iLogic Parts List & Opening Drawings

[Anonymous]

We have created parts lists with all the sorting that we want. Now we would like to go through each line of the parts list an open each individual part print through iLogic. We know how to do everything but get the drawings to open. We can retrieve information from the part iProperties, but we can't retrieve part path (either through iProperties or by other means).

We are using oPartList.PartsListRows.Count to run a loop through our sorted parts list. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Again we are reading the part numbers from the parts list and want to open the associated part drawings.

Thanks,

Allen

[Curtis_Waguespack]

Hi allen.knapp,

I think this can be done but not directly through the the parts list. Can you post the iLogic code you have so far?

Basically, you should be able to itereate through the assembly and use the FullFileName propety to get the path of each occurence, and then match it to the part number in the parts list and write it to that row.

You might give a description of the "big picture" goal as well, as currently the idea of adding the file path to the parts list seems like a unique request, and there might simply be another altenative approach.

I hope this helps.
Best of luck to you in all of your Inventor pursuits,
Curtis
http://inventortrenches.blogspot.com

[Anonymous]

So the big picture is that we want to take a sorted parts list and make PDF of every drawing in order as they appear on the parts list (for manufacturing purposes). I actually was able to get this accomplished this morning with more research and looking in the Community Resources and Programming Help. This is the method that I found worked for what we need to do... It does assume that a parts list is in the drawing and that each part print is in the same location as the part model. Both of which work fine for us. I have some programming background, but am by no means a programmer. There might be other ways to get the task accomplished, but this is working for us now.

Dim oDrawDoc As DrawingDocument = ThisApplication.ActiveDocument
Dim oDrawingView As DrawingView
Dim oSheet As Sheet = oDrawDoc.ActiveSheet
Dim oPartList As PartsList

oPartList = oSheet.PartsLists(1)
 
oDrgPrintMgr = oDrawDoc.PrintManager
oDrgPrintMgr.Printer = "PDFCreator"
oDrgPrintMgr.PrintRange = kPrintAllSheets
oDrgPrintMgr.AllColorsAsBlack = False
oDrgPrintMgr.ScaleMode = kPrintBestFitScale 'oDrgPrintMgr.ScaleMode = kPrintModel
oDrgPrintMgr.ColorMode = kPrintDefaultColorMode
oDrgPrintMgr.PaperSize = SizeActiveSheet
oDrgPrintMgr.SubmitPrint

Dim drawBomRow As DrawingBOMRow
Dim refDoc As Document

For Each oPartListRow In oPartList.PartsListRows
	If oPartListRow.Visible = "True" And oPartListRow.Custom = "False" Then
		Try
		drawBomRow = oPartListRow.ReferencedRows.Item(1)
		refDoc = drawBomRow.BOMRow.ComponentDefinitions.Item(1).Document
		FilePath = refDoc.FullFileName()
		FilePath = Left(FilePath,Len(FilePath)-3) & "idw"
		ThisApplication.Documents.Open(FilePath,True)
		Dim oDrawDoc2 As DrawingDocument = ThisApplication.ActiveDocument
		oDrgPrintMgr2 = oDrawDoc2.PrintManager
		oDrgPrintMgr2.Printer = "PDFCreator"
		oDrgPrintMgr2.PrintRange = kPrintAllSheets
		oDrgPrintMgr2.AllColorsAsBlack = False
		oDrgPrintMgr2.ScaleMode = kPrintBestFitScale 'oDrgPrintMgr.ScaleMode = kPrintModel
		oDrgPrintMgr2.ColorMode = kPrintDefaultColorMode
		oDrgPrintMgr2.PaperSize = SizeActiveSheet
		oDrgPrintMgr2.SubmitPrint
		ThisApplication.ActiveDocument.Close(True)
		Catch
		drawBomRow = oPartListRow.ReferencedRows.Item(1)
		refDoc = drawBomRow.BOMRow.ComponentDefinitions.Item(1).Document
		FilePath = refDoc.FullFileName()
		FilePath = Left(FilePath,Len(FilePath)-3) & "idw"
		MessageBox.Show(FilePath, "File Not Found")		
		End Try
	End If
Next

[Anonymous]

So I thought I would expand a little further in case someone in the future comes across this and wants to do something similar. Some of our drawings are on different size sheets (Letter, 11x17, ANSI D) so i'm reading the sheet size from each drawing file and converting that according to the PaperSize Enumerator from the programming help. The code isn't perfect - if anything in the "Try" section fails, it will say "File Not Found" even if it actually did find the file. But this is a very good start to what we need to accomplish.

