AutoCAD DevBlog

Drag and Drop from a modeless dialog into AutoCAD editor

By Balaji Ramamoorthy

ObjectARX 2004 had a nice C++ sample that demonstrates the implementation of drag-drop into AutoCAD both as files from the explorer and from a modeless dialog inside AutoCAD. I have attached the migrated sample for AutoCAD 2016. To try it, appload the arx and run "arxdd" command. Please follow the ReadMe.txt included in the sample for explanation on the methods implemented to enable drag and drop.

Download Arxdd

Common exceptions while running RealDWG application

By Balaji Ramamoorthy

In this blog post, we will look at a few common setup related issues that can cause problems in running your RealDWG application.

System.IO.FileNotFoundException : This exception get thrown usually because your RealDwg Application does not find the dependent dlls. To ensure your RealDwg application accesses the right DLLs is to create an installer for your application with all the dependencies and then installing your application in a clean test machine and test it. But, for testing purposes during development, you can place your RealDWG application in the RealDWG root folder and test it. It is easier to simply set the build output path in the Visual Studio solution to place the output in the RealDWG root folder.

Also, ensure that the [RealDWG root path], [RealDWG root path]\Fonts and [RealDWG root path]\Support folder paths are added to the system's PATH environment variable. You may need to restart Visual Studio if you made the environment variable change when Visual Studio was open.

System.InvalidProgramException : RealDWG SDK has two versions of acdbmgd.dll just as the ObjectARX SDK does. The dll in RealDWG 2016\Inc folder has its executable code removed and the one in the RealDWG root folder is the unmodified dll. When referencing the "acdbmgd.dll" in your VisualStudio project from the Inc folder, remember to set "Copy Local" property to false for the reference. This is to prevent Visual Studio from replacing the "acdbmgd.dll" in the RealDWG root folder with the one found in "Inc" folder. If this happens, your application can throw a System.InvalidProgramException and the only way to fix it would be to find the "acdbmgd.dll" from the RealDWG install CD and copy it to the RealDWG root folder.

Introduction to RealDWG .Net Programming

By Balaji Ramamoorthy

My colleague Adam Nagy had created an nice video recording back in 2008 on "Introduction to RealDWG .Net programming". You can download the recording here

DevTV on RealDWG programming

Here is another recording with the same sample project. The changes are mainly in the installer creation and in the licensing steps which have changed since the last recording was created.

The sample project and the slides can be downloaded here :

SampleCode_DevTV

Autodesk Cloud Accelerator update

Autodesk recently finished the first ever Cloud Accelerator where several companies were selected to come into the San Francisco office to work on their applications, which use the Autodesk cloud technology in some way.  They were able to work directly with the ADN and cloud teams to accelerate the development of their applications. 

The first event was so successful, there has been another one scheduled for June 1-12.  The deadline for applications is April 19th, so it’s quickly approaching. Visit Autodesk Cloud Accelerator for more information.

Here are some highlights from the last event.

And a link to several more videos.

Changing setup icon in AutoCAD OEM product installer

By Balaji Ramamoorthy

Here is a short blog post about a query from a developer on changing the setup icon for their AutoCAD OEM product.

In the OEM MakeWizard, the company name defaults to "Autodesk". If you leave it unchanged for your product, then the OEM InstallerWizard can automatically start using the "Autodesk" icon as its setup icon. This is regardless of the icon path provided in the OEM InstallerWizard for the setup icon. If you need your company icon to show up in your product installer, please remember to change the "Company name" and rebuild your product.

How to avoid ‘Trust This Publisher’ Dialog

By Madhukar Moogala

From 2016, if modules are signed and the certificate [.cer] file used to sign the modules  is not registered in store, or modules are not located in any of the trusted location, a window will pop-up asking user to trust the publisher, to avoid this pesky window dialog, you can follow any of these steps.

1. Adding certificate to trusted store during installation:

There is no inherent support in msi to add certificate to the certificate store. This has to be accomplished using a custom action. There are two ways to accomplish it using the custom action.

