Xref Layer Color (Back to original color)

[JBR-1]

Is there a way to revert back to the original colors of an xref besides having to reattach the xref and purging the DWG.

I always change the colors of the projects Existing site/utilty XREF to color 252 to shade it back to have the proposed show up darker. But I try to select all layers to change the colors back to what they were before and the box to set color by layer is not available.

Thank You

[Ed.McGriskin · Accepted solution]

If the layer colors are set correctly in the xref, you could use the visretain setting to reset back to those colors. 

[Jay_B · Accepted solution]

Temporarily set VISRETAIN to zero.

Reload the Xref's you want to inherit the Xref drawing color settings.

Change visretain back to 1 so any additional color assignments in current drawing are maintained.

[troma · Accepted solution]

Careful with that, VISRETAIN will also set all layers to whatever state they are in in the x-reffed drawing— ON/OFF FREEZE/THAW settings etc.

So perhaps the best way is to save a layerstate as is in your drawing, but don't save 'color ' in the layerstate. Then switch VISRETAIN to 0, reload the x-ref (or close the drawing and reopen it), and switch VISRETAIN back to 1 again. Then restore your layerstate so your layers are set as you need them, and just the colours will reflect your x-ref.

[Ed.McGriskin]

Good point troma. I typically don't have layers that I freeze/turn off in my base xrefs which is why I forgot to mention that. 

[troma]

Another option I have sometimes used it to set the colours for some objects individually, not ByLayer.  Typically I will do this if it is something simple that I need to change the colour of, and I don't want to go through 15 drawings changing the layer colour or messing with VISRETAIN.  If you do the colour this way it will automatically propagate to all drawings that reference it—because the colour is not ByLayer it ignores the colour setting for the layer in the host drawings.

[pmhisha]

Thanks its very usefull

[pmhisha]

Thanks its very useful. may i know how to save layerstate without color?

[troma]

@pmhisha expand out the dialog box and choose the setting you want to use before hitting 'Save'

 

[galvandelima]

Just Had this problem using FDOT Template

To change this setup, go to Layer Properties, click on setting right at the upper right corner of the window and change xref layer settings from don't retain overrides to refer layer properties to retain overrides.

[curtisclark]

I think this is what you are looking for (link below, post #10):

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/civil-3d-forum/visretain/m-p/9207520/highlight/true#M413377

It is a function called 'Reset Xref Layer Properties' and is a quick way to reset xref layer properties to those of the base drawing, without affecting viewport overrides (something VISRETAIN can't currently accomplish in any state).

Check it out and let me know if it helped you!

[kira.hunt]

This solution doesn't appear to work in CAD version 2018 - but I found something that does. 

I opened a blank CAD file and xrefed my base into it and then created a layerstate from this file in modelspace (note: no overrides in the layerstate).  I exported that layerstate.  Then open my original file that has the xref with layer colours overriden.  In modelspace, I import the new layerstate I just created.   

And voila - my modelspace is correct again, but all of my viewport overrides stay as is.  It's kind of annoying, but simpler than the VISRETAIN route where I have to re-freeze layers and fix layerweights etc in every viewport ever.  

[mariomtzb89]

gracias, me fue de gran utilidad.

[lilyflanigan]

In the layer properties manager, expand Xref node, right click the file you want to revert back to original colors, hover over Reset Xref Layer Properties, select Color. The colors will revert back to original colors assigned in the Xref file. Just discovered this myself, very simple after all!