Dim oDrawDoc As DrawingDocument = ThisApplication.ActiveDocument
Dim oDrawingView As DrawingView
Dim oSheet As Sheet = oDrawDoc.ActiveSheet
Dim oPartList As PartsList

oPartList = oSheet.PartsLists(1)
 
oDrgPrintMgr = oDrawDoc.PrintManager
oDrgPrintMgr.Printer = "PDFCreator"
oDrgPrintMgr.PrintRange = kPrintAllSheets
oDrgPrintMgr.AllColorsAsBlack = False
oDrgPrintMgr.ScaleMode = kPrintBestFitScale 'oDrgPrintMgr.ScaleMode = kPrintModel
oDrgPrintMgr.ColorMode = kPrintDefaultColorMode
oDrgPrintMgr.PaperSize = SizeActiveSheet
oDrgPrintMgr.SubmitPrint

Dim drawBomRow As DrawingBOMRow
Dim refDoc As Document

For Each oPartListRow In oPartList.PartsListRows
	If oPartListRow.Visible = "True" And oPartListRow.Custom = "False" Then
		Try
		drawBomRow = oPartListRow.ReferencedRows.Item(1)
		refDoc = drawBomRow.BOMRow.ComponentDefinitions.Item(1).Document
		FilePath = refDoc.FullFileName()
		FilePath = Left(FilePath,Len(FilePath)-3) & "idw"
		ThisApplication.Documents.Open(FilePath,True)
		Dim oDrawDoc2 As DrawingDocument = ThisApplication.ActiveDocument
		
		'use PaperSizeEnum from inventor programming help
		PageSize = oDrawDoc2.ActiveSheet.Size
		If PageSize = 9990 Then
			PageSize = 14347
		End If
		If PageSize = 9987 Then
			PageSize = 14353
		End If
		If PageSize = 9988 Then
			PageSize = 14338
		End If
		
		oDrgPrintMgr2 = oDrawDoc2.PrintManager
		oDrgPrintMgr2.Printer = "PDFCreator"
		oDrgPrintMgr2.PrintRange = kPrintAllSheets
		oDrgPrintMgr2.AllColorsAsBlack = False
		oDrgPrintMgr2.ScaleMode = kPrintBestFitScale 'oDrgPrintMgr.ScaleMode = kPrintModel
		oDrgPrintMgr2.ColorMode = kPrintDefaultColorMode
		oDrgPrintMgr2.PaperSize = PageSize
		oDrgPrintMgr2.SubmitPrint
		ThisApplication.ActiveDocument.Close(True)
		Catch
		drawBomRow = oPartListRow.ReferencedRows.Item(1)
		refDoc = drawBomRow.BOMRow.ComponentDefinitions.Item(1).Document
		FilePath = refDoc.FullFileName()
		FilePath = Left(FilePath,Len(FilePath)-3) & "idw"
		MessageBox.Show(FilePath, "File Not Found")		
		End Try
	End If
Next

[rjay75]

If you're just trying to save a pdf file honoring the papersizes and the PDFCreator printer isn't adding anything special to the pdfs you can use the builtin pdf exporter in Inventor. 

Here's code to export a drawing document as a pdf excluding non printing sheets.

ThisDoc.Document can be replaced by oDrawDoc2 in your code.

SyntaxEditor Code Snippet

Dim ctx As TranslationContext = ThisApplication.TransientObjects.CreateTranslationContext()
ctx.Type = IOMechanismEnum.kFileBrowseIOMechanism
Dim nvp As NameValueMap = ThisApplication.TransientObjects.CreateNameValueMap()
Dim dm As DataMedium = ThisApplication.TransientObjects.CreateDataMedium()
Dim _pdfAddin As TranslatorAddIn = ThisApplication.ApplicationAddIns.ItemById("{0AC6FD96-2F4D-42CE-8BE0-8AEA580399E4}")

If _pdfAddin.HasSaveCopyAsOptions(dwgDoc, ctx, nvp) Then
    nvp.Value("Launch_Viewer") = 0
    nvp.Value("All_Color_AS_Black") =  1
    nvp.Value("Remove_Line_Weights") =  0
    nvp.Value("Vector_Resolution") = 600
    nvp.Value("Publish_3D_Models") = 0
    nvp.Value("Override_Sheet_Color") = 1
    nvp.Value("Sheet_Color") = &HFFFFFF

    nvp.Value("Publish_All_Sheets") = 0
    nvp.Value("Publish_Mode") = DWFPublishModeEnum.kCustomDWFPublish
    nvp.Value("Sheet_Range") = PrintRangeEnum.kPrintSheetRange
    Dim sheets As NameValueMap = ThisApplication.TransientObjects.CreateNameValueMap()
    Dim sheetInfo As NameValueMap = Nothing
    Dim cSheet As Integer = 1
    For Each sheet As Sheet In ThisDoc.Document.Sheets
        'Include If Not excluded Or include no Print Is checked.
        If Not sheet.ExcludeFromPrinting
            sheetInfo = ThisApplication.TransientObjects.CreateNameValueMap()
            sheetInfo.Value("Name") = sheet.Name
            cSheet = cSheet + 1
            sheets.Value("Sheet" & cSheet) = sheetInfo
        End If
    Next
    nvp.Value("Sheets") = sheets
End If
Dim fileName = ThisDoc.Document.FullFileName
dm.FileName = String.Format("{0}\\{1}.pdf", System.IO.Path.GetDirectoryName(fileName), System.IO.Path.GetFileNameWithoutExtension(fileName))
_pdfAddin.SaveCopyAs(ThisDoc.Document, ctx, nvp, dm)

[Anonymous]

yes I have used the PDF add in with the SaveCopyAs command... however, printing all sheets to our printer called PDFCreator allows us to merge all of the individual sheets into a single document.

The PDFCreator waits while the iLogic code opens and prints every part drawing. When the code is finished, it leaves open a PDF Creator window showing all the documents. We can select merge to make the separate documents into one document with multiple pages. It works well for our needs.