Extension Library for managed AutoCAD.NET development
*** Important Note: This library requires C# 10.0 or later, see below for more ***
UPDATE: Some classes from other repos have been moved/merged into AcMgdLib at https://github.com/ActivistInvestor/AcMgdLib.
The merged code has been updated with more documentation and some minor bug fixes and changes to accomodate later framework versions.
This library merges various components that were previously distributed separately in various repositories, including parts of AcMgdUtility, AcDbLinq, and RibbonSupport into a single codebase, mainly because they are all dependent on common supporting code.
Additional components will be added regulary as they are documented.
Target Audience:
This library is primarily intended for use by skilled, moderately- experienced AutoCAD developers who are already somewhat familar with the programming language and the out-of-the-box managed API.
It may not be suitable for inexperienced programmers who are mainly interested in learning to use the out-of-the-box managed AutoCAD API, because it insulates the programmer from a great deal of that, to achieve the higher-level of productivity which the library enables.
The individual code files comprising this library cannot be used alone, or without other files from the library, because of the high-level of interdependence which the code has. Hence, if you are considering cherry-picking bits and pieces of this library for use alone, you will quickly find that AcMgdLib is for the most part, an all-or-nothing proposition.
The easiest way to consume AcMgdLib is outlined below.
Important Note:
This library requires C# varsion 10.0. You can specify C# 10.0 as the language version in a project that targets the .NET framework 4.x (e.g. targeting releases of AutoCAD prior to 2025). Note that not all code in the library requires C# 10.0, but there are no details on that.
A project targeting .NET Framework 4.x can be set to use C# 10 by
adding the <LangVersion>10</LangVersion> entry to .csproj file:
<PropertyGroup>
<TargetFramework>net4.7</TargetFramework>
<LangVersion>10</LangVersion>
<ImplicitUsings>disable</ImplicitUsings>
<Nullable>disable</Nullable>
</PropertyGroup>
While this project is dependent on C# 10.0, it does not use any of the features of that langauge version that have a dependence on more- recent framework versions (e.g., indexes and ranges), so it is safe to use C# 10.0 with earlier framework versions, as long as the code doesn't use features that are dependent on more-recent versions of the framework.
If using this library with later framework versions, note that it
requires <Nullable>disable</Nullable> which is because the code was
ported from older language versions and has not undergone the heavy
refactoring required to enable nullable support. Another reason is
to allow the code to remain compatible with older language versions
to the greatest extent possible.
The roadmap for this library includes support for nullable and implicit usings at some point in the future.
The best strategy for consuming this library is to download it, add it to a new project that targets the framework version used by the AutoCAD releases that are targeted, with the language version set to C# 10.0, with nullable disabled, and build a DLL that can be referenced from whatever projects use the library. This will allow one to avoid the need to change the language version of projects that consume this library, since it is already compiled into a separate assembly that can be referenced into projects that need to use it, without having to change the language version is those projects. If you are also targeting AutoCAD 2025 or later in addition to older releases, you'll need to build a separate build of the library assembly for AutoCAD 2025 or later, which uses .NET 8.0.