1. Use certutil.exe, a command line tool from Microsoft to install the certificate.
   Usage: certutil -addstore <storename> <yourcertfile.cer>
   Example: certutil.exe -addstore TrustedPublisher mycertfile.cer

2. Use the Microsoft crypto API to install the certificate to the store.

   Sample code is given below, please do the appropriate error checking.

.NET:

X509Certificate2 certificate =

    new X509Certificate2(@"c:\temp\mycertfile.cer");

 

/*To load Pfx file to store*/

//  X509Certificate2 certificate = new X509Certificate2(@"C:\temp\mycert.pfx", "pwd123", X509KeyStorageFlags.PersistKeySet);

X509Store store =

    new X509Store(StoreName.TrustedPublisher,

                  StoreLocation.LocalMachine);

store.Open(OpenFlags.ReadWrite);

store.Add(certificate);

store.Close();

 

C++:

#include <wincrypt.h>

#include <windows.h>

#include <wintrust.h>

 

#pragma comment(lib, "crypt32.lib")

 

#define ENCODING (X509_ASN_ENCODING | PKCS_7_ASN_ENCODING)

 

typedef struct {

LPWSTR lpszProgramName;

LPWSTR lpszPublisherLink;

LPWSTR lpszMoreInfoLink;

} SPROG_PUBLISHERINFO, *PSPROG_PUBLISHERINFO;

 

class X509Certificate

{

public:

X509Certificate();

~X509Certificate(void);

bool initialize(LPCTSTR pszFileName);

bool isCertificateInTrustedPubStore();

bool installCertificateToTrustedPubStore();

private:

HCERTSTORE mhStore;

HCRYPTMSG mhMsg;

CString msFileName;

PCMSG_SIGNER_INFO mpSignerInfo;

SPROG_PUBLISHERINFO mProgPubInfo;

PCCERT_CONTEXT mpCertContext;

};

 

X509Certificate::X509Certificate(void)

: mhStore(NULL),

mhMsg(NULL),

mpSignerInfo(NULL),

mpCertContext(NULL)

{

ZeroMemory(&mProgPubInfo, sizeof(mProgPubInfo));

}

 

X509Certificate::~X509Certificate(void)

{

if (mProgPubInfo.lpszProgramName != NULL)

free(mProgPubInfo.lpszProgramName);

if (mProgPubInfo.lpszPublisherLink != NULL)

free(mProgPubInfo.lpszPublisherLink);

if (mProgPubInfo.lpszMoreInfoLink != NULL)

free(mProgPubInfo.lpszMoreInfoLink);

if (mpSignerInfo != NULL)

free(mpSignerInfo);

if (mpCertContext != NULL)

CertFreeCertificateContext(mpCertContext);

if (mhStore != NULL)

CertCloseStore(mhStore, 0);

if (mhMsg != NULL)

CryptMsgClose(mhMsg);

}

 

bool X509Certificate::initialize(LPCTSTR pszFileName)

{

if (!PathFileExists(pszFileName))

return false;

msFileName = pszFileName;

DWORD dwEncoding, dwContentType, dwFormatType;

DWORD dwSignerInfo;

CERT_INFO CertInfo;

BOOL fResult = CryptQueryObject(CERT_QUERY_OBJECT_FILE,

    pszFileName,

    CERT_QUERY_CONTENT_FLAG_PKCS7_SIGNED_EMBED,

    CERT_QUERY_FORMAT_FLAG_BINARY,

    0,

    &dwEncoding,

    &dwContentType,

    &dwFormatType,

    &mhStore,

    &mhMsg,

    NULL);

fResult = CryptMsgGetParam(mhMsg,

CMSG_SIGNER_INFO_PARAM,

0,

NULL,

&dwSignerInfo);

if (!fResult)

return false;

// Allocate memory for signer information.

mpSignerInfo = (PCMSG_SIGNER_INFO)malloc(dwSignerInfo);

if (!mpSignerInfo)

return false;

// Get Signer Information.

fResult = CryptMsgGetParam(mhMsg,

CMSG_SIGNER_INFO_PARAM,

0,

(PVOID)mpSignerInfo,

&dwSignerInfo);

if (!fResult)

return false;

// Search for the signer certificate in the temporary

// certificate store.

