Catia V5 Title Block Editor
Laure Honigsberg
The title block editor provides an example (it was small in the beginning) for an easy integration of CATIA V5
with other applications. The program is free and can be distributed and used free of charge. The copyright follows
the GNU copyright.
I am trying to simplify the title block input in Catia V5.21 by reading data from an .xls table and using it to populate the title block (part number, material code, description, revision, date, author etc). I want to do this in a title block that I will design (not the styles already implemented in Catia).
Try first to record a macro when you are creating your new title block, this will give you an idea how lines and text are created. After that you can start to connect Excel cells values with text values in CATIA.
Hello all, I am working on a drawing and typically when I double click the title block all the boxes highlight and I can go into properties and change the text in the blocks. On this drawing I am working on now when I double click the title block only the line that I click on highlights. On another one when I click the title block just the outline highlights and I get a blue grip box in the lower right hand corner. Did I change something I shouldn't have?
Hello all, I am working on a drawing and typically when I double click the title block all the boxes highlight and I can go into properties and change the text in the blocks. On this drawing I am working on now when I double click the title block only the line that I click on highlights. On another one when I click the title block just the outline highlights and I get a blue grip box in the lower right hand corner. Did I change something I shouldn't have?
I would like to get some VBA code which would tell me the number of sheets in a Catia drawing. Each sheet would have a title block placed on it. A text field on each title block would communicates the number of sheets. So if you had three sheets in the drawing you would have 1 of 3 (in the title block sheet 1) 2 of 3 (in the title block shhet 2) and 3 of 3 (in the title block sheet 3). If the macro could update all title blocks on all sheets automatically.
The concept is to loop through all of the DrawingSheet objects in the Sheets collection of the DrawingDocument you should put all title block elements in the "Background View". Next we need to update or create existing title block text elements. These are DrawingText objects. We try to access the DrawingText by name(THIS MUST BE UNIQUE!). If it does not exist, we create it. If it does exist, we update the value.
In Advance Design Modules title blocks can be created or edited in AutoCAD, but certain conditions must be met.
For the title block to be correctly displayed, we recommend starting from an existing title block template found using the following path: C:\Users\#user#\AppData\Local\Graitec\Advance Design modules\#version#\Templates\Drawings.
You will see that many of the texts in the title block are attribute blocks. The attributes names must be from the table below otherwise they will not be recognized by Advance Design Modules to be correctly displayed in Drawings.
In the table below, in the second column, you will find the parameter name from the specific Advance Design module dialog. In red color, you will find the names you should give to the attributes to display the value of a certain corresponding parameter in the title block.
When finished editing, if the title block outline (highlighted in the image below) was recreated, xdata needs to be attributed to it. This is done so that the title block will be identified in the software as an entire entity. Following these steps, xdata will be applied to the title block outline for the four lines, one by one or to the polyline if it was created so. Xdata cannot be applied to multiple elements at once.
Ok, I've made a custom title block in Catia but I can't figure out how to create all of the links to the part (part name, page size, weight, drawn by etc..) so that when I update the drawing, these update with it. The closest I've come to finding the solution is from some guys who sell the program that basically does exactly that but where's the fun in that?
I currently have a giant stack of parts that I need to make the drawings for using my new title block, so if you're reading this and can help in any way, I'll be the most greatful grab cad member of all time.
The best, as in, most professional way to solve this problem is using Macros. This however involves measuring each and every point that you use to create lines for your title box and then programming them in using Macros (which is surprisingly easy once you get the hang of it but nevertheless ridiculously time consuming) to get your final title block. You can even add your new title block into the list of existing sample title blocks provided by catia by simply saving your new macro in the same directory as the sample catia macros. This is best accomplished by copy - pasting the macro used to create the sample title blocks and then editing them. This is explained here:
The most practicle way of solving this problem however is by simply, using one of the sample title blocks provided by catia, editing the lines and adding logos and such to create your custom title block, but making sure not to delete the values expressing scale, weight, drawing title and such. These can then be dragged into your custom title block by hand.
If you then save the drawing that should now be a blank drawing with your new customised title block, you can use it later on by choosing: data - page properties. (I'm using Catia in Geman, so it might not be called exactly "Page properties" in the English version but something along those lines) and then insert background, choose yours from the list and bobs your uncle.
The drawing should normally existin the CAD software prior to running CartWeb. Itis possible to start CartWeb on an empty drawing, in which case only adrawing frame and title block are returned to the CAD applictaion. InEuclid, the CAD login (CDDRC) are normally transferred into CartWeb,which prevents users from login each time they access CartWeb. If thetransfer is not done properly, a login page is presented at CartWeblaunch. In AutoCAD and Catia, the first access to CartWeb by a user froma certain PC on a normal working day requires login, which is thenremembered for up to 12 hours during which period access will notrequire a relogin.
If you start to edit a titleblock from scratch, the following information is automatically enteredin the title block in the CartWeb Application when CartWeb application is launched from the CADapplication:
Get anexisting drawing number: The usercan retrieve data from an existing drawing in the EDMS/CDD drawingdatabase and paste it into the title block. This operation is used forreplacing an old drawing. The user MUST have the rights:
When the user launches CartWeb from his CADapplication, an HP-GL file is automatically generated (on thelocal machine), and it is possible to view it from the WEB tocheck information on the drawing as the CAD application will be blockedwhile CartWeb is active.
Have you ever wondered if there was an easy way to have your SOLIDWORKS Drawing fill in the title block automatically? This can be achieved by using Custom Properties from your Part or Assembly Model.
In this example, we will have the fields for Material, Finish, and Weight fill in automatically in the Drawing title block. As you can see, the drawing title block is empty with a single drawing view inserted.
Right-click on the Drawing title block and select Edit Sheet Format. Right-click a second time and select Edit Title Block. The title block references annotation note fields in the sheet format.
Does anyone know how I can get a mass property weight to show up in a title block? I'd like to see the part weight show up in the drawing, and potentially see the full weight of an assembly printed in the title block as well.
Is there better way to update the title blocks for multiple sheets and drawings in the folder? At the moment, we have 100s of drawings and each drawing has multiple sheets. They are all referring to an xref. So if I update the xref i want to update revision info/dates on all drawings automatically without opening and closing each drawings individually.
Changing the attributes is very easy across multiple layout tabs the code I found here and modified (its posted here also on forum ) finds the blocks in the title details no matter where they are in a DWG so no extra coding required to change tabs. We just do a simple "issued for construction" at the moment.
That is the stumbling block. I'm not sure of the post BigAl is talking about, but if it's the one I was involved in that didn't get resolved. It becomes difficult because no two people have the same excel template format.
Thanks SteveK and Bigal. And yes I did make a thorough search on this forum and also on google but no luck. There are similar situations but nothing resolve and when I check dates they are far away thats why I am posting this. So far ....... I am using eattext to generate excel file but I am still figuring how to put it back to block after modifying in excel. Attin and attout won't help as its multiple sheets and multiple drawings. SteveK are you talking about getting one and then do automatic batch? Is there any script or lisp to do that? Sorry I am a beginner when it comes to lisp/script autocad. Cheers
You create a form with two selectable lists the first is populated by picking a block this will populate it with the attribute tagnames, you pick a tagname you then pick a column name and you remember the column number repeat as necessary, any tags not picked etc will mean no changes.
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