topic How to insert an entity from another drawing using vb.net in stand-alone program in .NET Forum

How to insert an entity from another drawing using vb.net in stand-alone program

Anonymous — Thu, 29 May 2014 11:59:18 GMT

Hello, I'm wondering how to get a point from the user to insert an entity into a drawing from another drawing using vb.net in a stand-alone program. I'm having to write this as a stand alone program because this is only a small portion of my overall program and I'm interfacing with 3 other softwares besides Autocad. I know how to do this when writing the vb program as a dll and how to do it in AutoLisp but not as a stand alone vb program. Any help would be appreciated. Thank you.

Re: How to insert an entity from another drawing using vb.net in stand-alone pro

Mikko — Thu, 29 May 2014 20:34:34 GMT

You need to prompt the user for a point:
Dim insertionPnt = AcadDoc.Utility.GetPoint(, "Enter a point: ")

Then get block ref into your drawing:
Dim AcadApp As AcadApplication = CType(GetObject(, "AutoCAD.Application.?"), AcadApplication)

Dim TargetDoc As AcadDocument = AcadApp.ActiveDocument
Dim DbxDoc As Object = AcadApp.GetInterfaceObject("ObjectDBX.AxDbDocument.?")
DbxDoc.Open("the_Source_FileName")
Dim Objects(0) As Common.AcadBlock
For Each entry As Common.AcadBlock In CType(DbxDoc.Blocks, IEnumerable)
If (Not entry.IsLayout) AndAlso (Not entry.Name.StartsWith("*")) Then
Objects(0) = entry
DbxDoc.CopyObjects(CObj(Objects), TargetDoc.Blocks)
End If
Next entry

Then insert block into drawing at the prompted point:
AcadDoc.ModelSpace.InsertBlock(insertionPnt, "SomeBlock", 1#, 1#, 1#, 0)

I haven't done this in a while but I think this is all thats needed. Maybe somebody can give you more complete code to use but if you play around with this a bit you should be able to figure it out. Then again, I could be way off base 🙂

Re: How to insert an entity from another drawing using vb.net in stand-alone pro

Anonymous — Thu, 29 May 2014 21:22:47 GMT

That worked great! Here is what worked for me:

Dim acadapp As Autodesk.AutoCAD.Interop.AcadApplication = Nothing
        Dim acadDoc As Autodesk.AutoCAD.Interop.AcadDocument = Nothing

        Try
            acadapp = CType(GetObject(, "AutoCAD.Application"), Autodesk.AutoCAD.Interop.AcadApplication)
            acadDoc = CType(acadapp.ActiveDocument, Autodesk.AutoCAD.Interop.AcadDocument)

            If acadapp IsNot Nothing And acadDoc IsNot Nothing Then

                Dim insertionPT = acadDoc.Utility.GetPoint(, "Pick Insertion Point Between Radii At Bottom Of Pocket:")

                Dim DbxDoc As Object = acadapp.GetInterfaceObject("ObjectDBX.AxDbDocument.19")
                DbxDoc.Open("C:\Path_To_Block_Drawing.dwg")

                Dim Objects(0) As AcadBlock
                For Each entry As AcadBlock In CType(DbxDoc.Blocks, IEnumerable)
                    If (Not entry.IsLayout) AndAlso (Not entry.Name.StartsWith("*")) Then
                        Objects(0) = entry
                        DbxDoc.CopyObjects(CObj(Objects), acadDoc.Blocks)
                    End If
                Next entry

                acadDoc.ModelSpace.InsertBlock(insertionPT, "NameOfBlock", 1.0#, 1.0#, 1.0#, 0)                
            End If

        Catch InsertBlockError As Exception
            Debug.WriteLine(InsertBlockError)
        End Try

Thank You Very Much! I was starting to write a bunch of small AutoLisp programs that I would start with:

acadDoc.SendCommand("_startlispcommand ")

This will work much better for me and not require a bunch of AutoLisp program maintenence on our network. Thanks again!