wildcard for vla-item layers

Here's the code I have:
(vla-item *layers* layer)


How can I add widcards to the layer *Vent and make this function?

Thanks, kemp

 

One way would be to (vlax-for) your way through
the layer collection and test each with (wcmatch).

 

Will this cause a lot of overhead if have to run this 188 times? I
supose I can test it to see.

Thanks!

 

Will this cause a lot of overhead if have to run this 188 times? I
supose I can test it to see.

Thanks!

 

Why do you need to run it 188 times? Perhaps
there is another solution to your problem?

 

I have a database with 188 layers listed in it. I am trying to set the
layers on/off based on the database settings and this function is inside
of a foreach statement. Maybe there is a better way to handle this but I
am only a novice Take a look and tell me what you think - this is
what I have so far, I have not added the vlax-for or wcmatch yet.

(foreach data-list-line data-list
(if (not (vl-catch-all-error-p
(vl-catch-all-apply
'(lambda ()
(vla-item *layers* layer))
nil)))
(progn
(if (= LayerFreeze "thaw")
(vla-put-freeze (vla-item *layers* layer) :vlax-false)
;add more functions once this works
)
)
)
)

Thanks for your help Jason!

kemp

 

What does "data-list" look like? How is it
formatted?

 

data-list is in this format:

(("1" "A" "B" "C" "D" "E" "F" "G" "H")
("2" "A" "B" "C" "D" "E" "F" "G" "H")
("3" "A" "B" "C" "D" "E" "F" "G" "H"))

 

There are that many elements for each item
in the list?

The frist item is the layer name? what about
the rest of them?

 

Well, I have one more value in that list than in reality. The fields
include:

Layer name
Color
Lineweight
Plot Style
Description
Plot/noplot value
Freeze/thaw
on/off

 

Possibly something like this?

(foreach item data-list
(if
(vl-catch-all-error-p
(vl-catch-all-apply
(function
(lambda ()
(setq name (nth 0 item))
(setq object (vla-item *layers* name))
)
)
)
)
(princ (strcat "\nlayer " name " doesn't exist"))
(progn
(vla-put-color object (nth 1 item))
(vla-put-lineweight object (nth 2 item))
(vla-put-plotstylename object (nth 3 item))

; inlcude the rest......
)
)
)

 

This is much cleaner code than mine, but it must also be able to allow
for layers with varying xref names, so I have been passing the name
varible with a wildcard (eg *A-Wall). This wildcard is my sticking point
because it fails the vla-item test every time.

At this point I am working on the wcmatch function with the vlax-for
function like you suggested earlier to see how it works. Unless there is
a better method for this also?

Thanks!

kemp

 

Guess I don't really understand. I thought the
data-list contained all the layer names and properties
for each layer. Not sure why you would need
to use vlax-for or wcmatch if that is the case.

Are you saying that the first element in each item
within data-list is a wildcard pattern and not an
actual layer name?

 

Yes, you are correct. The name element of the array does not always have
the exact layer name that needs to be manipulated. I wildcard the
majority of them. The way I have this script currently working is using

(command "._layer")
;;foreach code goes in here
(command "T" name "C" color name "LT" linetype name "LW" lineweight
layer........ )
;;end foreach
(command "")

It works with the wildcards but it's pretty slow as you can imagine when
I do this 188 times.

Thanks,

kemp

 

Perhaps this is a more suitable solution.

; function to retrieve layer objects from
; the specified document whose names match
; the specified pattern.
; Arguments:
; [document] - vla-object, document object
; [pattern] - string, wildcard pattern
; return: list of vla-objects or nil
(defun getLayerObjects (document pattern)
(setq pattern (strcase pattern))
(vlax-for item (vla-get-layers document)
(if (wcmatch (vla-get-name item) pattern)
(setq lst (cons item lst))))
(reverse lst)
)

(foreach item data-list
(setq pattern (nth 0 item))
(if
(setq
objects
(getLayerObjects
(vla-get-activedocument
(vlax-get-acad-object))
pattern
)
)
(foreach object objects
(vla-put-color object (nth 1 item))
(vla-put-lineweight object (nth 2 item))
(vla-put-plotstylename object (nth 3 item))

; inlcude the rest......
)
)
)

That is it for me today, I'm outta here headed
for a 5 day weekend

 

PS: you should/could move the (vla-get-activedocument......)
out of the foreach loop, as you really only
need to do that once. Not much point in
getting the activedocument 188 times.

 

Thanks a lot Jason, I'll dig into it tomorrow so I can see exactly what
your code does (they are actually making me work now). Have a great long
weekend!

kemp