XClip objects viewable when being moved

[rclayton]

Hi

I kindly and respectfully ask you in future not! to question my honesty or integrity...

Mike, my apologies for any misunderstanding. I was not questioning your integrity or honesty. I was simply implying that theere may have been a semantic misunderstanding in the descriptions of what we were all seeing. And with the fact that you seem to be the only poster in the thread that was seeing something different, I wanted to make sure that we are all on the same page.

I have both 2006 and 2002 and the XLoadCTL variable has no effect on the issue in either version for me.

XLOADCTL controls demand loading of XREFS and to my knowledge has nothing to do with how xrefs are displayed in the drawing but only how they are loaded initially. We use this variable to control whether an XREF file gets locked by the operating system when used in a file opened by multiple users.

With all that said, and please don't take offense, you are still the only person in this thread to say that you see the desired behavior as opposed to the behavior the rest of us experience, and we just can't let you have all the fun . I highly doubt this is version specific as it operates the same in 2002 and 2006, but I have been known to be wrong before. Since I do not question your integrity or honesty, then it stands to reason that I am still missing something here.

As a challenge to Autodesk, if any of their minions are lurking here abouts, I would be very interested to hear there take on this discussion. I have tried all the variables that I can find that relate to XREFS with nothing giving me the desired results.

[Mike.Perry]

Hi

Mike, my apologies for any misunderstanding. I was not questioning your integrity or honesty. I was simply implying that theere may have been a semantic misunderstanding in the descriptions of what we were all seeing. And with the fact that you seem to be the only poster in the thread that was seeing something different, I wanted to make sure that we are all on the same page.

No worries...

As I have repeatedly stated within this thread, I fully understand the issue / problem at hand...

I agree it occurs with XClipped Blocks, I honestly don't know if there is a setting that controls this... tell the truth I have not taken a look...

With XClipped Xrefs I can reproduce the issue / problem if I set XLoadCtl = 0
With XLoadCtl = 1 or 2 I do not experience the issue / problem.

I have both 2006 and 2002 and the XLoadCTL variable has no effect on the issue in either version for me.

I will check AutoCAD 2002 & 2004 tomorrow at work.

With all that said, and please don't take offense, you are still the only person in this thread to say that you see the desired behavior as opposed to the behavior the rest of us experience, and we just can't let you have all the fun . I highly doubt this is version specific as it operates the same in 2002 and 2006, but I have been known to be wrong before. Since I do not question your integrity or honesty, then it stands to reason that I am still missing something here.

I might be the only one in this thread so far not to experience the XClipped Xref issue / problem we are discussing here, but I am also the only person so far in this thread to report testing in AutoCAD 2005.

Have a good one, Mike

[rclayton]

Mike, I am beginning to wonder if this might be a combined hardware/software issue. Would you mind posting your Video Card and driver specs. I have a pretty good range of video cards in my office and would like to do some more experimentation with my workgroup and I am curious if I have a matching video card to yours for testing.

Thanks,

Robert

[Mike.Perry]

Would you mind posting your Video Card and driver specs.

Hi

128MB DDR ATI Radeon 9800 Pro

Provider: ATI Technologies Inc.

Driver Version: 6.14.10.6553

Have a good one, Mike

[rclayton]

Hi

128MB DDR ATI Radeon 9800 Pro

Provider: ATI Technologies Inc.

Driver Version: 6.14.10.6553

Have a good one, Mike

OK, I dont have one of those exactly, but I do have one based on the same chipset. We mostly use NVidia hardware. I will get back to everyone on my results tomorrow evening after I can do some multi-station testing

[Mike.Perry]

With XClipped Xrefs I can reproduce the issue / problem if I set XLoadCtl = 0
With XLoadCtl = 1 or 2 I do not experience the issue / problem.

I will check AutoCAD 2002 & 2004 tomorrow at work.

Hi

As promised...

Test conditions -

Drawing Files:

"rclayton" - CLIPPEDXREF.dwg
&
"max.sabre" - Mike.Perry.Copy.dwg

System 1:

AutoCAD 2002 SP2
Windows XP Pro SP1

128MB NVIDIA Quadro FX 500

Driver Provider: NVIDIA

Driver Version: 4.5.0.2

System 2:

AutoCAD 2004 SP1a
Windows 2000 Pro SP4

16MB ATI Rage 128 Ultra

Driver Provider: ATI Technologies Inc.

Driver Version: 5.13.1.3217

Results -

Both systems (1 & 2) reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 0

Both systems (1 & 2) do not reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 1 or 2

Conclusion -

Within AutoCAD 2002, 2004 & 2005 I am able to reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 0 (this must be set in the actual drawing files themselves ie. "CLIPPEDXREF.dwg" & "Mike.Perry.Copy.dwg").

Within AutoCAD 2002, 2004 & 2005 I am unable to reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 1 or 2 (this must be set in the actual drawing files themselves ie. "CLIPPEDXREF.dwg" & "Mike.Perry.Copy.dwg").

Have a good one, Mike

[Rico]

Hi

As promised...

