Notes on the philosophy of CUI

Anonymous · ‎05-07-2005

Most of us used to use Acad.mns as the root of our menu structure, and then
MenuLoad (partial) the rest of our menus. So this was the structure:

-Acad.mns
--Express.mns
--Custom.mns
--Office.mns

However, the CUI has flipped our tidy lives. And the tendency is to try to
shoehorn the CUI into how we've always done things. I propose an
alternative, taking advantage of the Enterprise CUI in the process.

It is no longer necessary to make Acad.cui the root of structure. Think
about it; we did that before so that we could always insure that at least
Acad's menu structure was there. But CUI does some undesired things if you
continue this approach. More will be said on that later. Instead, I
recommend making Custom.cui the main .cui file, and your Office.cui the
Enterprise .cui file.

-Custom.cui (Main)
-Office.cui (Enterprise)
--Acad
--Express

Why?

> Well, the Custom.cui can be modified by the user to their heart's content
> in most shops. So that's a good starting place. As CAD Managers we don't
> want the users mucking with the Acad.cui, but if you leave it as the main
> .cui file, it is going to get mucked up.

> With the Custom.cui as the main .cui file, the users can make their own
> workspaces, and stand a reasonable chance that their customizations make
> the next round of hardware/software upgrades. Far easier to backup/migrate
> the user's Custom.cui, IMHO, than worrying about a mucked up Acad.cui
> file.

> Making the Office.cui the Enterprise .cui file is an obvious choice. It
> will be read-only inside AutoCAD to the users, and any workspaces defined
> in the Office.cui are available to the user.

> If you need to run a test environment, say, a "vanilla" AutoCAD profile,
> and your normal profile, you are actually forced (!) not to use Acad.cui
> as you main .cui file. The reason for this is that you need the Acad.cui
> to be the main .cui file for the vanilla profile, but if you leave the
> Acad.cui as the main .cui file in your normal profile, changes you make to
> the CUI will be evident in the vanilla profile. The largest visible effect
> is that your Custom/Office.mnl files will execute in the vanilla profile,
> since the Custom/Office.cui files are MenuLoaded in the main Acad.cui
> file. This will "pollute" the Visual LISP environment in your nominally
> vanilla profile.

> And speaking of profiles, as a CAD Manager you can setup another profile
> that makes the Office.cui the main .cui file so that you, the CAD Manager,
> can edit the file!

I hope that this post helps you in your efforts with the CUI.

--
R. Robert Bell

Anonymous · ‎04-12-2006

No, you need both. But there are known issues with the beta of the 2.0
framework. You could download the latest from Microsoft.

--
R. Robert Bell

wrote in message news:5141209@discussion.autodesk.com...
Robert I do see that Microsoft .NET framework 2.0 is installed on my
computer. Is this what you mean and if so should I uninstall this. If so
this is a known conflict with 2007? I also have .NET 1.1 installed should I
remove that too?

Anonymous · ‎04-12-2006

when i go to download it it says that i already have it installed on my machine so i guess that's not it. what lead you to the bitmaps conclusion and .net conclusion? just out of curiousity should i path my bitmaps inside of the customization files section or under the main search path. i am guessing they added the bitmaps section so they could incorporate them into the migration wizard. i'll troubleshoot more tomorrow heading home now.

Anonymous · ‎04-12-2006

No need to go on a wild goose chase. This doesn't
have anything to do with the version of .NET, or if
a beta was installed (if a beta was installed, then
you wouldn't have gotten too far installing A2K7),
and whatever you do, *DO NOT* uninstall or try to
update any version of .NET (there are no updates
for 2.0 if I'm not mistaken).

When you select a node in the treeview that
cooresponds to a toolbar, the CUI editor shows a
'preview' of the toolbar on the right.

What is happening is that it is attempting to get
the images to display in the toolbar preview from
a list in memory, and the list does not contain the
number of images expected.

It could because they're not being found, or the
indices are corrupt; a defect in the CUI editor; a
corrupt CUI file or any number of other things.

The best chance you have is to ensure that the
images for the toolbar it is trying to display the
preview for are being found.

So, is this a custom toolbar with custom images,
or a stock toolbar with stock images (stock = the
ones that come with AutoCAD)?

--
http://www.caddzone.com

AcadXTabs: MDI Document Tabs for AutoCAD 2004/2005/2006/2007
http://www.acadxtabs.com

wrote in message news:5141213@discussion.autodesk.com...
when i go to download it it says that i already have it installed on my machine so i guess that's not it. what lead you to the bitmaps conclusion and .net conclusion? just out of curiousity should i path my bitmaps inside of the customization files section or under the main search path. i am guessing they added the bitmaps section so they could incorporate them into the migration wizard. i'll troubleshoot more tomorrow heading home now.

Anonymous · ‎04-13-2006

thanks for the input tony. i didn't touch my .net stuff.thanks for the explaination of what might be going on. this menu is a custom one with custom bitmaps. alot of the toolbars' bitmaps appear onscreen but does this mean they are being found, i suppose. some of the buttons show up as question marks though which is what i was trying to fix when i discovered this problem. so do you think i should attempt to rebuild this menu toolbar by toolbar? thanks again

Anonymous · ‎04-13-2006

Hello,

Bob pointed me at this thread and said you were having some issues. A couple
questions for you.

