Number base conversion - optimized

This is a second iteration on my previous post.

		Seconds for 25,000 Iterations
Number	Base	ToBase10	ToBase10-2	Change
1111	2	1.08	0.656	-40%
1523	6	1.09	0.547	-50%
15A23	26	1.86	0.703	-38%

Take the above for what it’s worth.  If this is a time critical conversion and you have tight control over the number being converted – you may opt for using ToBase10-2 and wrapping it in a vl-catch-all-apply.  Either way, it’s your call.

(defun ToBase10-2(NumBase InputValue / )
       (setq
       indx      0
       ;;Get the list of multipliers
       temp (mapcar
          (function
        (lambda    (x)
          (if (< 57 x)
            (- x 55)
            (- x 48)
          )
        )
          )
          (reverse (vl-string->list
             (if (= 'INT (type InputValue))
               (itoa InputValue)
               InputValue
             )
               )
          )
        )
       rtval      0
     )
     (repeat (length temp)
       (setq
     digit (nth indx temp)
     rtval (+ rtval (* Digit (expt NumBase indx)))
     indx  (1+ indx)
       )
     )
     rtval
  )

Number base conversion

This routine will convert a number from any base between 2 and 36, inclusive, to base 10.

  Routine:    ToBase10
  Purpose:    Convert a number from any base between 2 and 36 to base 10
  Arguments:    NumBase - integer where 2<= NumBase <= 36.  The number base from which we are
            converting.
          InputValue
            Symbol - example: '010010
            Number - example:   10010
            string - example: "010010" or "10010"
  Returns:    The input value converted to base 10
=============================================================================================
  This routine is the inverse of the base routine found in the acad developement help files
    under "ASCII Code Conversion", hence, (tobase10 16 (base 16 5284)) returns 5284
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Example1:    (tobase10 2 '11001011 )  returns      203
  Example2:     (tobase10 2  11001011 )  returns      203
  Example3:     (tobase10 2 "11001011")  returns      203

  Example4:     (tobase10 6 '15243 )     returns     2475
  Example5:     (tobase10 6  15243 )     returns     2475
  Example6:     (tobase10 6 "15243")     returns     2475

  Example7:     (tobase10 16 '34F1A )    returns   216858
  Example9:     (tobase10 16 "34F1A")    returns   216858
    Notice that '34F1A cannot be represented as a number, hence, only two examples

  Example10:    (tobase10 36 '11001011 ) returns 60525828
  Example11:    (tobase10 36  11001011 ) returns 60525828
  Example12:    (tobase10 36 "11001011") returns 60525828
    As a check, use this online java applet.

 

(defun ToBase10 (NumBase InputValue / rtval)

;;Here we convert out input value’s type.
  (cond
    ((= 'str (type inputvalue))
     (setq inputvalue (strcase inputvalue))
     )
    ((= 'SYM (type inputvalue))
     (setq InputValue (vl-symbol-name InputValue))
     )
    )

;;Here we start validating our input
  (cond
    ;;Base is not an integer
    ((not (= 'int (type NumBase)))
     (strcat
       "ERROR|ToBase10 base argument must be an integer - "
       (vl-prin1-to-string (type NumBase))
       " provided (" (vl-prin1-to-string NumBase) ")"
       )
     )
    ;;Base argument is out of range
    ((or
       (> 2 NumBase)
       (< 36 NumBase)
       )
     (strcat
       "ERROR|ToBase10 Base argument must be greater than 1 and less than 36 - " (itoa NumBase) " provided."
       )
     )
    ;;InputValue is of wrong type for specified base
    ((and
       (> NumBase 10)
       (not (= 'STR (type InputValue)))
       )
       "ERROR|Numbers in a base greater than 10 must be expressed as a string - ToBase routine."
    )
    ;;InputValue has invalid characters
    ((not (vl-every
        (function
          (lambda (asciicode)
        (cond
          ;;Character below "0" used
          ((< asciicode 48) nil)
          ;;Character greater than valid used for base less than or equal to 10
          ((and
             (<= NumBase 10)
             (> asciicode (+ 47 NumBase))
             )
           nil
           )
          ;;For base greater than 10, invalid character used
          ((and (> NumBase 10)
            (not (wcmatch (chr asciicode) (strcat "[0-9],[A-" (chr (+ NumBase 54)) "]")))
            )
           nil
           )
          (T T)
          )
        )
          )       
        (vl-string->list (if (= 'INT (type InputValue))
                   (itoa InputValue)
                   InputValue
                   )
          )
      )
     )
     (strcat
       "ERROR|Invalid InputValue argument provided to ToBase10 routine : " (vl-prin1-to-string InputValue)
     )
    )

;;Now we’re done validating the input, let’s get started
    (T
     (setq
       indx      0
       ;;Get the list of multipliers
       temp (mapcar
          (function
        (lambda    (x)
          (if (< 57 x)
            (- x 55)
            (- x 48)
          )
        )
          )
          (reverse (vl-string->list
             (if (= 'INT (type InputValue))
               (itoa InputValue)
               InputValue
             )
               )
          )
        )
       rtval      0
     )
     (repeat (length temp)
       (setq
     digit (nth indx temp)
     rtval (+ rtval (* Digit (expt NumBase indx)))
     indx  (1+ indx)
       )
     )
     rtval
    )
  )
)

The concept for this approach was derived from here - chapter IX.

