Hello tcebob, welcome to theswamp.
Couple tips:
(1) Stig is scary smart (like a lisp savant), there are pearls of wisdom to be found in all his posts; seek them out!
(2) Alan (CAB) is one of the brightest, most prolific and friendly coder / swamp ambassaders we have. I don't know how he pounds out so much code but look around, he posts volumes of most excellent utilites and help posts, bar none!
(3) When posting code between [ code ] [ /code ] pairs I believe it just ignores any additional bb formatting, so it ends up messing with the actual posted logic.
(4)
Info.fas (use your logon name and password when prompted) is a little utility I wrote that will spew the activex properties / methods and dxf data for any valid supplied or selected object / entity.
One use is that it can help you identify what info you need to (ent)make an entity, by displaying the data for an existing entity of the type you want to make.
For example, if I select a text entity it might show this info:
; IAcadText2: AutoCAD Text Interface
; Property values:
; Alignment = 10
; Application (RO) = #<VLA-OBJECT IAcadApplication 00c2db8c>
; Backward = 0
; Document (RO) = #<VLA-OBJECT IAcadDocument 0ce20f24>
; Handle (RO) = "97"
; HasExtensionDictionary (RO) = 0
; Height = 0.09375
; Hyperlinks (RO) = #<VLA-OBJECT IAcadHyperlinks 0ced99e4>
; InsertionPoint = (-0.8125 -0.046875 0.0)
; Layer = "0"
; Linetype = "ByLayer"
; LinetypeScale = 1.0
; Lineweight = -1
; Normal = (0.0 0.0 1.0)
; ObjectID (RO) = 2130054904
; ObjectName (RO) = "AcDbText"
; ObliqueAngle = 0.0
; OwnerID (RO) = 2130054392
; PlotStyleName = "ByLayer"
; Rotation = 0.0
; ScaleFactor = 1.0
; StyleName = "Standard"
; TextAlignmentPoint = (0.0 0.0 0.0)
; TextGenerationFlag = 0
; TextString = "TheSwamp.org rocks."
; Thickness = 0.0
; TrueColor = #<VLA-OBJECT IAcadAcCmColor 0ceda9d0>
; UpsideDown = 0
; Visible = -1
; Methods supported:
; ArrayPolar (3)
; ArrayRectangular (6)
; Copy ()
; Delete ()
; FieldCode ()
; GetBoundingBox (2)
; GetExtensionDictionary ()
; GetXData (3)
; Highlight (1)
; IntersectWith (2)
; Mirror (2)
; Mirror3D (3)
; Move (2)
; Rotate (2)
; Rotate3D (3)
; ScaleEntity (2)
; SetXData (2)
; TransformBy (1)
; Update ()
; DXF Group Codes:
; (-1 . <Entity name: 7ef60ef8>)
; (0 . "TEXT")
; (330 . <Entity name: 7ef60cf8>)
; (5 . "97")
; (100 . "AcDbEntity")
; (67 . 0)
; (410 . "Model")
; (8 . "0")
; (100 . "AcDbText")
; (10 -0.8125 -0.046875 0.0)
; (40 . 0.09375)
; (1 . "TheSwamp.org rocks.")
; (50 . 0.0)
; (41 . 1.0)
; (51 . 0.0)
; (7 . "Standard")
; (71 . 0)
; (72 . 1)
; (11 0.0 0.0 0.0)
; (210 0.0 0.0 1.0)
; (100 . "AcDbText")
; (73 . 2)
As you can see, all it does is make a call to vlax-dump-object and entget respectively, formating the dxf data like vlax-dump-object does. I found it very convenient to have the two together.
Anyway, once you load the
Info.fas utility you can use it at the command line via
Info or
nInfo, the latter being for nested entities (like inside a block or xref) or, if you have a saved entity name, object or handle, like this
(info x), where x is a valid ename, object or handle.
Have fun.
PS: I compiled info.fas using 2006, let me know if there are problems loading it in older AutoCAD versions; I can't test that scenario here because I only have 2006 on this machine. Thanks.