1. On your home system that is working, did you use the same menu and
toolbars? If yes then something is different on your work system so that
it's not finding the images. At least that is what it sounds like to me.
If you remove your custom CUI file does the exception go away?

2. Can you zip up the CUI files and any support files that they are using
and eMAIL them to me so that I can try to reproduce this error? Please send
it to bud@autodesk.com

3. As far as .NET goes, we have seen issues if people have used the BETA.
The MS uninstall was not always cleaning up every thing and we were seeing
crashes in some of the .NET specific applications. Microsoft had a cleanup
tool that could be downloaded from there WEB site. Then you would remove
.NET from your computer, run this tool and then install it back using the
shipping versions. That cleared up some issues when we were in BETA for
AutoCAD 2007.

But lets try to see what is different between your home system and office
system. That could help track down what this issue is.

Thanks

Bud Schroeder
AutoCAD Test Development
Autodesk Inc.

wrote in message news:5141758@discussion.autodesk.com...
thanks for the input tony. i didn't touch my .net stuff.thanks for the
explaination of what might be going on. this menu is a custom one with
custom bitmaps. alot of the toolbars' bitmaps appear onscreen but does this
mean they are being found, i suppose. some of the buttons show up as
question marks though which is what i was trying to fix when i discovered
this problem. so do you think i should attempt to rebuild this menu toolbar
by toolbar? thanks again

Anonymous · ‎04-13-2006

sorry bud you are too late. this morning i took parts i had backed up and rebuilt the menu. it seems to be working now. i am half glad that it's working and half sad that i don't know how it broke. i tell ya one thing i learned is backup more frequently because this shaky and can fail at any time. i guess you can understand us being protective of our tools which in many cases has taken years to gather. i'll keep you all posted on what's happening thanks again

Anonymous · ‎04-13-2006

Hello,

No problem. I was a CAD Manager for years and always had backups of my
customization just for issues like this ;-)...

Thanks again for letting us know your up and running. That is always good
news.

Bud

wrote in message news:5141989@discussion.autodesk.com...
sorry bud you are too late. this morning i took parts i had backed up and
rebuilt the menu. it seems to be working now. i am half glad that it's
working and half sad that i don't know how it broke. i tell ya one thing i
learned is backup more frequently because this shaky and can fail at any
time. i guess you can understand us being protective of our tools which in
many cases has taken years to gather. i'll keep you all posted on what's
happening thanks again

Anonymous · ‎04-13-2006

Changed your tune, eh?

--
R. Robert Bell

"Tony Tanzillo" wrote in message
news:5141392@discussion.autodesk.com...
No need to go on a wild goose chase. This doesn't
have anything to do with the version of .NET, or if
a beta was installed (if a beta was installed, then
you wouldn't have gotten too far installing A2K7),
and whatever you do, *DO NOT* uninstall or try to
update any version of .NET (there are no updates
for 2.0 if I'm not mistaken).

Anonymous · ‎04-18-2006

I'm having trouble with my POP501 menu when I switch between profiles - it works for 1 profile, but I can't get it to work for the other.
My cui structure is,
Profile1:
-DrawingOffice (Main)
-Client1(Enterprise)
-ACAD
-Express
-Custom1

Profile2:
-DrawingOffice (Main)
-Client2 (Enterprise)
-ACAD
-Express
-Custom1

I've done this so I can get different layer/line/text tools come up on the POP501 menu depending on which client I'm working for. Problem is tho, POP501 won't activate in the Profile2. At present I have the same details for the POP501 in both cui's,
name= Default Menu
aliases= POP502, CMDEFAULT
element ID= PM_0006

What am I doing wrong ? Is there a different way I should be trying to change my pop menu for different clients ?

thanks for any thoughts,
Talbot

Anonymous · ‎04-18-2006

sorry 1st post didn't quite display as I'd typed.....
Profile1:
-DrawingOffice (Main)
-Client1(Enterprise)
--ACAD
--Express
--Custom1

Profile2:
-DrawingOffice (Main)
-Client2 (Enterprise)
--ACAD
--Express
--Custom1

Anonymous · ‎04-18-2006

[my morning's been full of loose fingers & stray syntax....]

the actual details of my pop menus are,
name= Default Menu
aliases= POP501, CMDEFAULT
element ID= PM_0006

As you can see, I need some sage advice...thanks Talbot

Anonymous · ‎04-20-2006

Are all the shortcut menus located in Client2 for the 2nd profile? Due to
the way AutoCAD stores shortcut menus in the registry, all the shortcut
menus need to reside in one cui file.

If all the shortcut menus are in Client2.cui, then use the Menu command,
specifying Client2. This wakes up AutoCAD to the shortcut menus located
there.

