Added lisp routine, hatch styles disappeared. Related?

[Anonymous]

I added 2 lisp files that create custom plywood to our Autocad 2016 in my office. The two desktop computers are running it fine, but two laptop computers running different Windows versions have lost all hatch variants inside the program. As in, they no longer exist. I understand that I can re-load the acadiso files but I don't understand how the lisp could have removed the hatch files. I added the folder that contains our lisp files to the search path in the options folder, and added the necessary lisp files to the startup suite. I understand that startup suite causes problems for some people, but again I don't understand how. Any help would be greatly appreciated. 

[paullimapa]

Are all the computers running the same AutoCAD versions?  What Windows version are the desktop computers running vs the Latops?

When you mention Hatch Styles, do you mean the custom Hatch PAT files that contain the pattern definitions?

Perhaps you can include a screen capture to describe what you are seeing?

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[hugha · Accepted solution]

Could the Lisp routine be creating hatch patterns to append to an existing ACAD.PAT or ACADISO.PAT by some means within its code?  All going well on the Desktop because the file locations and search path match the assumptions contained within the Lisp. If the Laptops do not agree, then the Lisp may be creating a new ACAD.PAT or ACADISO.PAT by appending to an empty file in its expected location rather than the correct location, then setting the search path accordingly.so while the pre-existing patterns remain on the laptop, AutoCAD cannot find them because the search path has moved.

Search for all .PAT files on your desktop and on your laptop. Check for any difference in the pre-existing hatch file location between the desktop and the laptop. Different Windows versions may place them differently. 

Check the Lisp routine to find its expectation of where the pattern files should be and adjust if necessary to suit differing circumstances.

PS Offhand, I'd just copy the patterns this Lisp generates to individual custom pattern files stored in a separate directory on the search path once and for all - then unload and archive the Lisp for reuse if you ever need to regenerate the patterns.  

[DannyNL]

Please remember that when you login and logout on a corporate Windows environment, some settings/files will be loaded and saved from/to the network.

Example: in our case at my company, the user registry is loaded and saved from our network profile. This means that if I run AutoCAD for the first time on PC X and AutoCAD creates my profile, then AutoCAD will point to specific file locations in my local Windows profile. If I now logout on PC X (will write the registry part back to the network, but not the files) and login on PC Y were I never before used AutoCAD, I will get a lot of errors and missing files. This is caused as the registry points to folders and files, that existed on PC X but were never before initialized on PC Y.

What you can try to do is to use 'Reset Settings To Default' from your All Programs --> Autodesk.

Optionally you can first export and after resetting import your AutoCAD profiles.

Key is to trigger AutoCAD's secondary installer on the laptop to copy all the necessary default folders and files to your own Windows profile.

[Anonymous]

Yes, all computers are running the same Autocad versions. The two desktops run windows 7 and the laptops run Windows 10. You are correct, I meant the  hatch pat files that have the patterns. I fixed the problem by simply adding the acadiso.pat and acad.pat files to the search folder at the top of the queue, but I still don't understand how adding the lisp routines could have affected this. But, the timing is way too coincidental for it not to be related.

[Anonymous]

There are individual Autocad profiles at each station, and we do not connect via any Windows network. We use a cloud based server to share files, but each Autocad station is connected solely to the computer of that employee. Thanks for the advice.