Test conditions -

Drawing Files:

"rclayton" - CLIPPEDXREF.dwg
&
"max.sabre" - Mike.Perry.Copy.dwg

System 1:

AutoCAD 2002 SP2
Windows XP Pro SP1

128MB NVIDIA Quadro FX 500

Driver Provider: NVIDIA

Driver Version: 4.5.0.2

System 2:

AutoCAD 2004 SP1a
Windows 2000 Pro SP4

16MB ATI Rage 128 Ultra

Driver Provider: ATI Technologies Inc.

Driver Version: 5.13.1.3217

Results -

Both systems (1 & 2) reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 0

Both systems (1 & 2) do not reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 1 or 2

Conclusion -

Within AutoCAD 2002, 2004 & 2005 I am able to reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 0 (this must be set in the actual drawing files themselves ie. "CLIPPEDXREF.dwg" & "Mike.Perry.Copy.dwg").

Within AutoCAD 2002, 2004 & 2005 I am unable to reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 1 or 2 (this must be set in the actual drawing files themselves ie. "CLIPPEDXREF.dwg" & "Mike.Perry.Copy.dwg").

Have a good one, Mike

Forgive me, but I'm not sure I understand what you found out ....can you re-explain it please?

[Mike.Perry]

Forgive me, but I'm not sure I understand what you found out ....can you re-explain it please?

Hi

Please highlight the part(s) of my above post you do not understand, I will then happily try my best to explain further.

Have a good one, Mike

[rclayton]

Mike, I find your conclusions interesting since I cannot reproduce them and I have now tested them on 8 different workstations running both 2002 and 2006 with NVidia and ATI video hardware.

For the sake of clarity, lets look at the XLoadCTL variable. XLOADCTL controls Demand Loading of XREFS (i.e. XLOADCTL=0 is Demand Loading "Disabled", XLOADCTL=1 is Demand Loading "Enabled", and XLOADCTL=2 is Demand Loading "Enabled with a Copy"). This setting is a Global setting, which means that it is NOT drawing specific but global within AutoCAD. It can also be set within the Options Dialog under the System Tab (see attached image)

Given the description of demand loading below, I thought that maybe this had something to do with Spatial and Layer indexes in the saved drawing file (info on Spatial and Layer indexes can be found on Autodesks web site, just search for Document no TS20895), But I tried turning these on and they still seem to have no effect on any of my machines or versions.

At this point the issue has become purely acedemic. An intriguing conundrum at its best. I would hope that others might chime in here besides the few who have been involved to provide a little more insight as I am now totally at a loss for ideas

Thank you all for your participation!



The AutoCAD Help file describes Demand Loading as follows;

With demand loading, only the data from the referenced drawing that is necessary to regenerate the current drawing is loaded into memory.

To realize the maximum benefits of demand loading, you need to save the referenced drawings with layer and spatial indexes. The performance benefits of demand loading are most noticeable when you do one of the following:

Clip the xref with the program to display a small fraction of it, and a spatial index is saved in the externally referenced drawing.
Freeze several layers of the xref, and the externally referenced drawing is saved with a layer index.
If demand loading is turned on, and you have clipped xrefs that were saved with spatial indexes, objects in the external reference database that are contained within the clip volume comprise the majority of the objects read into the drawing. If the clip volume is modified, more objects are loaded as required from the reference drawing. Similarly, if you have xrefs with many layers frozen that were saved with layer indexes, only the objects on those thawed layers are read into the current drawing. If those xref-dependent layers are thawed, the program reads in that geometry from the reference drawing as required.

When demand loading is turned on, the program places a lock on all reference drawings so that it can read in any geometry it needs to on demand. Other users can open those reference drawings, but they cannot save changes to them. If you want other users to be able to modify an xref that is being demand loaded into another drawing, use demand loading with the Copy option.

If you turn on demand loading with the Enable with Copy option, the program makes a temporary copy of the externally referenced file and demand loads the temporary file. You can then demand load the xref while allowing the original reference drawing to be available for modification. When you turn off demand loading, the program reads in the entire reference drawing regardless of layer visibility or clip instances.

Layer and spatial indexes were added in AutoCAD Release 14 and AutoCAD LT 97. If you externally reference a drawing saved in a release previous to this, you do not see the same performance benefit as drawings saved with the indexes. For maximum performance, use demand loading with referenced drawings saved with layer and spatial indexes turned on in AutoCAD Release 14, AutoCAD LT 97, or more recent versions.

[Rico]

Results -

Both systems (1 & 2) reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 0

Both systems (1 & 2) do not reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 1 or 2

Conclusion -

Within AutoCAD 2002, 2004 & 2005 I am able to reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 0 (this must be set in the actual drawing files themselves ie. "CLIPPEDXREF.dwg" & "Mike.Perry.Copy.dwg").

Within AutoCAD 2002, 2004 & 2005 I am unable to reproduce the "XClipped Xref Outline Move" issue / problem if XLoadCtl = 1 or 2 (this must be set in the actual drawing files themselves ie. "CLIPPEDXREF.dwg" & "Mike.Perry.Copy.dwg").

From what I understand ... you can reproduce it in one but not the other? This is what I don't understand ..... what can I say? It's Monday ..... I played two soccer games over the weekend and I am a wreck today ....