Dynamic Blocks & Scaling prompt/pull down

[Anonymous]

Sorry this may be a little long winded but here it goes.

I just started getting back into Civil 3D after a long hiatus of being out of the engineering business.  I am a novice with Civil 3D but I have been making good headway.  I recently got a new job and replaced another drafter who was apparently a 'CAD genius'.

Here is my scenario.  The 'CAD genius', whom I never met nor have spoken to, had set up a tool palette with some custom dynamic blocks (a concept that is new to me and I just recently learned about) that are used to show various symbols on our plans.  When inserting the blocks, I would click on whichever block I wanted to use and it would automatically pop up with a pull down menu asking me to select the scale of the drawing that block would be appearing in.  The options in the pull down included various scales (1"=10', 1"=20', etc.).

QUESTION 1 Is this pop up pull down menu with the scales that appears after selecting a dynamic block something that is within the AutoCAD software or a custom prompt made by this other drafter?

QUESTION 2 Does anyone know what I am speaking of and possibly how to recreate this?

PROBLEM I recently edited one of the dynamic blocks and added a new visibility state to include an additional component/option in the block.  I used block editor and it told me that it had authoring elements and I said yes/ok.  I made my edits saved the block and went on my way.  The issue is that now when I select any of the dynamic blocks from the tool palette, it no longer pops up with the scale prompt but rather this message appears "Warning and error occurred during save. We recommend that you run RECOVER on the drawing".

It doesn't seem to affect the drawing that I am inserting the block into so I'm not so much worried about that.  But I would like to get the dynamic blocks to operate properly with the scale prompts again.  I am just not familiar enough with dynamic blocks or this scale prompt to figure out how to get it to work again.  Google has not been much help in this case.

I am hoping that someone with more experience here in the forums knows what I am talking about regarding the scale prompts and might be able to help me get the blocks working again.  Unfortunately, I did not think ahead and didn't make a copy of the blocks before tinkering with them.  The save/recover warning seems to me like it has more to do with the dynamic blocks and less to do with the drawing I am inserting them into. One, because the error message comes up when inserting these dynamic blocks into any drawing and two, the error message pops up instead of the scale prompt and I feel like the scale prompt has something to do with it.  What I find odd is that I only edited one block and now several of the blocks come up with this error message. I am honestly at a loss, hence my message! PLEASE HELP!

[Libbya]

The tool palette will be sourcing its block definitions from somewhere.  That source file or files are probably where the recovery needs to occur.  You probably know this, but it is always good practice to make sure there is a backup of any blocks, tools, files, etc...  before editing them, especially if you are not the one who created them in the first place.

If the scale menu popped up automatically it is probably not out-of-the-box autocad.  A grip to click on to access a pulldown menu would likely be stock.

[kasperwuyts]

Can you remember specifically if the scale prompt was the one as seen in my attached screenshot?

If not, I have a small hunch that your tool palette doesn't actually contain blocks but instead are custom commands that your 'cad genius' made. Try right clicking on one of the blocks in the palette, go to properties, and post the resulting screen here.

[Charles_Shade]

And to add to the discussion here:

Typically when the prompt to ...contains authoring elements. Open in block Editor? comes up and the DynBlk has been INSERTed into the Container File (i.e the file you opened) you will get a DynBlk that opens in the BE but is not the DynBlk you want. There may be orphaned Actions or missing Parameters or Actions that you know should be there. If unsure type NO at the prompt, if the BE opens close it. Type BE and then choose the Block you want. Make sure you know which DynBlk you are working on. You may very well have not revised the original DynBlk. It may be that there has been a change in the Container File therefore your prompts may have been lost.

Is there a DWG file that you know contains the Block this DynBlk was before you revised it? Maybe find an "original" that way?

A Container File: being a Drawing file, with a single but more often several DynBlks in it.