Field for Viewport Showing XREF Scale First

[Cadguru42]

I'm sure people have run into this issue. I've got a drawing that contains an XREF. I've got a field reading the viewport object's Custom scale>Use scale name. However, whenever the drawing is loaded up all of the XREF's scales get imported. Since they contain the same scales, the field changes to read the XREF scale instead of the one it was set to. They are the same scale, but the field reads the XREF one first. Here is a screenshot showing what I'm talking about. Notice that the viewport's properties never show the scale as 1:20_XREF, but the field does. 

I've been having to click "show all scales", do a SCALELISTEDIT, remove the XREFs, then do a UPDATEFIELD. I have to do this every time the drawing is open. It stays that way until C3D is closed. This becomes a problem when I go to PUBLISH a sheet set. If I haven't opened all the sheets in the sheet set and changed the scale list then they all get the wrong scale list shown. 

How do other people handle this?

[Joe-Bouza]

Add the scalelistedt parameters to your acaddoc.lsp

[Cadguru42]

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@Joe-Bouza wrote:
Add the scalelistedt parameters to your acaddoc.lsp

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What do you mean by this? I am leary of trying to edit any out of the box files in our office. 

[Joe-Bouza]

The intention of it being there is to be modified by the user.

http://www.jtbworld.com/lisp/acaddoc.htm

[Cadguru42]

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@Joe-Bouza wrote:

The intention of it being there is to be modified by the user.

http://www.jtbworld.com/lisp/acaddoc.htm

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What I meant by that is that I don't want to have to have a custom file to distribute for everyone in our office. There isn't an out of the box method of not letting ACAD read XREF scales first? Why would Autodesk make a field read a different scale from what the actual object's property is set to? 

[Joe-Bouza]

That would be the OOTB method.

We put the acaddoc.lsp file on the server and set its location in the top of the search path on all work stations (this can be incorporated into deployments) .

[Cadguru42]

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@Joe-Bouza wrote:

That would be the OOTB method.

We put the acaddoc.lsp file on the server and set its location in the top of the search path on all work stations (this can be incorporated into deployments) .

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I've never used LISP, so now I'm going to have to learn how to program in LISP in order to fix this? 

[Joe-Bouza]

Didn't mean to intimidate; I could'nt program lisp if you held a gun to my head. I got this info from the good folks here on the boards.

Paste this into a notepad file and save as acaddoc.lsp to your server. I have the other 3 lines in it to take care of other annoying things. Make sure you add the location to the top of the search path in options.

(command "-scalelistedit" "r" "y" "e")
(command "rasterpercent" "90")
(command "rasterthreshold" "100")
(setvar "geomarkervisibility" 0)

[joelmaxwell]

Here is what works for me.

scalelistedit,

make sure the the scale you want is in the list,

using the up and down buttons to the right move the "_xref" scale to the bottom

move the scales you want it to read first to the top.

Then I select "standard scale" when selecting the field option 

hope it helps someone.

[jmayo-EE]

Did you try using Standard Scale instead of Custom Scale in the field?

[Cadguru42]

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@jmayo wrote:
Did you try using Standard Scale instead of Custom Scale in the field?

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That's what I use, Standard Scale. With 2015 this doesn't happen all the time in every drawing, but some still do read the XREF scale first. It's annoying.

[BrianOBoatright]

Not to hijack this thread, but this problem still exists for me in 2016.

I've tried Joe Bouza's method and the others, and I notice the problem goes away when I open the drawing, and is gone when I plot the individual layout (right-click print on the layout tab).

But whenever I plot a batch of sheets through the sheet set manager, the problem still occurs.

Every single time.

Very annoying.

[Joe-Bouza]

I believe the culprit in these cases are users adding the scale to their drawing, with all good intention, but hose up the works. If the Scale is created ever so slightly different then the original the XREF will appear, If I recall correctly. I combated this by setting the scales in the prototype to dissuade users from entering a scale. Additionally, reseting the scale list on open should prevent teh occurance ( i.e. acaddoc.lisp}

1'' = 20'

or

1" = 20'

very subtle but will cause the miscommunication with SSM

[BrianOBoatright]

Very good point.  But it begs the question:  why allow customizing the scale list if it causes these kinds of errors?

And I do reset the scale list through my acaddoc.lsp.  I still have the problem.

In my case I have narrowed it down to an interesting observation.  In paperspace, if I activate a viewport and then Qsave the drawing, all the scales in my view labels update correctly. 

When I switch back to paperspace out of the viewport and hit Qsave the problem reappears.  See if it doesn't do that for you too.

Damned annoying since the SSM plots through the layouts and therefore the file is saved in Pspace mode.

[jdwoodWJ4HH]

I have this same problem in AutoCAD 2017 and in Autodesk AutoCAD Civil 3d 2017. Any new news on how to correct this annoying problem?

[Cadguru42]

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@jdwoodWJ4HH wrote:

I have this same problem in AutoCAD 2017 and in Autodesk AutoCAD Civil 3d 2017. Any new news on how to correct this annoying problem?

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Autodesk doesn't consider this a problem, so they won't ever fix it. The only thing I've found after 3 years is to just make sure the XREF scales are below the main one in the list that shows up in the SCALELISTEDIT dialog. 

[cwr-pae]

Go to edit the scale list, move all -Xref scales to the bottom of the list. ACAD will read the list from top to bottom and use the first scale with properties that match those of the vport. And check the source xref, make sure the properties match the viewport in the client. You may have to reset the annotation and standard sales of the view port to clear the xref (one of them stays with the setting regardless of order of scale list). Any of this shouldn't need to be done more than once.

[jdwoodWJ4HH]

Obviously I do not understand this xref scale list in the first place. In my mind I have convinced myself this should not be a problem unless one were to create a custom scale in the xref file. So I must be missing some train of logic here since this is not true in this case. For the record both of these files were originally created with autodesk's own dwt file. Specifically this one _AutoCAD Civil 3D (Imperial) NCS.dwt. So why does the reference file create a "custom" scale at all? If both files have the exact same scales list isn't the one labeled xref just redundant? Therefore in my humble opinion if the Autodesk development team does not see this as a problem then they are simply wrong. It would seem to be a fairly simple matter to correct the code. If scale list "A" is = to scale list "B" ignore scale list b or use scale list "A". I can not help but to wonder if the development team understands structured logic? Surely they understand this is a "problem". That being said ignoring it for three releases is inexcusable.

[cwr-pae]

The only time ACAD creates a -xref scale is when the current scale in the xref does not exist in the client. The difference can be in the name, in the properties or both and can be minor. I have never had an xref scale created except under those circumstances.

[Cadguru42]

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@cwr wrote:

The only time ACAD creates a -xref scale is when the current scale in the xref does not exist in the client. The difference can be in the name, in the properties or both and can be minor. I have never had an xref scale created except under those circumstances.

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That doesn't happen with me. I can create two or more drawings using the same template with the same scale lists and when one is XREF'd into another a second duplicate scale with _XREF is created. My original post had two drawings created from the exact same template with the same scale list names.