--
R. Robert Bell

wrote in message news:5146669@discussion.autodesk.com...
I'm having trouble with my POP501 menu when I switch between profiles - it
works for 1 profile, but I can't get it to work for the other.
My cui structure is,
Profile1:
-DrawingOffice (Main)
-Client1(Enterprise)
-ACAD
-Express
-Custom1

Profile2:
-DrawingOffice (Main)
-Client2 (Enterprise)
-ACAD
-Express
-Custom1

I've done this so I can get different layer/line/text tools come up on the
POP501 menu depending on which client I'm working for. Problem is tho,
POP501 won't activate in the Profile2. At present I have the same details
for the POP501 in both cui's,
name= Default Menu
aliases= POP502, CMDEFAULT
element ID= PM_0006

What am I doing wrong ? Is there a different way I should be trying to
change my pop menu for different clients ?

thanks for any thoughts,
Talbot

Anonymous · ‎04-27-2006

thanks Robert , this did work. I was getting stuck on the fact that I would have to initiate the Menu cmd each time I switched the profile....but obviously once I had done this manually it got it going properly.....curiously enough it also meant that all other machines with same config worked without having to do a menuload as well (?)

BUT....I have a new & more serious problem - I am getting really bad delays when I use this menu/cui config. Undo of even a simple 2d rect takes 20 sec's. I've experimented making the cui files local - no difference , I've removed the custom shortcut menu from the cui's - no difference. When I switch to the default 'unnamed' profile, all works fine. Since my main/enterprise/partial cuis are set-up exactly the same way you suggested at the start, do you have any ideas why I may be having this problem, or have you heardopf any similar problems from other users ?

thanks,
Talbot

Anonymous · ‎05-01-2006

robert i was watching your presentation of the cui at au this weekend and have a question about the section where you were creating a tile menu. i was trying to create one but couldn't get it to popup.
i have a menu called dan and an alias called dan_images from memory here is what my deisel looked like

$I=dan dan_images $I.*

once again i'm doing this from memory but what does the end of that string look like because in the tutorial you never spelled it out. I have everything but it it doesn't pop up can you help me out?

Anonymous · ‎05-01-2006

I haven't experienced that here, or remember of anyone else running into
this.

Can you zip and post your cui file(s) and list the final structure you are
using?

--
R. Robert Bell

wrote in message news:5157628@discussion.autodesk.com...
thanks Robert , this did work. I was getting stuck on the fact that I
would have to initiate the Menu cmd each time I switched the profile....but
obviously once I had done this manually it got it going
properly.....curiously enough it also meant that all other machines with
same config worked without having to do a menuload as well (?)

BUT....I have a new & more serious problem - I am getting really bad delays
when I use this menu/cui config. Undo of even a simple 2d rect takes 20
sec's. I've experimented making the cui files local - no difference , I've
removed the custom shortcut menu from the cui's - no difference. When I
switch to the default 'unnamed' profile, all works fine. Since my
main/enterprise/partial cuis are set-up exactly the same way you suggested
at the start, do you have any ideas why I may be having this problem, or
have you heardopf any similar problems from other users ?

thanks,
Talbot

Anonymous · ‎05-01-2006

Did you download the handout? The needed info is there on page 11.

--
R. Robert Bell

wrote in message news:5159620@discussion.autodesk.com...
robert i was watching your presentation of the cui at au this weekend and
have a question about the section where you were creating a tile menu. i was
trying to create one but couldn't get it to popup.
i have a menu called dan and an alias called dan_images from memory here is
what my deisel looked like

$I=dan dan_images $I.*

once again i'm doing this from memory but what does the end of that string
look like because in the tutorial you never spelled it out. I have
everything but it it doesn't pop up can you help me out?

Anonymous · ‎05-01-2006

thanks Robert, zip file with cuis & txt desc attached.

Talbot

Anonymous · ‎05-02-2006

A couple of things I noticed, that sort of stopped further resolution...

Both KCRC-LMC and WRSA-FXT refer to a partial cui located at
f:\drawing\cad_management\acad\user_config_files\test_configs\fxt.cui

This partial cui wasn't included in the zip file.

Then, in the text file, you said that foxt.cui contained only a custom
toolbar. However, it is evident that that file contains all of acad.cui
also.

--
R. Robert Bell

wrote in message news:5160421@discussion.autodesk.com...
thanks Robert, zip file with cuis & txt desc attached.

Talbot

Anonymous · ‎05-02-2006

Please include the .mnr files too.

--
R. Robert Bell

"R. Robert Bell" wrote in message
news:5161854@discussion.autodesk.com...
A couple of things I noticed, that sort of stopped further resolution...

Both KCRC-LMC and WRSA-FXT refer to a partial cui located at
f:\drawing\cad_management\acad\user_config_files\test_configs\fxt.cui

This partial cui wasn't included in the zip file.

Then, in the text file, you said that foxt.cui contained only a custom
toolbar. However, it is evident that that file contains all of acad.cui
also.

--
R. Robert Bell

wrote in message news:5160421@discussion.autodesk.com...
thanks Robert, zip file with cuis & txt desc attached.

Talbot

Anonymous · ‎05-02-2006

apologies for making it a hassle, the correct partial_is_'fxt', & is now included along with the mnr files also.
thanks for the help, Talbot

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Notes on the philosophy of CUI

Notes on the philosophy of CUI

Notes on the philosophy of CUI