CertInfo.Issuer = mpSignerInfo->Issuer;

CertInfo.SerialNumber = mpSignerInfo->SerialNumber;

mpCertContext = CertFindCertificateInStore(mhStore,

                ENCODING,

                0,

                CERT_FIND_SUBJECT_CERT,

                (PVOID)&CertInfo,

                NULL);

if (!mpCertContext)

{

return false;

}

return true;

}

bool X509Certificate::isCertificateInTrustedPubStore()

{

if (mpCertContext == NULL)

return false;

HCERTSTORE hCertStore = NULL;

PCCERT_CONTEXT  pFoundCertContext = NULL;

__try

{

HCERTSTORE hCertStore = CertOpenStore(

CERT_STORE_PROV_SYSTEM,

0,

0,

CERT_STORE_OPEN_EXISTING_FLAG |

CERT_SYSTEM_STORE_CURRENT_USER,

_T("TrustedPublisher"));

if (hCertStore == NULL)

return false;

pFoundCertContext = CertFindCertificateInStore(hCertStore, ENCODING,

0, CERT_FIND_EXISTING, mpCertContext, NULL);

}

__finally

{

if (pFoundCertContext != NULL)

{

CertFreeCertificateContext(pFoundCertContext);

}

if (hCertStore != NULL)

{

CertCloseStore(hCertStore, 0);

}

}

if (pFoundCertContext == NULL)

return false;

return true;

}

bool X509Certificate::installCertificateToTrustedPubStore()

{

if (mpCertContext == NULL)

return false;

 

bool bRet = false;

HCERTSTORE hCertStore = NULL;

__try

{

HCERTSTORE hCertStore = CertOpenStore(

CERT_STORE_PROV_SYSTEM,

0,

0,

CERT_STORE_OPEN_EXISTING_FLAG |

CERT_SYSTEM_STORE_LOCAL_MACHINE,

_T("TrustedPublisher"));

if (hCertStore == NULL)

return false;

if (CertAddCertificateContextToStore(hCertStore, mpCertContext, CERT_STORE_ADD_NEWER, NULL))

{

bRet = true;

}

else

{

if (GetLastError() == CRYPT_E_EXISTS)

{

bRet = true;

}

}

}

__finally

{

if (hCertStore != NULL)

CertCloseStore(hCertStore, 0);

}

return bRet;

}

2. Check the Box

Check the check box in the message which says “always trust the applications from XXXXX”

3. Trusted Location

Install the modules in C:\Program Files\Autodesk\ApplicationPlugins or C:\Program Files (x86)\Autodesk\ApplicationPlugins

Changing raster image paths in drawing to relative paths

By Balaji Ramamoorthy

Here is a code snippet to change the raster image paths in a drawing from absolute path to one that is relative to the host drawing path. Raster images that already have a relative path set remain unchanged.

 using  System.IO;

 Document doc 

 = Application.DocumentManager.MdiActiveDocument;

 Editor ed = doc.Editor;

 string  dwgFilePath = null ;

 dwgFilePath = @"D:\Temp\Test.dwg" ;

 using  (Database db = new  Database(false , true ))

 {

     db.ReadDwgFile(dwgFilePath, 

         FileOpenMode.OpenForReadAndWriteNoShare, 

         false , "" );

     using  (Transaction tr 

         = db.TransactionManager.StartTransaction())

     {

         DBDictionary nod = tr.GetObject(

             db.NamedObjectsDictionaryId, 

             OpenMode.ForRead) as  DBDictionary;

         ObjectId imageDictId = nod.GetAt("ACAD_IMAGE_DICT" );

         DBDictionary imageDict 

             = tr.GetObject(imageDictId, OpenMode.ForRead) 

                 as  DBDictionary;

         foreach  (DBDictionaryEntry dbDictEntry in  imageDict)

         {

             RasterImageDef rasterImageDef = tr.GetObject(

                 dbDictEntry.Value, 

                 OpenMode.ForWrite) as  RasterImageDef;

             ed.WriteMessage("{0} Old SourcefileName : {1}" , 

             Environment.NewLine, rasterImageDef.SourceFileName);

             try 

             {

                 if  (File.Exists(rasterImageDef.SourceFileName))

