Maximum number of layers

[jonmadjon]

Hi,

 

anyone knows the maximum number of layers that we can have in a dxf (2000) file ?

 

Thanks in advance

[ReMark]

How many could you possibly have? 256?

[jonmadjon]

It's for a complicated process for export from another software... so I don't know how many I could have and yes maybe there are more than 256...

 

well, I tried adding some and I managed to add 2000 layers.... then I got bored to add more !! So I suppose that there isn't a "small" limit in the number of layers you could have... maybe if you add 9999 would be a problem but i guess that for some tens of thousands it is ok...

[ReMark]

Having a drawing with 256 would be bad enough but a drawing with a couple of thousand layers? Well, that's just insane.

[jonmadjon]

I agree with you totally... but it's not my decision, so I don't really care about how much complicated the final file will be !

[BIGAL]

We start a dwg template with 624 layers as its our field survey template and has every available feature code in it. They have to exist unfortunately.

 

We purge after the drawing is tweaked and end up with about 150 working layers.

 

Maximum number ? Just load your other software dxf, it will either work or will not. Sounds like its creating a new layer for every entity maybe go back a step and see if you can change the source program to limit layers.

[alanjt]

I think you are safe, I just created 10,000 layers and successfully did a save as and opened the newly created DXF.

 

Code I used...

((lambda (i la)
  (while (>= 10000 (setq i (1+ i)))
    (vla-add la (itoa i))
  )
)
 0
 (vla-get-layers (vla-get-activedocument (vlax-get-acad-object)))
)

[ReMark]

I wonder how many layers one could create before the software crashes? A million?

 

10,000 layers? I have trouble when it comes to naming more than 24! LOL

[jonmadjon]

I think you are safe, I just created 10,000 layers and successfully did a save as and opened the newly created DXF.

 

Code I used...

((lambda (i la)
  (while (>= 10000 (setq i (1+ i)))
    (vla-add la (itoa i))
  )
)
 0
 (vla-get-layers (vla-get-activedocument (vlax-get-acad-object)))
)

 

 

nice ! thanks

[alanjt]

I wonder how many layers one could create before the software crashes? A million?

 

I stopped it at 450,000 and it was still running strong. However, when I hit the Layer pulldown, it crashed.

[alanjt]

nice ! thanks

 

You're welcome.

[rkmcswain]

I wonder how many layers one could create before the software crashes? A million?

Pre-R2000, it was pretty much 32,767.

 

You can make more than that today, but AutoCAD becomes really slow and unstable.

[rkmcswain]

Having a drawing with 256 would be bad enough but a drawing with a couple of thousand layers? Well, that's just insane.

 

I guess we are insane...

 

Our template(s) have three to four hundred, depending on the type of drawing. Then when you xref 6 or 7 of these together, it can easily get up to a couple of thousand layers. Of course with the proper layer filters, it's not bad at all.

[ReMark]

Our in-house drawings rarely exceed 12 layers. One drawing from a landscape architect had somewhere around 265 layers but he had better than half of them frozen (I guess his computer was starting to bog down). A drawing with a couple thousand layers in it with something on each layer just seems as though it would be a chore to work with. But as you say, with the proper layer filters, I suppose it's workable. Must spend a lot of time switching between groups of layers though right?

[BIGAL]

I am the cuplrit who wrote the code for a lisp program to seprate out objects to a number of layers about 15 but essentially they are the same group of objects (drainage pipes) this was done for a reason, the easy way around this was to la n drain s drain-150 off * on drain-* then just select all and put on the new drain layer and then purge. It would be pretty easy to write a script that groups common layers back into 1 layer.

 

interesting our dedicated civil software typical project 70-80 layers acad 126min this is due to the overheads of layers in civil 3d that they must exist.

[Glen1980]

My colleague had a drawing with 1003 layers today (a site plan with all the house structures x-reffed into it, about 20 drawings) and he found that the layers in the drop down lost alphabetical ordering, no other discernible problems just, difficult to find the layers he wanted to thaw. Deleting the information from 4 layers and purging caused them to all drop back into alphabetical order. He runs 2010LT and It did a similar thing with me but with different layers being out of order on 2011LT. Has anyone else experienced this?

[DANIEL]

I don't get why so many companies demand so many layers ... I recieved a file once with over 13, 000 layers, i was able to purge it down to like a thousand or so, absolutely ridiculous if you ask me lol

[Glen1980]

It averages 50 for each drawing which is still way too many. Trouble is before the downturn we mainly built flats (apartments) so dropping the ground floor of the block on the site worked well for setting out and coordination of services but now the market wants houses x-reffing 50+ units into the site plan is counter-productive. I was just wondering if anyone else had noticed this problem before. I'm not bothered as it isn't slowing things down or stopping people work, I'm just interested to see if there is a better work around than messing drawings around.

[DANIEL]

I'm not sure why but architectural drawings have gotten out of control when it comes to layering, in my not so humble opinion. theres no way there utilising all those layers ..... i was once asked to put the doors on a building i was working with on there own layer, I told them no, they asked me why and I told them 'I may need to freeze the building in some drawings but i will never need to freeze the doors and show the building nor will i want to freeze the building and show just the doors, the doors are going on the building layer ....'

[Glen1980]

As a developer we do almost everything in house so we have to have our Architectural drawings used for setting out on site, the M&E engineers, civils, structural engineers stuff and of course due to shrinking deadlines we use our floor plans for kitchen drawings, bathrooms drawings, duct plans etc so each house plan get used on 5-6 different drawings with different scales and different layering requirements. We also have no drawing standards so some people flood the drawings with even more layers than we actually need.