Get all insertions of a block

Note: this process will not correctly identify insertions of dynamic blocks. - mweaver 01/18/2019
Let’s look at a way to get all insertions of a block without using ssget and without iterating through all objects in the drawing.  This method will also get nested block insertions.
Let’s say the block we want is named “Test2”.
We can use tblobjname to get the block definition entity, thus:

(tblobjname "block" "test2")

This will get us an entity name which we can run through entget to get the following:

((-1 . <Entity name: 7ee414c8>)
  (0 . "BLOCK")
  (330 . <Entity name: 7ee414c0>)
  (5 . "181")
  (100 . "AcDbEntity")
  (67 . 0)
  (8 . "0")
  (100 . "AcDbBlockBegin")
  (70 . 0)
  (10 0.0 0.0 0.0)
  (-2 . <Entity name: 7ee414d0>)
  (2 . "test2")
  (1 . "")
)

Here we have the beginning of the block definition – the objects that make up the block.  If we do an entget on the entity name at assoc 330, we get something like the following:

((-1 . <Entity name: 7ee414c0>)
  (0 . "BLOCK_RECORD")
  (330 . <Entity name: 7ee3fc08>)
  (5 . "180")
  (100 . "AcDbSymbolTableRecord")
  (100 . "AcDbBlockTableRecord")
  (2 . "test2")
  (360 . <Entity name: 7ee414c8>)
  (340 . <Entity name: 0>)
  (102 . "{BLKREFS")
  (331 . <Entity name: 7ee414e8>)
  (331 . <Entity name: 7ee41540>)
  (102 . "}")
  (70 . 1)
  (280 . 1)
  (281 . 0)
)

Note the 331 entries.  These are the entity names for each insertion of Test2.
This approach has distinct advantages over ssget, primarily because this will show nested insertions.  Also, with a bit of trickery, this can be used with objectdbx documents – avoiding the need to iterate every object in the drawing looking for block insertions.
For more information see my entry on Getting block insertions with objectdbx.

Gathering attributes from a block insertion

In an earlier post I showed a routine for gathering attributes from a block insertion object.  I have since found a better way to get the attribute objects.

For years I have been using vla-get-attributes, which returns a variant, which must then be converted to a safearray and then a list.  The “New and Improved” method is to use vlax-invoke.

Below are a couple of test procedures I used to benchmark these two methods.

First, I selected the block insertion and converted the entity name to a vla object.

(setq obj (vlax-ename->vla-object(car (entsel))))

Here are the two functions.  AttTest1 using vla-getattributes, and AttTest2 using vlax-invoke.  Note that the functions are defined using Defun-q rather than Defun.  This is because the benchmarking routine I used (by Vladimir Nesterovsky – Profiler) requires defun-q.  I typically change the defun to defun-q to run the profiler, then change it back.

(defun-q attTest1
     ()
     (vlax-safearray->list
       (vlax-variant-value
         (vla-getattributes obj)
       )
     )
     (princ)
)

(defun-q attTest2
     ()
     (vlax-invoke obj 'getattributes)
     (princ)
)

Now for the fun part. Profile-Func is a routine in Vladimir’s profiler that registers the function and starts the timer.

(profile-func 'attTest1)
(profile-func 'attTest2)

Below are the timer results after running both routines 10 times.

Routine	Number of runs timed	Total seconds for all runs	Average seconds per run
AttTest1	10	0.4	0.041
AttTest2	10	0.07	0.007

To put this in perspective, the test block I created for this has 10,000 attributes.  That’s 0.00007 milliseconds per attribute!  Not too shabby!  Needless to say, I am going to be using vlax-invoke to get block attributes on all my routines in the future.  In addition I am going to be looking much more closely at the vlax functions.  I am particularly interested in using vlax-invoke with the GetDynamicBlockProperties method.

A Free copy of AutoCAD? From Autodesk???

Jimmy Bergmark, over at JTBWorld posted an article pointing out the Autodesk Assistance Program. This program makes a copy of AutoCAD 2010 available to qualified applicants. If you are a recently un-employed AutoCAD user, check this out!