Close the Active Drawing for Next and Previous Commands

Hey all,
I'm only about 4 hours into trying to understand VLA, VLAX, etc. Objects
etc. So this may be pretty ugly codewise, but
I managed to get a working version of NEXT and PREV drawings (ie. open the
next or previous drawing in the project folder and close the Active
Document).

This has been addressed a number of times on the Newsgroup - but I have yet
to see a complete answer. The problem with this one is that after about 5
uses, my drawing CRASHES! No damage done, but I assume this is due to some
clogging of memory? I don't want to resort to SDI, to solve this - that
would be the easy way out.

Here's what I have so far...

;;;
(defun c:NEXT ( / acadapp docs activedoc path fnam dwgs nextfnam nextdwg)
(setq acadapp (vlax-get-acad-object))
(setq docs (vla-get-documents acadapp))
(setq activedoc (vla-get-ActiveDocument acadapp))
(setq path (vla-get-Path activedoc))
(setq fnam (vla-get-Name activedoc))
(setq dwgs (acad_strlsort (vl-directory-files path "*.dwg" 1)))
(setq nextfnam (cadr (member fnam dwgs)))
(if (/= nextfnam nil)
(progn
(setq nextdwg (vla-Open docs (strcat path "\\" nextfnam)))
(command "vbastmt" "activedocument.close false")
)
)
(prin1)
)
;;;
(defun cREV ( / acadapp docs activedoc path fnam dwgs nextfnam nextdwg)
(setq acadapp (vlax-get-acad-object))
(setq docs (vla-get-documents acadapp))
(setq activedoc (vla-get-ActiveDocument acadapp))
(setq path (vla-get-Path activedoc))
(setq fnam (vla-get-Name activedoc))
(setq dwgs (reverse (acad_strlsort (vl-directory-files path "*.dwg"
1)))) ;;;reverse for previous
(setq nextfnam (cadr (member fnam dwgs)))
(if (/= nextfnam nil)
(progn
(setq nextdwg (vlax-invoke-method docs "Open" (strcat path "\\"
nextfnam)))
(command "vbastmt" "activedocument.close false")
)
)
(prin1)
)
;;;;

Thanks for Any Help.

P. Farrell

 

Well That Flew right over my head - but not as much as it would have
Yesterday =).
In your example it appears "Previous" drawing is the Base drawing you return
to from your Xref, but the Xref stays open and so does the base drawing, and
I think I've already accomplished that, though crudely. I want to go one
step further to actually close the "base" drawing in your example, but
that's where I'm stuck - With my versions of Next and Previous I can step
through the directory of drawings, but only get 4 or 5 "Nexts" or
"Previouses" before I crash. Which either means I'm not doing something
right with the VL-stuff, or the VBA line, or I'm reaching some memory issue
or something else. Does this has something to do with needing to "release"
objects?

As for the opendwg part, Previously I was using a VBA snipet from somebody
on this newsgroup, and occasionallyy it would choke on a file name - it
would say the file name wasn't available to open when it clearly was. It
seems similar to what you have in your utilities lisp - is vl-cmdf is a
better way to go than command?

(defun cmdOpen (name)
(command "._VBAStmt"
(strcat "AcadApplication.Documents.Open \"" name "\"")
)
)

THANKS for the Pointer to your site - Lots to digest there.

a

 

Without knowing the details of what you're up to I would ask:
Why are you opening the next drawing, then closing the previous? Why not
close the current drawing, then open the next? (this is a stupid question if
you're insuring that at least one drawing stays open, but begs to be asked)
Also, Why are you opening a drawing, then closing it without saving it?
<snip>
(command "vbastmt" "activedocument.close false")
<snip>
And more, are you trying to do a batch process or are you wanting the
drawing to remain open until you are ready to move on to the next?
Is there a particular reason that you use the "(command "vbastmt"" over the
vla-open and vla-close statements? (other than the fact that it might make
translations a bit easier)

If you're after a batch process I've just built a decent little routine that
launches a second session of AutoCAD and sends commands to it from the first
session. I have been able to batch process 30+ drawings in a given folder,
and all of it's subfolders, with lisp routines (some that required user
input).

I kept hitting dead ends when I was trying to run the process from the same
session of AutoCAD.

--
Gary J. Orr
CADD Administrator
(218) 279-2421


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