                 {

                     dynamic dwgPathUri 

                             = new  Uri(dwgFilePath);

                     dynamic rasterImagePathUri 

                         = new  Uri(rasterImageDef.SourceFileName);

                     // Make the raster image path  

                     // relative to the drawing path 

                     dynamic relativeRasterPathUri 

                         = dwgPathUri.MakeRelativeUri

                                 (rasterImagePathUri);

                     // Set the source path as relative 

                     rasterImageDef.SourceFileName 

                     = Uri.UnescapeDataString(

                         relativeRasterPathUri.ToString());

                     ed.WriteMessage(

                         "{0} Image path changed to : {1}" , 

                         Environment.NewLine, 

                         rasterImageDef.SourceFileName);

                     // Reload for AutoCAD to  

                     // resolve active path 

                     rasterImageDef.Load();

                     // Check if we found it 

                     ed.WriteMessage("{0} Image found at : {1}" ,

                     Environment.NewLine, 

                     rasterImageDef.ActiveFileName);

                 }

             }

             catch  (UriFormatException ex)

             {

                 // Will ignore this. 

                 // If the raster image path is already relative 

                 // we might catch this exception 

             }

         }

         tr.Commit();

     }

     db.SaveAs(db.OriginalFileName, 

             true , 

             db.OriginalFileVersion, 

             db.SecurityParameters);

 }

CreateInstance returns E_NOINTERFACE when invoking AutoCAD instance

By Balaji Ramamoorthy

When trying to launch an AutoCAD instance from an external application using CreateInstance, you may get E_NOINTERFACE. In this blog post we will look at some possible reasons and ways to resolve it.

Please note that it is required to build separate 32 and 64 bit versions of your external exe that imports the right version of acax20ENU.tlb. There are GUIDs that are different in 32 and 64 bit versions of the acax20ENU.tlb and so cannot be used interchangeably.

Also, when you build the exe, try providing the absolute path to #import. This will ensure that the right version of the typelibrary gets imported in your project.

For example, use this when building the 32 bit version of your exe :

#import "D:\ObjectARX 2016\inc-win32\acax20ENU.tlb" no_implementation raw_interfaces_only named_guids

and this when building the 64 bit version of your exe :

#import "D:\ObjectARX 2016\inc-x64\acax20ENU.tlb" no_implementation raw_interfaces_only named_guids

If the absolute path is not specified, it can happen that the typelibrary is being picked up from a common location such as "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Autodesk Shared" and which on a 64 bit system is a 64 bit version of the typelibrary. This can cause issue on a 32 bit system and result in E_NOINTERFACE.

Also, from a general COM perspective, the calling thread is required to be a STA. You can have this set using ::CoInitializeEx. Including the following line should help with that :

::CoInitializeEx(NULL, COINIT_APARTMENTTHREADED);

Another reason for E_NOINTERFACE could be a mismatch between the typelibrary being imported and the CLSID used with CreateInstance. For example, if you are importing acax20ENU.tlb, the CLSID must be "AutoCAD.Application.20" which corresponds to AutoCAD 2016.

Here is a sample code to invoke an AutoCAD 2016 instance :

 #include  <acadi.h> 

 #pragma  warning ( disable  : 4278 )

 // Makes change to the tlb name  

 // based on the AutoCAD version.  

 #import  "D:\\ObjectARX 2016\\inc-x64\\acax20ENU.tlb"  \\

 	no_implementation raw_interfaces_only named_guids

 using  namespace  AutoCAD; 

 #pragma  warning ( default  : 4278 )

 ::CoInitializeEx(NULL, COINIT_APARTMENTTHREADED);

 CLSID clsidAcad;

 HRESULT hr;

 hr = ::CLSIDFromProgID(

 	L"AutoCAD.Application.20" , 

 	&clsidAcad);

 if (FAILED(hr))

 {

 	::MessageBox(

 	m_hWnd,

 	_com_error(hr).ErrorMessage(),

 	L"CLSIDFromProgID Error !" ,

 	MB_OK);

 	return ;

 }

 OLECHAR* bstrGuid; 

 ::StringFromCLSID(clsidAcad, &bstrGuid); 

