thumbnails as System.Drawing.Image

[DynamicObjects]

Please upgrade Inventor to use System.Drawing.Image for thumbnails instead of the old deprecated stdole.IPictureDisp format?

The stdole.IPictureDisp format means that all thumbnails must be converted by convoluted AxHost wrapper class each time before they can be used.

[DynamicObjects]

The stdole.IPictureDisp format means that all thumbnails must be converted by convoluted AxHost wrapper class each time before they can be used.

[Anonymous]

Since Inventor uses IPictureDisp, any developer making an addin will have to use code to convert to this format.  Wouldn't it make sense to include this conversion directly in the Inventor API?  

I know about the blog post with the class to convert: http://modthemachine.typepad.com/my_weblog/2012/02/bitmaps-without-vb6-icontoipicture.html

Every Inventor developer currently includes this code, or their own version of it.  It might also be convenient to have Inventor auto-scale the image to the proper size (like it did in 2012, but does not in 2013). See this post for that discussion: http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/Autodesk-Inventor-Customization/Inventor-2013-addin-Icons-displays-too...

Better yet, just support icons natively...

[adam.nagy]

The only problem is that Inventor has a COM API and there I think the only way to expose an image that is accessible from other processes as well and from any language that supports COM (C++, .NET, VB6, JavaScript, etc) is to use IPictureDisp. If you can point out another way of doing that then we could have a look at that.
What we could do is add the conversion class to the add-in created by the Add-In Wizard. Would that be good enough?

[thom-g]

The old IPictureDisp is impractical when you're writing add-ins in .Net.

Please replace it with a default .Net object as it is done in the AutoCAD API.

E.g. the AutoCAD API uses for a ribbon button (Autodesk.Windows.RibbonButton) the System.Windows.Media.ImageSource class, which is still supported by .Net 4 or newer.

[inv.ideareview]

Thanks for sharing your Idea. We use this forum to guide product development and help users in the best way we can based on voting. We occasionally merge Ideas or archive old ones to keep the forum working properly- it ensures there is room for people to review new Ideas and that the most relevant and meaningful ones can gain votes. We’re archiving this Idea because it's been on the board for well over a year and hasn't received many votes from the community. If you want to raise it again and try to gain more support, you're welcome to do so. We’ve found that pictures and mock-ups can help get concepts across and win more votes from other users. If you have questions or see a connection between this Idea and others, let us know. - Inventor product team (Inv.idea review)