Michael’s Corner

Michael's Corner is a monthly publication written by Michael E. Beall, Autodesk Authorized Author and peripatetic AutoCAD trainer. Michael travels all over the USA, bringing his fantastic experience and great understanding of AutoCAD to his clients. Michael's Corner brings together many of the tips, tricks and methods developed during these training sessions for the benefit of all users.

Michael's Corner provides something for every AutoCAD user. Every month, a number of articles cover a wide range of topics, suitable for users at all levels, including "The Basics" for those just starting out. Essentially, the aim of Michael's Corner is to help all AutoCAD users work smarter and faster.

This month…

From the Vault

Originally published March 2009

Extracting Attribute Data

Many of the drawing title blocks for the Cabinda Gulf Oil Company drawings are rich with attributes, including revision information, project titles and information, and approvals. One of their Document Control folks was interested in knowing if there was a way to extract that data and put it in an Excel sheet.

In July, 2003 I covered how to extract data from a drawing, but it's time for an update. These procedures work for A2008 & A2009; I haven't checked A2007.

Instructions to Extract Data From an Attributed Title Block

1. On the Modify II toolbar, click Data Extraction to open the first page of the Data Extraction dialog box (or "Extract Data" from the "Blocks & References" tab of the Ribbon).
2. For new extraction files [.DXE], click the radio button for "Create A New Data Extraction", then click Next to open the Save Data Extraction As dialog box. Enter a name for the DXE, then click Save.

3. For this application - where I'm only selecting the attributed title block - click the "Select Objects In The Current Drawing" radio button, then click the Select Objects button. After selecting the objects, click Next.

4. In the Data Extraction dialog box, under Display Options, clear the check box for "Display All Object Types", then click the radio button for "Display Blocks Only". You can leave the other two boxes checked for displaying of blocks and objects. Click Next.

Note: If you use the Data source option of "Drawing/Sheet Set", you can Add Drawings to the extraction process.

5. In the Select Properties page (Page 4), under Category Filter, clear all the check boxes except for Attribute and Drawing. The resulting list will display all attribute and drawing-related information. Scroll through the properties and toggle off those you won't need in the final result. Click Next.

6. In the Refine Data dialog box, in the lower left corner, check or clear the desired check boxes, then click Next.

7. Choose the desired option - Insert a table into the drawing or save an external file - then click Next.

Note: If you opt to insert the data as a table into the drawing, your next screen will give you an opportunity to choose the desired Table style and/or formatting structure. See August 2008 for coverage of the current status of Tables.

8. At this point, you have completed all the requisite steps to extract data from your drawing and can click the Finish button on the final screen.

Closing notes

Obviously, there is much more that can be done with this extraction tool and this has been just a quick review of the steps involved in accomplishing the extraction of data from a single attributed block in a drawing.

Also, if you find that the result is agreeable and you would like to repeat the process for another drawing or group of drawings, when you launch the Data Extraction dialog box, you will notice there's an option to "Use Previous Extraction As A Template".

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