 ::MessageBox(

 		m_hWnd,

 		bstrGuid,

 		L"Got CLSID from ProgID !" ,

 		MB_OK);

 LPUNKNOWN punkAcad = NULL;

 HRESULT hr = S_OK;

 IAcadApplicationPtr	m_acPtr;

 hr = m_acPtr.GetActiveObject(clsidAcad);

 if (SUCCEEDED(hr))

 {

 	::MessageBox(

 	m_hWnd,

 	L"Success_GetActiveObject" ,

 	L"Ok!" ,

 	MB_OK);

 	m_acPtr->put_Visible(VARIANT_TRUE);

 }

 else 

 {

 	::MessageBox(

 	m_hWnd,

 	L"GetActiveObject failed,  

 	Will try  CreateInstance !", 

 	L"GetActiveObject" ,

 	MB_OK);

 	hr = m_acPtr.CreateInstance(

 		clsidAcad, NULL, CLSCTX_LOCAL_SERVER);

 	if (SUCCEEDED(hr))

 	{

 		::MessageBox(

 		m_hWnd,

 		L"Success_CreateInstance" ,

 		L"Ok!" ,

 		MB_OK);

 		m_acPtr->put_Visible(VARIANT_TRUE);

 	}

 	else 

 	{

 		::MessageBox(

 		m_hWnd,

 		_com_error(hr).ErrorMessage(),

 		L"CreateInstance Error !" ,

 		MB_OK);

 		return ;

 	}

 }

 if (punkAcad) 

 	punkAcad->Release();

Dismissing popup dialogs in AutoCAD

By Balaji Ramamoorthy

Most AutoCAD dialogs that get displayed can be suppressed if needed using certain system variables or when the command is preceded with a "-" to invoke the commandline version of it. You can read about such usage in this post :

Switch Between Dialog Boxes and the Command Line

Also, for batch processing of drawings AccoreConsole or AutoCAD.IO is much more suited and does not have the limitation of dialogs popping up during processing. To know about these options, please refer to the following blog posts :

Getting started with AccoreConsole

Getting started with AutoCAD.IO

If you still find yourself needing a way to dismiss the dialog inside AutoCAD, you can try using Windows hooks to dismiss the dialog. Please note that this method is not recommended, but since it is a commonly asked query I have posted a sample code here. This sample code uses CBT hooks in C# and is based on this MSDN article:

How to set a Windows hook in Visual C# .NET

To use it, you will need to call the “SetupHook” and “RemoveHook” around the code which might result in the dialog and ensure that the hook closes the right dialog.

 //For example :      

 //    SetupHook(); 

 //    ...Some processing that might result in a dialog  

 //    ...that you want to close. 

 //    RemoveHook(); 

 public  delegate  int  HookProc(

 			int  nCode, 

 			IntPtr wParam, 

 			IntPtr lParam);

 //Declare the hook handle as an int. 

 static  int  hHook = 0;

 //Declare the mouse hook constant. 

 //For other hook types, you can obtain these values 

 // from Winuser.h in the Microsoft SDK. 

 public  const  int  WH_CBT = 5;

 public  const  uint WM_CLOSE = 0x0010;

 private  static  long  HCBT_ACTIVATE = 5;

 private  static  long  HCBT_CREATEWND = 3;

 //Declare MouseHookProcedure as a HookProc type. 

 HookProc CBTHookProcedure_;

 // This is the Import for the SetWindowsHookEx function. 

 // Use this function to install a thread-specific hook. 

 [DllImport("user32.dll" , CharSet = CharSet.Auto, 

 	CallingConvention = CallingConvention.StdCall)]

 public  static  extern  int  SetWindowsHookEx(int  idHook, 

 	HookProc lpfn, IntPtr hInstance, int  threadId);

 // This is the Import for the UnhookWindowsHookEx function. 

 // Call this function to uninstall the hook. 

 [DllImport("user32.dll" , CharSet = CharSet.Auto, 

 	CallingConvention = CallingConvention.StdCall)]

 public  static  extern  bool  UnhookWindowsHookEx(int  idHook);

 // This is the Import for the CallNextHookEx function. 

 // Use this function to pass the hook information  

 // to the next hook procedure in chain. 

