Changes to Standard Layer Colors

[John MacFall]

My office has standards for layer colors. Our client has different standards for layer colors. I want to be able to change all of my layers that are magenta, for instance, to yellow for the client's deliverables, and so on thru the entire Acad color spectrum. Does anybody have either a lisp routine or script for doing that?

[BlackBox]

A custom LISP routine can be written, but I would try the LAYTRANS command first.

[John MacFall]

I'll work with that and see if I can make it work. Thanks

[BlackBox]

I'll work with that and see if I can make it work. Thanks

Your welcome.

[John MacFall]

I tried Laytrans but it doesn't do the job I want to do. If I could set the filter by color rather than layer name and then change only the color I would be part way there but I would still have to deal with what happens when I try to change other colors; eventually I'll be grabbing layers that I just changed and changing them again. I almost need to put each group of layers (based on color only) in temporary holding tanks until all original layers have been selected, then change the color of each group and release them back into the drawing.

This whole need for change is brought about by differences in color tables, not layer names. I just want my drawing to print like I want it to print using their color table. Nothing changes but the layer colors.

COLOR TABLE TRANSLATOR. That's what I need. That would be a very cool addition to the software.

[jaberwok]

Create a new template drawing with the revised colours and insert each existing drawing, one at a time, and resave it. The colours in the new template will take precedence if the layer names are the same.

[Ian Philpott]

You can create filters in the layer manager so it only show layers with a particular layer colour, which you could then change and move on to the next one. Only hitch being what order to do this in so you don't change colours to a client colour that you already have in your colours (if you get my drift). Just a matter of thinking about the order in which you do the layers

[BlackBox]

If laytrans won't work for your needs, then I'd follow Jaberwork's suggestion.

The only other method I can think of requires a custom LISP routine, which steps through each Layer Item in the Layers Collection of the ActiveDocument Object, and conditionally changes the Layer Item's Color Property.

[John MacFall]

We have projects with hundreds of drawings. I don't think it would be practical to create a template with all of the layer names in it. But thank you for the thought.

[John MacFall]

If laytrans won't work for your needs, then I'd follow Jaberwork's suggestion.

The only other method I can think of requires a custom LISP routine, which steps through each Layer Item in the Layers Collection of the ActiveDocument Object, and conditionally changes the Layer Item's Color Property.

Yeah, that's pretty much what has to happen. But the holding tank concept has to be a part of it, otherwise I'd be in an endless loop of changing colors that have already been changed. If I could somehow get the application to read two selected color tables and spit out a script to run on the drawing to change it from being compatible with one color table into being compatible with the other color table......