Have you ever wanted to make a change to a level in your main drawing and have the change propagate through to multiple sheets in the projects? This can be accomplished using more than one method but each method has it’s advantages and drawbacks.

Scenario

Your main drawing that contains your design is created by referencing several different drawings or models into one drawing (model) that is a composite of the individual drawings. This main composite drawing is then referenced into individual sheet models to create the sheets to be plotted. To make it easier to follow along, let’s refer to the individual drawings that make up the design as the “Design Models”, the main composite drawing as the “Composite model” and the individual sheets as the “Sheet models”. The Design model > referenced into the Composite model > referenced into the Sheet models.

What you are trying to accomplish

The challenge accurse when you need to make a change to a level in every Sheet that was created from the main Composite model. This may require you to open every sheet model and make the same change to each and every sheet. There is an easier way. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could make a change, in the Composite model, to a level from one of the Design models and have that change propagate through to the each sheet model?

Different methods available.

If you only want to control the level display using View Display, this can be accomplished using the “Display Overrides” setting in the reference attachment settings.

• Easy to set

• You can select which sheets to apply it to.

• Only applies to View Display

• Does not apply to levels that originate in the Composite Model

If you want to control all the level settings that are included in Level Manager, you want to use the “Synchronized” method.

• Control all the level settings that are included in Level Manager

• Applies to all models that contain nested references (you cannot select which sheets to apply it to)

• Does not include View Display

• You may need to re-attach some existing references to the sheets.

• Does not apply to levels that originate in the Composite Model

Display Overrides method

This refers to the “Display Overrides” setting in the Reference attachment setting dialog box. This setting will apply to reference display, locate, snap, raster reference display, and level display (view Display) of the Design Models in the Sheet Models. These settings are controlled in the Composite model and propagate through to the Sheet Model when the setting is set to “Never”. Never means that in the sheet model, you can never override the setting that was set in the Composite model for the design model. The Composite Model is controlling the View Display settings for the levels from the Design Model.

1. When attaching the Composite Model to the Sheet Model, set the attachment setting “Display Overrides” to “Never”.

2. Open the Composite Model and make changes to reference levels from the Design Model using View Display.

3. Open the Sheet models and the level change in the Composite Model will be propagated to the sheet model.

4. You may need to re-open the file containing the Sheet Model before the change to the levels takes effect.

Synchronized method

When a reference file is attached, the reference level settings in level manager are synchronized to the file being referenced, until a change is made to a reference level in the file that it is attached to. Once a change has been made to a referenced level, the files become out of synchronization and act independent from each other. When reference levels become un-synchronized, the only way to get them back into synchronization is to re-attach the reference file.

When you attach the Composite Model to the Sheet Model, the reference levels from the Composite Model and the nested Design Model will be synchronized with the level settings in the Composite Model. In order to keep the levels synchronized, you cannot make a change to any of the level settings for that reference. To ensure that the levels from the nested Design Model are not changed, do NOT allow editing of nested attachment levels. The variable MS_LEVEL_EDIT_NESTED_ATTACHMENT_LEVELS needs to be undefined or set to Null. Even if it is set to 0, it is still considered being defined. You will need to set MS_LEVEL_EDIT_NESTED_ATTACHMENT_LEVELS = (blank, with no value added).

If you cannot edit the Design Model levels in the Sheet Model (nested levels), the Design Model levels in the Sheet Models will always be synchronized to the level settings in the Composite Model. You can then make your changes to the Design Model levels in the Composite Model and the changes will propagate through to all the sheet models. One drawback of this method is that all instances of nested reference levels will be synchronized with the direct attachment. It is an all or nothing type of workflow.

1. Set MS_LEVEL_EDIT_NESTED_ATTACHMENT_LEVELS = (blank, with no value added)

2. Reference the Composite Model to the Sheet Model

3. Make changes to the Design Model levels in the Sheet Model by changing the level in the Composite Model.

4. If the Sheet Models already had the synchronization broken, you with need to detach the reference of the Composite Model and re-attach it.

Determining which method to use

There are many different things that need to be taken into consideration when determining which method you want to use. First you need to determine what you want to control. Only view display or all level attributes? Then you need to determine if you want to determine which Sheet Models you want to control the levels in. All Sheet Models or selective Sheet Models? You may want to try both methods and determine which method works best for you. There is no method that works best for everyone in every situation.

See also

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