 [DllImport("user32.dll" , CharSet = CharSet.Auto, 

 	CallingConvention = CallingConvention.StdCall)]

 public  static  extern  int  CallNextHookEx(int  idHook, 

 	int  nCode, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam);

 [DllImport("user32.dll" , CharSet = CharSet.Auto, 

 	SetLastError = true )]

 static  extern  int  GetWindowText(IntPtr hWnd, 

 	System.Text.StringBuilder lpString, int  nMaxCount);

 [DllImport("user32.dll" )]

 static  extern  IntPtr GetActiveWindow();

 [DllImport("user32.dll" , CharSet = CharSet.Auto)]

 static  extern  IntPtr SendMessage(IntPtr hWnd,

 	UInt32 Msg, IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam);

 public  static  int  CBTHookProcedure(int  nCode, 

 	IntPtr wParam, IntPtr lParam)

 {

     if  (nCode < 0)

     {

 		return  CallNextHookEx(

 			hHook, nCode, wParam, lParam);

     }

     else 

     {

         System.Text.StringBuilder wndName 

 			= new  System.Text.StringBuilder(300);

         GetWindowText(GetActiveWindow(), wndName, 300);

         if  (! wndName.ToString().Contains(

 			"AutoCAD Civil 3D" ))

         {

             SendMessage(GetActiveWindow(), 

 				WM_CLOSE, IntPtr.Zero, IntPtr.Zero);

         }

     }

     return  CallNextHookEx(hHook, nCode, wParam, lParam);

 }

 void  SetupHook()

 {

 	if  (hHook == 0)

 	{

 		// Create an instance of HookProc. 

 		CBTHookProcedure_ = new  HookProc(CBTHookProcedure);

 		hHook = SetWindowsHookEx(

 		WH_CBT,

 		CBTHookProcedure_,

 		(IntPtr)0,

 		AppDomain.GetCurrentThreadId());

 		//If the SetWindowsHookEx function fails. 

 		if  (hHook == 0)

 		{

 			System.Windows.Forms.MessageBox.Show(

 				"SetWindowsHookEx Failed" );

 			return ;

 		}

 	}

 }

 void  RemoveHook()

 {

     if  (hHook != 0)

     {

 		bool  ret = UnhookWindowsHookEx(hHook);

 		//If the UnhookWindowsHookEx function fails. 

 		if  (ret)

 		{

 			hHook = 0;

 		}

     }

 }

Positioning AcPane in StatusBar

By Madhukar Moogala

I’ve recently received a query from an ADN partner about positioning AcPane, I will show sample code to achieve the same.

Before getting in to the code, just want to inform you that with Acad 2015 support for showing text labels on the buttons in the status bar is not available.

Earlier we can switch between text labels and icons of status bar panes, now only icons.

I got an opportunity to migrate a very old sample on status bar which was shipped with ObjectARX SDK 2007  to current AutoCAD 2014/15.

void testPane()

{

int result;

AcApDocument *pDoc=acDocManager->curDocument();

AcApStatusBar* pStatus = acedGetApplicationStatusBar(); 

if (pStatus) 

{ 

/*Get pane count*/

int iCnt = pStatus->GetPaneCount();

/*Get default pane to position our custom pane */

AcPane* pdfltPane =

pStatus->GetDefaultPane(ACSBPANE_APP_ORTHO);

int index =

pStatus->GetIndex(pdfltPane);

int iStyle=

pdfltPane->GetStyle(); 

CPaneItem* pPaneItem = new CPaneItem();

result=

pPaneItem->SetToolTipText(

        _T("Pane Icon Item Tooltip"));

pPaneItem->Enable(TRUE);

result=pPaneItem->SetStyle(iStyle);

pPaneItem->SetVisible(TRUE);

HICON hIcon =

(HICON)::LoadImage(_hdllInstance,

                    MAKEINTRESOURCE(IDI_WORLD),

                    IMAGE_ICON, 16, 16, 0);

result=pPaneItem->SetIcon(hIcon);   

result = pStatus->Insert(index+1, pPaneItem); 

 

} 

pStatus->Update(); 

 

SDK migrated sample