Export Parts List as Shown in Drawing

[Anonymous]

Hey all,

I've been dabbling in VB.Net to export a parts list from an AutoCAD Mechanical drawing to an Excel sheet, and it has been successfully exporting. However, my problem I've been running into is that what the list looks like in the export is variable to what the drawing displays. There's sometimes extra columns (some I can easily check for and delete, but others I can't anticipate like an extra part column from previous revisions), and sometimes the columns aren't in the right order. Normally I could just give an array of the column headers and order them accordingly, but some drawings have more or less columns than others. So, to put it simply, I'm wondering if there is a way to programmatically export the parts list as it shows in the drawing and not get all the excess data?

I've posted the class I have been using below to do this. Any help you could provide would be appreciated!

'Contains the AutoCAD Type Library
Imports Autodesk.AutoCAD.Interop
'Contains the AutoCAD/ObjectDBX Type Library
Imports Autodesk.AutoCAD.Interop.Common
Imports Autodesk.AutoCAD.ApplicationServices
Imports SymBBAuto

Public Class ExportParts


    Dim FullPathName As String = "C:\Users\nicholas.biggs\Documents\VBNet_test.csv"
    Dim BomName As String = "MAIN"
    Dim acadApp As AcadApplication = Application.AcadApplication
    Dim acadDoc As AcadDocument = acadApp.ActiveDocument

    <Autodesk.AutoCAD.Runtime.CommandMethod("GetTheParts")> _
    Public Sub GetTheParts()
        'Code adapted from: https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/net/autocad-mechanical-automatic-parts-list-extraction-c/td-p/6374100
        '   by shaffer_nathan.
        ' --------------------------------------------------------------
        ' Get the Surface Texture Library Object
        Try
            ' Get Interface to SymbolBBMMgr
            Dim I_symBBmgr3 As IMcadSymbolBBMgr3 = Nothing
            I_symBBmgr3 = acadDoc.Application.GetInterfaceObject("SymBBAuto.McadSymbolBBMgr")

            ' Get Interface to BOMMgr from the active document
            Dim I_cadBOMmgr3 As SymBBAuto.IMcadBOMMgr3 = Nothing
            I_cadBOMmgr3 = I_symBBmgr3.BOMMgr(acadDoc)

            ' Save the Contents to Non-Interface variable
            Dim cadBOMmgr As SymBBAuto.McadBOMMgr = Nothing
            cadBOMmgr = I_cadBOMmgr3

            ' Dispose of the Interfaces
            I_symBBmgr3 = Nothing
            I_cadBOMmgr3 = Nothing

            ' Check if BOMName exists in Table
            If cadBOMmgr.BOMTableExists(BomName) Then
                ' Get the BOMTable by name (Non-Interface Variable)
                Dim cadBom As SymBBAuto.McadBOM = Nothing
                cadBom = cadBOMmgr.GetBOMTableByName(BomName)

                If cadBom IsNot Nothing Then
                    'Idea for sorting export: http://adndevblog.typepad.com/manufacturing/autocad-mechanical/
                    'Dim item As SymBBAuto.McadBOMItem
                    For Each item As SymBBAuto.McadBOMItem In cadBom.Items
                        Dim p As Long : p = Val(item.ItemNumber)
                        If p > 0 Then item.SortPriority = p
                    Next

                    cadBom.applySort()
                    cadBOMmgr.ExportBOM2(SymBBAuto.McadBOMExportFormatType.exCSV, cadBom, FullPathName, "Main", True)
                End If
            End If

        Catch acEx As Autodesk.AutoCAD.Runtime.Exception
            ' Write Error Message
            MsgBox(acEx.Message)
        Catch ex As System.Exception
            ' Write Error Message
            MsgBox(ex.Message)
        End Try
    End Sub
End Class

Thanks,

Nic Biggs