AutoCAD 2006 had been added. If you have subscription, give it a try and learn some of the new features.

AutoCAD 2006 - LAYERFILTERALERT a new system variable

With this new system variable you have better control on when and if layer filters should be deleted.
Type: Integer
Saved in: Registry
Initial value: 2

Deletes excessive layer filters to improve performance. When a drawing has 100 or more layer filters, and the number of layer filters exceeds the number of layers, LAYERFILTERALERT provides a method for deleting layer filters to improve performance.
0 Off
1 When the Layer Manager is opened, deletes all layer filters; no message is displayed
2 When the Layer Manager is opened, displays a message that states the problem, recommends deleting all filters, and offers a choice: “Do you want to delete all layer filters now?”
3 When the drawing is opened, displays a message that states the problem and offers to display a dialog box where you can choose which filters to delete
More about AutoCAD 2006 here.

Delete AutoCAD layer filters

Often requested tool. Here it is again. I just confirmed that it works great in AutoCAD 2009 as well.

Download DLF.LSP

;;; DLF.LSP
;;;
;;; Delete all layer filters with the DLF command
;;;
;;; By Jimmy Bergmark
;;; Copyright (C) 2004-2008 JTB World, All Rights Reserved
;;; Website: www.jtbworld.com
;;; E-mail: info@jtbworld.com
;;; 2004-05-23 - Added support to delete filters introduced in 2005
;;; 2005-03-14 - Confirmed to work with AutoCAD 2006
;;; 2005-04-19 - Added (vl-load-com)
;;; Written for AutoCAD 2000, 2000i, 2002, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009
;;;

(vl-load-com)

;;; Purge/delete all layer filter or filters
;;; Example: (DeleteLayerFilters)
(defun DeleteLayerFilters ()
(vl-Catch-All-Apply
'(lambda ()
(vla-Remove
(vla-GetExtensionDictionary
(vla-Get-Layers
(vla-Get-ActiveDocument
(vlax-Get-Acad-Object))))
"ACAD_LAYERFILTERS")))
)
;;; Purge/delete all layer filter or filters compatible with 2005 or later
;;; Example: (DeleteLayerFilters2)
(defun DeleteLayerFilters2 ()
(vl-Catch-All-Apply
'(lambda ()
(vla-Remove
(vla-GetExtensionDictionary
(vla-Get-Layers
(vla-Get-ActiveDocument
(vlax-Get-Acad-Object))))
"AcLyDictionary")))
)

(defun c:dlf()
(DeleteLayerFilters)
(DeleteLayerFilters2)
(princ "\nAll layer filters deleted!")
(princ)
)

To batch purge multiple drawings automatically take a look at SmartPurger.

Lisp sample on how to change plot devices

I got a request from a user that wanted to change the plot devices on his drawings. They had been changed from lets say OLD01.PC3 to NEW01.PC3. Here is one way. This code could be run manually on a drawing or when drawings are opened by making use of acaddoc.lsp that loads whenever a drawing opens.

; ChangePlotDevices.lsp
; Sample command CPD on how to change
; plot devices on all layouts
; Changes have to be made to match
; your old and new plot devices
;
; By Jimmy Bergmark
; Copyright (C) 2005 by JTB World
; www.jtbworld.com
; 2005-01-13
;

(defun PutPlotDevice (layout PlotDeviceName)
  (vla-put-ConfigName
    layout
    PlotDeviceName)
)

(defun GetPlotDevice (layout)
  (vla-get-ConfigName
    layout)
)

(defun changePlotDevice (layout)
  (cond
    ((= (GetPlotDevice layout) "OLD01.pc3")
      (PutPlotDevice layout "NEW01.pc3"))
    ((= (GetPlotDevice layout) "OLD02.pc3")
      (PutPlotDevice layout "NEW01.pc3"))
    ((= (GetPlotDevice layout) "OLD03.pc3")
      (PutPlotDevice layout "NEW02.pc3"))
    (t (PutPlotDevice layout "None"))
  )
)

(defun c:CPD ()
  (setq layouts
    (vla-get-Layouts
      (vla-get-activedocument
        (vlax-get-acad-object))))
  (vlax-for layout layouts
    (changePlotDevice layout)
  )
  (princ)
)

AutoCAD 2006 Sheet Set Manager more enhancements

Here are some more enhancements:

• Import multiple layouts as sheets.
• Sheet Set Publish Options dialog has been modified to also include block properties and attributes in published DWF files.
• It's possible to select multiple sheets and open them or open them as read only.
• Renaming of sheets has been improved.
• Now it's possible to rename the file name as well.
• The option "Rename Associated Drawing File to Match Sheet Title" changes the drawing file name to match the sheet title.
• The option "Prefix Sheet Number to File Name" changes the drawing file name to a new name formed by adding the sheet number to the beginning of the sheet title.
• There is a "Previous" button in the rename and renumber dialog box for sheets and views so now you can take either the next sheet or the previous.
• On the View List tab you can select if you want to view by "category" or by "sheet".
• The Sheet Properties also includes Revision number, Revision date, Purpose and Category.
• The Create Sheet Set Wizard has an option to "Create a folder hierarchy based on subsets.
• There is a new little button on the Sheet List tab that lets you refresh the sheet status.
• When creating subsets there is an option to "Create Folders Relative to Parent Subset Storage Location". This option provides a convenient method for creating a folder hierarchy in parallel with the subset hierarch
  

AutoCAD 2006 and fixed bugs

24+ bugs have been fixed in AutoCAD 2006 when I took a look at my bug list at my website. If you find more of them fixed please let me know.

