Topic: Document collection items.

[kaefer]

I think I tried that, now that you mention it, but I didn't like it switching back and forth, so I didn't go that route.  I think Tony said that it was an oversight, as to make item appear like that in Arx you can change the current document, without switching it to the active document, but it isn't exposed to .Net, so if you want to P/Invoke I think you can get it without switching the active document.

Correct me if I'm wrong: nowhere seems to be an exposed signature of AcApDocManager::setCurDocument, so you can't even P/Invoke it.

Apart from that, what does the average End User expect here? Is it OK to manipulate an opened non-current drawing? If it's opened by anyone else, it would be effectively write-protected; why then handle the case that it's opened in the same application session differently?

Cheers, Thorsten

[T.Willey]

Apart from that, what does the average End User expect here? Is it OK to manipulate an opened non-current drawing? If it's opened by anyone else, it would be effectively write-protected; why then handle the case that it's opened in the same application session differently?

I have a program that I wrote to update revisions for our drawings.  I do it without opening the drawing in the editor, and I allow the user to select as many drawings as they want within a folder.  If they happen to have a drawing open, then with the old code it wouldn't update the drawing, but they selected it to update, so why not update it if they have it open?

My thought is why limit the user?  If they select a couple of drawings that they want to update, and they happen to have one of them open, why not update that one also?  If it's open by another user, then I wouldn't try to do anything to said drawing, but would alert the user that said drawing couldn't have the work preformed on it.

Sometimes users forget which drawings they have open, and sometimes the only option is to select drawings from a file selection dialog box.  If they select it, do what you can to it.

[BillZndl]

I think I tried that, now that you mention it, but I didn't like it switching back and forth, so I didn't go that route.

This works fine for me as when I'm working in one drawing (making groups) and see that I have the same group existing already over in anther drawing, I can switch drawings, select the group and end up back in the original drawing with the copied group displaying nicely, instead of making the group from scratch.