UPDATED FOR V17 CUSTOMIZING BRICSCAD® Customizing the BricsCAD Environment Working with the Customizing Dialog Box Other Customizations Programming BricsCAD This book is covered by copyright. As the owner of the copyright, upFront.eZine Publishing, Ltd. gives you permission to make one print copy. You may not make any electronic copies, and you may not claim authorship or ownership of the text or figures herein. PAYMENT INFORMATION By Email Acrobat PDF format Suggested price $40.00 Allow for a 17MB download. PayPal Check or Money Order To pay by PayPal, send payment to the account We can accept checks from the following of [email protected] at www.paypal.com. regions of the world: • US funds drawn on a bank with address in the USA. PayPal accepts funds in US, Euro, Yen, • Canadian funds drawn on a bank with a Canadian Canadian, and 100+ other currencies. address (includes GST). 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This eleventh edition is based on BricsCAD V17 4 January 2017 Technical Writer Ralph Grabowski All brand names and product names mentioned in This book is sold as is, without warranty of any kind, either this book are trademarks or service marks of their express or implied, respecting the contents of this book and respective companies. Any omission or misuse (of any any disks or programs that may accompany it, including but not kind) of service marks or trademarks should not be limited to implied warranties for the book’s quality, performance, regarded as intent to infringe on the property of oth- merchantability, or fitness for any particular purpose. Neither ers. The publisher recognizes and respects all marks the publisher, authors, staff, or distributors shall be liable to the used by companies, manufacturers, and developers as purchaser or any other person or entity with respect to any a means to distinguish their products. liability, loss, or damage caused or alleged to have been caused directly or indirectly by this book. Summary of Contents Part I — Customizing the BricsCAD Environment Chapter 1. Introduction to Customizing BricsCAD ....................3 Chapter 2. Adjusting BricsCAD’s Settings ..........................19 Chapter 3. Changing BricsCAD’s Environment ......................29 Chapter 4. Adapting the User Interface ...........................51 Part II — Working with the Customizing Dialog Box Chapter 5. Introduction to the Customize Dialog Box ................67 Chapter 6. Customizing the Menu Bar and Context Menus ............81 Chapter 7. Customizing Toolbars and Button Icons ..................99 Chapter 8. Writing Macros and Diesel Code .......................121 Chapter 9. Customizing Ribbon Tabs and Panels ...................149 Chapter 10. Customizing Keystroke Shortcuts, Aliases, Shell Commands 171 Chapter 11. Customizing Mouse, Double-click, and Tablet Buttons ....195 Chapter 12. Customizing Rollover Properties. .211 Chapter 13. Customizing Workspaces ............................217 Chapter 14. Customizing the Quad ..............................235 Part III — Other Customizations Chapter 15. Designing Tool & Other Palettes ......................245 Chapter 16. Designing Simple and Complex Linetypes ..............267 Chapter 17. Patterning Hatches .................................279 Chapter 18. Decoding Shapes and Fonts ..........................291 Chapter 19. Coding Field Text ..................................305 Part IV — Programming BricsCAD Chapter 20. Writing Scripts ....................................333 Chapter 21. Programming with LISP .............................341 Chapter 22. Designing Dialog Boxes with DCL .....................373 Chapter 23. Dabbling in VBA ...................................405 Part V — Appendices Appendix A. Command Summary. 439 Appendix B. System Variables and Settings ........................459 Appendix C. Concise DCL Reference .............................477 Appendix D. Concise LISP Reference .............................523 Full Table of Contents Part I — Customizing the BricsCAD Environment 1. Introduction to Customizing BricsCAD ......... 3 The Many Ways to Customizing ....................................4 Which Customization? .............................................. 5 Versions of BricsCAD ............................................... 5 58 Tips for BricsCAD Users ........................................7 For Further Reference ...........................................18 Tutorial Books ................................................... 18 BricsCAD API References. 18 DWG, DXF, and DWF References .................................... 18 2. Adjusting BricsCAD’s Settings ...............19 Touring the Settings Dialog Box ...................................20 Settings Dialog Box: Toolbar ........................................ 21 Categorized/Alphabetic Sorting . 21 Export Settings . 21 Exporting Variables . 23 Drawing/Dimensions/Program Options . 24 Finding Variables . 25 Accessing and Changing Values ..................................... 26 Variables Specific to Windows . 27 Changing Variables at the Command Prompt ........................27 3. Changing BricsCAD’s Environment. .29 Starting BricsCAD ..............................................30 Command Line Options ............................................ 30 Catalog of Command-Line Switches .................................. 33 No Switch - Load Drawings . 33 B Switch - Script Files . 33 L Switch - No Logo . 34 LD Switch - Application Load . 34 S Switch - Search Support Paths . 34 P Switch - User Profiles . 34 PL Switch - Batch Plotting . 35 T Switch - Template Files . 35 Regserver and Unregserver Switches . 35 Changing the Colors of the User Interface ..........................36 Background Color ................................................ 36 Changing the Cursor’s Color and Size ................................. 37 DISPLAY SETTINGS ...................................................38 Snap Marker Options .............................................. 40 SETTINGS AT THE COMMAND LINE. .41 Hyperlink Cursor Options .......................................... 42 Dynamic Dimension Options ........................................ 42 Support File Paths ..............................................43 Summary of Files Settings .......................................... 45 Files (and Paths) . 45 Project Paths . 46 Printer Support Paths and Files . 46 Templates Paths and Files . 47 Tool Palettes Path . 47 Dictionaries Section . 47 Log Files Paths and Files . 47 File Dialogs . 47 Places Bar (Windows only) . 48 Reusing User Preferences ........................................48 Launching the User Profile Manager. 49 Using the Profile Manager . 50 vi Customizing BricsCAD V17 4. Adapting the User Interface .................51 Customizing Drawing Tabs .......................................52 Related System Variables . 52 Customizing the Look From Control ...............................53 LookFrom Command. 54 Related System Variables . 55 Customizing the Command Bar ...................................56 Benefits of Multiple Monitors. 57 Related System Variables . 59 Customizing the Ribbon. 62 Related System Variables . 64 Part II — Working with the Customize Dialog Box 5. Introduction to the Customize Dialog Box ......67 Touring the Customize Dialog Box ................................68 ABOUT MAIN AND PARTIAL CUSTOMIZATION .............................69 Customize’s Menu Bar. 70 ABOUT CUI FILES ....................................................71 CUI Customization Files . 72 Search Field ..................................................... 74 Tabs of the Customize Dialog Box ................................... 74 Shortcut Menus .................................................. 75 Apply and OK Buttons ............................................. 75 The Nuclear Option . 76 Using Partial Menus to Customize BricsCAD Correctly .................77 Setting Up a New Partial Menu. 77 Sharing Customizations . 78 Removing Partial CUI Files . 80 6. Customizing the Menu Bar and Context Menus ..81 QUICK SUMMARY OF MENU PARAMETERS ................................82 Modifying the Menu Bar ........................................... 83 Touring the Menu Tab . 83 Opening and Closing Nodes . 84 Gray Dots and Separator Lines . 84 Table of Contents vii Understanding Menu Title Conventions ............................... 85 Keyboard Shortcut - & . 85 Dialog Box - . 86 Menu Titles . 86 Commands Use Macros ............................................ 86 Cancel - ^c . 86 Transparent - ' . 87 Internationalize - _ . 87 Enter - ; . 87 Pause - \ . 87 Editing the Help String. 88 Adding Menu Items .............................................88 Deleting Menu Items .............................................. 90 Adding Tools to Menus ..........................................91 Customizing Context Menus ......................................93