There was a thread a while back where I complained the Publish tool did not use cached xrefs.
@BlackBox_ suggested I use coreconsole and run in parallel for fastest plotting.
Hmm, not the worst idea, but I was not great at using .net for parallel tasks. I had done it, but from a sample that I had to relearn each time and I was not sure if it was the best way.
This is where chatgpt has changed everything. You still have to have decent programming skills, but you can navigate things you may not normally try. Its part of the reason this is open source. You can discuss the code with it and add and modify stuff pretty easily.
So we put together what I call the "CoreConsole Scripter", and posted runtime and source here:
It has a windows exe that can run any autocad core console version.
It also has a plotting helper (acad 20-22 to 2024 currently) that can scan dwg's for layouts, and then plot them when ready. I can update to 2025 and 2026 easily, wanted to get this posted though.
Once you get it going, it plots 12 to 32 drawings at once.
Yes folks, at once. I have 32 cores so commonly plot a whole planset in 1 minute.
You will never want Publish command again.
It makes separate pdfs. You will merge them once done with your pdf tools.
Dialog looks like this:
You configure with coreconsole path, profile name, and however you want the core console windows to run.
Then pick a script for your paper size and situation, and plot (output) folder.
Then select drawings, and say yes to "enumerate..." box as it must read the layout names from drawings.
It adds one row per layout, or one row per drawing if plotting modelspace.
Then hit run and watch it spit out plots like it had them already done.
The thing with this tool is you need to spend some time testing it to make sure the profile you use is working and can load the plot helper dll. You can check the "Keep windows open" box to see the command line, and what its saying.
Then you spend some time understanding the script, and that its using named page setups from template drawings, and that you could use any drawing, maybe sheet 1 of your planset, like publish.
Once you have that, you can use the tool to run multiple coreconsoles in parallel.
The box on upper right is the core count you have, keep it as is.
The documentation on it is through chatgpt. Use phrase "Core Console Scripter" and ask it about basics, and setup steps. I assume lots of feedback about confusion, as I am not sure how to best guide people to getting it set up. Note that its not just for plottting. You may want to use a script with just QSAVE as a test.
Hopefully this will be the beginning of standard way of batching through dwg's, since its so fast.
Its also a great .net example program IMO. See what you think.
