Smart Client
Smart Client Extension for AutoCAD

Working with the Drawing List

The Drawing List , available by choosing the Drawings tab in the Smart Client's Explorer pane, shows all the drawings that are part of your current project.

When you add a drawing to your project, the program adds the drawing to the project's Drawing List. More specifically, the Drawing List displays drawing references that are defined in the database. When you open a drawing, Smart Client loads the file from the folder that is specified by drawingsFolderForSmartClient in \webapps\archibus\WEB-INF\config\afm-projects.xml . This folder can be on your hard drive or on your local network.

The Drawing List includes a filter row (located above the first drawing entry) so that you can quickly find a specific drawing. Use the filter row to search for the drawing by Drawing Title or file name.

Note for Archibus SaaS Deployments: Although the Drawing List shows all drawings in the project (all drawings listed in the Archibus Drawings table, which can include local drawings as well as drawings on the Cloud), you can open only drawings that are on your hard drive or local network. For information, see CAD and BIM on SaaS Deployments .

Drawing List shown from the Explorer panel in the Smart Client CAD Extension

The Drawing List contains a list of commands above the list of drawings. From the Drawing List you can:

Action Drawing List Command Help Topic / Notes
Create a new Archibus drawing New Creating New Floor Plan Drawings
Add an existing .DWG file to the project Add Bringing Drawings into Archibus Projects
View drawing properties, such as the drawing's folder path, AutoCAD version, and space hierarchy values. Select a drawing and click Properties
Remove a drawing from the drawing list Select a drawing and click Remove If a drawing is removed from the Drawing List, Archibus no longer keeps the data associated with the drawing up-to-date as you add, remove, and edit entities within the drawing.

Open drawings.

Select the drawing from the list and click Open.

Or, double-click the drawing.

Procedure: Opening a Drawing

On SaaS deployments, you can open only those drawings that are on your local system.

Check drawings in and out of a central location to work with them on your local server If your site has enabled Document Management for Drawings , the Drawing List will include options for this.

Checking Drawings In and Out of the Document Management System .

Document Management for Drawings is not available on Cloud deployments.

Accessing the Drawing List

You can access the Drawing List from either the Extension for AutoCAD or the Smart Client. Use these methods:

  • From the Archibus Smart Client Extension for AutoCAD 's Explorer pane (shown above), select the Drawings tab.
  • From the Navigator in Smart Client, select a drawing task, such as Draw Rooms.
  • From the Smart Client Explorer pane, select the Drawings tab. Note that the Smart Client's Explorer pane displays the Drawings tab only if your license lists you as a CAD user.

Procedure: Open a Drawing

Once you select a drawing, Archibus launches the Smart Client Extension for AutoCAD, and opens the selected drawing.

  1. Access the Drawing List as described above.
  1. If needed, limit the drawings shown in the list:
    1. Enter all or part of a drawing’s Title or Name in the filter row; as you type the list is restricted to show only drawings matching your entry. See the topic Searching for Records in a Grid Using the Filter Row found on the Table of Contents in the Smart Client User's Guide / Grid Basics book.
    2. To clear the filter so that the list again displays all drawings, click Refresh at the top of the Drawing List.
  2. To view properties for a drawing, such as the drawing's folder path, AutoCAD version, and the drawing's space hierarchy values , select the drawing from the list and click Properties from the top of the drawing list.
  3. Double-click the drawing you want to open.

    The drawing opens in the Extension for AutoCAD set in your user preferences. If the Extension for AutoCAD is not active, selecting the drawing launches the CAD drawing tool.

Note:. If you find you cannot launch newly created drawings from the Drawing List, check the permissions on your project folder by right-clicking on the folder and using the Properties dialogs. In some configurations, Windows creates as read-only folders under the \\<machinename>\aiprojects\ folder . To correct the situation, uncheck the “Read Only” toggle on the Properties box. Either cascade the changes to the subfolders, or make the same change on the subfolders (that is, make both the \myproject and the \myproject\drawings subfolders read/write).

Alternately, if you have a single-user workstation, you can change your Preferences/Projects form (or directly edit the afm-projects.xml file) to set the Drawings Folder for Smart Client value to access the files without using the share name (e.g. c:\users\public\archibus\myproject\drawings).

Using a Relative Path with the Drawing List

You can use the Drawing List's Relative Path to Drawing File field to control how the Drawing List searches for drawings.

  1. Use the Smart Client to load the System / CAD and BIM Manager / Edit Drawing List view.
  2. Display the Relative Path to Drawing File (relative_path) field.
  3. For the desired drawings, enter a relative path, such as /site-01.
  4. Use Smart Client's Projects command to set your project's Smart Client Drawing Files Folder to //filesvr/AIPROJECTS/hq/drawings .

Now, when you load a drawing from the Drawing List, the program will look for it first in //filesvr/AIPROJECTS/hq/drawings/site-01 . If the program does not find the file there, it will do a breadth-first search of each successive level of subfolders until it finds the file, or until it has searched the entire subfolder tree.