Completely lost

[Quick Karl]

Ok this is going to be tricky

First, the only thing I know about LISP and VLISP, is that when they work, they’re great!

In 2004 a friend wrote a group of lisp routines that I rely on heavily, and although I was somehow able to get them to work on my new ACAD2012 Win7 64-bit computer, I can NOT, for the life of me, figure out what I did to get them to work. It had something to do with adding _$ (vl-load-com) somewhere, and then suddenly everything worked, but I haven’t a fricken clue what I did or where I did it. There IS a vlx folder in the directory where all this stuff is installed, and it has vlx stuff in it.

Having experienced an annoying memory glitch I just had to reload everything on my computer and, I have the menus loaded (menuload), and can see the toolbars that are part of the lisp tools, and even one of them actually works (changes the drawing scale (and dim scale concurrently) and LT scale to what I like from a list), but other tools like a dimension tool that automatically places dimensions on the DIM layer and at the proper dimscale for the drawingscale, regardless of what layer is current, and all the other tools, just report something like this:

Command: (setq DIMCMND
"_dimlinear")"_dimlinear"
Command: dimlyr undo Current settings:
Auto = On, Control = All, Combine = No,
Layer = No
Enter the number of operations to undo or
[Auto/Control/BEgin/End/Mark/Back]
<1>: begin
Command: bad argument type: FILE
nil

Like I said, I did something with a _$ (vl-load-com) somewhere that made all of these tools work, but I am getting old and just can’t remember what the * I did.

If anyone can help I can’t begin to tell you how thankful Iwould be. It worked only a week ago before I had to reinstall everything, and I am miffed...

Thank you

[MSasu]

Just create a text file named acaddoc.lsp in your profile's Support folder (check in Properties -> Files --> Support File Search Path) and paste the line below in that file. This will ensure that VisualLISP extension is loaded in every drawing.

(vl-load-com)

[marko_ribar]

Try to create acaddoc.lsp file and place it in AutoCAD Support folder... Inside acaddoc.lsp add line (vl-load-com), and whenever you start CAD (vl-load-com) will be automatically loaded into memory... This is probably the reason why programmers of routines have omitted (vl-load-com) line within their codes - they simply had that function reactors for making operational all vla- VisualLisp AciveX COM+ functions loaded in the start so they don't concentrate of making functions operational, but they just write them like they are built-in AutoLisp Vanilla API...

[Quick Karl]

I've tried that in both the acad2012doc.lsp AND the acad2012.lsp files (they are the only files like this I could find on my system) - and I have the correct support file path - but still the same error... should I NOT be using these '2012' version of this file (should I just create a acaddoc.lsp file)??

[MSasu]

Please do not modify those file - are reserved for AutoCAD. Create your user auto-loader as instructed above.

If you don't have an acaddoc.lsp file on your system, then create a new one using Notepad; if there is one then open it and append at the end.

If by doing so your tools still not work, then you should revise their installation/setup procedure.

[Quick Karl]

Please do not modify those file - are reserved for AutoCAD. Create your user auto-loader as instructed above.

If you don't have an acaddoc.lsp file on your system, then create a new one using Notepad; if there is one then open it and append at the end.

If by doing so your tools still not work, then you should revise their installation/setup procedure.

No idea what you mean revise installation/setup procedure...

I restored the original 2012 files and created the new file with only (vl-load-com) and saved it to the profile's support location - still the same error

I could swear that the first time I had to go through this I used this exactly _$ (vl-load-com) including the underscore and dollar sign, but I wish I could remember what the heck I did??? Would that be something inside a lisp program??? Should I add the _$ in front of (vl-load-com) in my new acaddoc.lsp?

I guess I should have been smart and wrote down that the heck I did -- I hate working wothout these lisp tools :-(

[MSasu]

The "_$" is the prompter of VisualLISP editor console; I'm not aware to be used somewhere else. You can load there the VL extension and will look like you wrote it, but then will have to do so in each and every drawing.

By "installation/setup procedure" I mean the exact procedure you should follow to get the said tools pack installed in your AutoCAD. It doesn't come with a written document describing the step-by-step setup? Can you contact the developer? Maybe you are missing a setup step - for example to add a folder to Support File Search Path list (from the error you posted above seems that a routine isn't able to locate a file).

[Quick Karl]

The person that wrote these isn't around anymore, and he was very hard to work with.

I've installed this many times, it still works perfect on a 32bit laptop with XP Pro on it -- I actually had it working on this 64bit Win 7 computer before I had to reload everything. I was searching all over the internet for vl-load-something and somehow I got it to work but not this time... pain in my butt I swear.

[MSasu]

Please try to paste the line below on AutoCAD's command prompt and press <Enter>. If will print "Is loaded!" then the VL extension is available. Other will get and error message (; error: no function definition: VL-STRING-SUBST).

(vl-string-subst "loaded" "*" "Is *!")

[Lee Mac]

Hi Quick Karl,

To clarify a few things from my perspective:

1. Loading the Visual LISP Functions

Before you can use any functions with the prefix: vla-* / vlr-* / vlax-* you will need to load the Visual LISP Module; this module only needs to be loaded once per session.

To ensure the Visual LISP module is loaded , create a file in an AutoCAD Support Path called ACADDOC.lsp (notACAD2012DOC.lsp or ACAD2012.lsp, as these are reserved for use by the application and will be overwritten if you upgrade or update the software).

Before creating this file, first search your AutoCAD Support Paths to ensure that the file doesn't already exist. If the file already exists, in the following steps, modify the existing file.

If the file doesn't already exist, open Notepad and type the following:

(vl-load-com)

Now save this file as ACADDOC.lsp (with the 'Save As Type' box set to 'All Files').

Note: you only need to type (vl-load-com) not _$ (vl-load-com). The "_$" is the Visual LISP IDE Console Prompt.

2. Your Applications

From the message you are reporting:

Command: (setq DIMCMND "_dimlinear")"_dimlinear"
Command: dimlyr undo Current settings: Auto = On, Control = All, Combine = No,
Layer = No
Enter the number of operations to undo or [Auto/Control/BEgin/End/Mark/Back]
<1>: begin
Command: bad argument type: FILE nil

It would appear that your programs rely heavily on calling AutoCAD commands. This can be an unreliable approach, since the prompt order, behaviour and available options for many AutoCAD commands will vary across versions, resulting in many applications working in one version, but not another.

The error:bad argument type: FILE nil would indicate that the program is supplying a function which requires a file descriptor parameter (such as write-line / write-char / princ / print / prin1) a null argument. However, this is almost impossible to debug without the ability the view the program source code.