Edits not documented - can they be forced?

[trchambe]

A few people in my office have AutoCAD (two copies of 2010 and two of 2004). One of them is an AutoCAD operator, and the other three are engineers. Some of the engineers will open a drawing that the CAD operator made and make changes to it, but do not update the revisions section. They make the change but do not document it. Further, they often make subtle mistakes. I'd like a way to somehow force people to document their edits... a message box that will now allow the changes to be saved until the revisions section has been updated, for example.

Has anyone ran into a similar problem, or have any suggestions?

 

[lpseifert]

you could try this... an attempt to learn reactors

;;;Close reactor - write rev data to file  LPS 2010-08-18

(vl-load-com)
(defun closereact ()
  (if (not close_react)
    (setq  close_react (vlr-editor-reactor nil '((:vlr-beginClose . revdata)))) 
  ) 
) 
(closereact)

(defun revdata (event parameter / revs dat usr fn)
  (alert "Enter Revisions \n Enter \"none\" if not saving")
  (setq revs (getstring T "\nDescribe revisions made: ")
	dat (rtos (getvar "cdate") 2 6)
	usr (getvar "loginname")
	fn  (strcat (getvar "dwgprefix")(vl-filename-base (getvar "dwgname")) "-Revisions.txt")
   )
  (setq fn (open fn "a"))
  (write-line (strcat "Revised by: " usr) fn)
  (write-line (strcat "Date: " dat) fn)
  (write-line (strcat "Revisions made: " revs) fn)
  (write-line "\n" fn)
  (close fn)
  )

____________________
Civil 3D 2008, Terramodel

 

[trchambe]

That worked, thank you.

I noticed however that I had to add the above code to the project each time I opened it. Is there a way to permanently associate this code with the project, so that it does not need to be added each time? I suspect that people in the office will add the reactor as often as they documented their edits.


To automate this a bit further... is there a way to force the Attribute graphics to be edited, rather than a separate text file? Or, if there is not, can the text file be sent to a location of my choosing rather than to the same folder as the project?

 

[lpseifert]

Is there a way to permanently associate this code with the project, so that it does not need to be added each time?

Investigate the use of acaddoc.lsp

To automate this a bit further... is there a way to force the Attribute graphics to be edited, rather than a separate text file?

Oh, I'm sure there is but I have neither the time or inclination to write that many lines of code.

can the text file be sent to a location of my choosing rather than to the same folder as the project?

edit the (getvar "dwgprefix") to "c:\\revfolder\\" or something similar to your liking.

____________________
Civil 3D 2008, Terramodel

 

[trchambe]

When you say to "the (getvar "dwgprefix") to "c:\\revfolder\\" or something similar to your liking", must I precede "C:\\revfolder\\" by some function, indicating that it is a path name?

I can't seem to tell it to place the text file in another path

 

[lpseifert]

fn  (strcat "c:\\revfolder\\" (vl-filename-base (getvar "dwgname")) "-Revisions.txt")

BTW- are you familiar with using Custom Drawing Properties (Dwgprops > Cusom tab) to populate fields used in Tables or Attributes? There might be a fairly easy way to "force the Attribute graphics to be edited" using Dwgprops.

____________________
Civil 3D 2008, Terramodel

 

[trchambe]

That fixed my problem... it was just a formatting issue.

I'm not very familiar with AutoCAD. I'm one of those engineers I mentioned that makes edits without knowing what he's doing. However, I am friends with the CAD operator and am familiar with programming at a moderate level, so I got curious.

I will look into that Custom Drawing Properties that you mentioned. Thank you for your help