How to work correctly with an annotative block in AutoCAD for Mac?

[sophieEK]

I have an annotative block set up which has suddenly stopped working in one drawing only. The enhanced attribute editor is not opening when I double click on the block. Instead it's saying 'select a block' and it won't select my block. I've checked other drawings and they are working fine. 

In the block pallet it's saying that the block is annotative and dynamic but in the block attribute manager is has 'no' against it (see image) but there doesn't seem to be an option to change this.

What else should I be checking?

@sophieEK 

The topic title has been edited to improve findability by @alina.balkanskaia. Original: annotative block

[maxim_k]

Hi @sophieEK ,

Please check that your annotative block is not nested inside another block.

As about the record in the Block Attribute Manager- it shows that on of the attributes inside this block doesn't have annotative property assigned.

Can you share the problem drawing with this block here?

[sophieEK]

I've literally just figured it out - I had layer 0 locked. The block is on a different layer but it obviously has some kind of link to layer 0. It's now working fine 🙄😅

Thanks for your help though. Be great if someone could explain how that works for future ref......

[maxim_k · Accepted solution]

Hi Sarah,

The block consists of objects located on layer 0, this is a common practice:

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/autocad/learn-explore/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2015/ENU/3PP-A...

So when you lock layer 0 - you cannot edit block attributes as they are on the locked layer inside block. AutoCAD gives you an alert in the Command window: "The object is on a locked layer."

So you need to avoid locking layer 0 because it's kind of a special layer in AutoCAD.

[sophieEK]

Thanks Maxim, I wasn't seeing the locked layer warning either as I'd reduced the command line. Thanks for explaining 😁

[alina.balkanskaia]

Hello, @sophieEK! Happy to see that you have found the correct answer here with the help of @maxim_k! Thank you for marking his reply as the Solution - it will help other users.