Block vs. wblock

[Memnon]

Quick question here. What is the dirrerence between a regular block and a wblock?

Or is wblock just a command?

[uddfl]

You said it, WBLOCK (write block) is just a command that allows you to create a drawing file made of entities from another drawing. There is no such thing as "a WBlock".

A Block is an autocad entity whose geometry is made of one or several other entities. You can create a block definition in the drawing by making the block from within the drawing (with the BLOCK command) or by inserting another drawing file into your drawing.

[Memnon]

I see, that makes sense.

[freeko]

one of the best way to cleanup drawing is using Wblock> Entire Drawing it will remove unused entities.. try it, you'll love it.

[opreese]

freeko, what do you mean "best way to clean up a drawing" ?
i'm trying to understand the advantages and disadvantages of blocks in general.
one thing i can see being a problem is the matter of organization (or naming of blocks).

[StykFacE]

The definition of a Block is this: "A generic term for one or more objects that are combined to create a single object."

Just means that you are combining one or more entities and making it a single entity. If you edit a block, any changes will be distributed to all references (or better understood as all "copies" of the block) within the drawing. You can type BLOCK at the Command Line to create a block.

[opreese]

Wow, that was a fast reply. thanks.
So, continuing to understand the idea of block vs. wblock...
What's to prevent me from accidentally naming the block that of a name already in use (already in use in current drawing or in library of blocks). Or perhaps the block already exists (exact duplicate of block to be created) and it's not necessary to re-create the block, ie. instead of having redrawn the block from scratch, I could have simply inserted it)

[StykFacE]

WBLOCK means to create a block from AutoCAD to the hard drive as it's own DWG file. Think of "exporting to a block". BLOCK means to create a block within the current drawing. You can't overwrite a block accidentally without it prompting you to either overwrite the block, or update the block reference. Either way it's a prompt that can be canceled.

[CyberAngel]

You wanted to know about the advantages and disadvantages of blocks. The main advantage is in organization. If you have to draw, say, a cafeteria with tables and chairs, you can make a block for a table and another block for a chair. You only have to draw them once, then it's a matter of placing blocks instead of drawing or copying new tables and chairs. When you're dealing with dozens or hundreds of objects, it saves a lot of time.

Another advantage is in modification. If you've placed hundreds of chairs and then someone decides you need a different model of chair, you modify the block definition once and those hundreds of chairs all automatically change.

Disadvantages: you have to deal with scales, especially when you recycle old blocks in new drawings. There's no way to change some of the inserted blocks and not others. You have to be careful defining a block because they can do some strange things (you can find some on this forum).

As for duplicate names, you can't create a new block with the same name as an existing block. There's a table of block names in the drawing, and AutoCAD checks that table when you add one. If you define a new block that is a duplicate of an existing block, but give it a different name, AutoCAD will let you do that. If you want to use a block from an old drawing in your current drawing, you can cut and paste it.

WBLOCK is short for Write BLOCK. It's nothing but a procedure. It doesn't make sense to compare blocks and wblocks.

[opreese]

If I Wblock a chair, it writes it to file and I can use that block in other drawings. If I change (modify) that chair, will it update it in all drawings that use it?