AutoCAD 2006 Sheet Set Manager enhancements

Here are some SSM enhancements:

The eTransmit Transmittal Setups dialog box has a new Import button that opens the Import Transmittal Setups dialog box.

New Project Control properties have been added to the Sheet Set Manager. Project number, Project name, Porject phase, Project milestone.

To open a sheet or resource drawing in a read-only mode, right-click the name of the sheet and click Open Read-Only on the shortcut menu. If the sheet or resource drawing is already open, the Open Read-Only shortcut menu item is unavailable.

Missing sheet status icon. You now receive visual notification if sheets in the Sheet Set are not found. The icon for the sheet is replaced with a red exclamation point (!) if the sheet name is unavailable or if a subset is missing all sheets.

SSMPOLLTIME - Controls the time interval between automatic refreshes of the status data in a sheet set.

SSMSHEETSTATUS - Controls how the status data in a sheet set is refreshed.
Sheet and Sheet Set information/properties can be published to DWF's.

Eattext can grab block attribute data from Sheet Sets.

It's not that that many enhancements that I had wish for so I hope more work will be done for AutoCAD 2007.

Silent installation of Autodesk migration tools

Open the exe file of Autodesk Batch Drawing Converter and/or Autodesk Customization Conversion Tools with WinZip and extract the msi file. Using VBScript: WshShell.Run "msiexec /i ""\\server\BatchDWGConverter.msi"" /qb-! ACAD_SILENT_LICENSE=YES",1,True WshShell.Run "msiexec /i ""\\server\CustConvTools.msi"" /qb-! ACAD_SILENT_LICENSE=YES",1,True Download the tools here.

ADT 2006 soon at your desktop...

Since the beta testers of ADT 2006 has been released from the NDA you will start to get news about the upcoming ADT 2006. One thing that I'm very excited about and that will make me start using ADT 2006 in production usage as soon as possible is the new Project Standards feature. This will help you better setup, control and synchronize all style definitions and display settings that exists in an ADT project.

AutoCAD 2006 and Tool Palette compatibility

Tool Palettes created or modified in AutoCAD 2006 are not compatible in AutoCAD 2005 because some new features in AutoCAD 2006. If you during a transition period supports both AutoCAD 2005 and AutoCAD 2006 you can make the changes with AutoCAD 2005 and then copy the Tool Palettes folder with its content to a folder specific for AutoCAD 2006 to make sure that you don't make any changes to the Tool Palette with AutoCAD 2006.

AutoCAD 2006 and borrowing licenses

A new thing that is great with AutoCAD 2006 and when using network licenses is that you can borrow the license more than 30 days. As you can see from the image I can set it to borrow almost 6 months now. This is great when you have people having to work off the network for a longer period.

This is still valid for later versions of AutoCAD.

Ralph have missed some of the new AutoCAD 2006 features

A comment about what Ralph wrote. "All that's missing from the bloggers reports are the ton of minor changes in AutoCAD 2006, like ImageFrame now has a third option, and several dialog boxes are redesigned." Improvements to the Sheet Set Manager are among them. More about that later. I will also report and list the bugs but I have to wait for the final release to confirm if there are any and what bugs there are. I can say that many bugs that existed in 2005 and earlier versions have been fixed. I write about AutoCAD 2006 much of the same reason as Ralph and others are.

Google Desktop Search 1.0 released

Google Blog is writing about the Google Desktop Search 1.0 that now is released.

AutoCAD 2006 Hatch enhancements

Hatch creation is enhanced to include ability create separate hatches. This is useful if you want to hatch multiple objects and have the hatches separated. The custom hatch tab has been improved. Instead of showing the whole path to the hatch as it did before only the name shows and the path as a tool tip.

Hatch editing has been enhanced to include ability to recreate boundary. You can even choose if you want it associated with the hatch or not as well if you want it as a region or a polyline. (No more need for my hatchb.lsp tool ;-)

You have also much more control of the hatch origin now. You can set it to bottom left or right, top left or right, center or pick a point. It's also possible to easy remove and add islands as well as view the current selection.

The dialog box has been streamlined and is more intuitive now. Here is how it looked like in 2005 and now in 2006.

The area of one or multiple hatches can also easily be retrieved using the properties of the hatch object(s). See the cumulative area below.

The area can also be retrieved with a field as shown below. Observe also the improved formatting that allows to convert from mm² to m² as well as adding prefix, suffix and more.

with limited permission from Autodesk.

For more about AutoCAD 2006 check these links to websites and blogs with approval to write about AutoCAD 2006 right now:

http://www.jtbworld.com/autocad2006.htm

http://autodesk.blogs.com/between_the_lines

http://lynn.blogs.com/lynn_allens_blog

http://hyperpics.blogs.com/beyond_the_ui

http://scottdurkee.blogspot.com

http://rcd.typepad.com/rcd/cad_autocad/index.html

http://ellenfinkelstein.com/autoCAD.html

http://bethscadblog.blogspot.com/

AutoCAD 2006 is soon to be released

As a beta user of AutoCAD 2006 or Rio as it is called during beta I will start to share some of my experiences. With limited permission from Autodesk of course. Click on the image above and get an idea what will come. There are plenty of nice things in this version. Don't be afraid that you don't see the command line. You can show and hide it by pressing CTRL+9. And do you know what? I actually like having it hidden. The improved heads up design makes it possible. I'll be back and let you know more. Stay tuned...