CompuServe Messages

Well, I'm not expecting *everyone* to be on my side, so I don't mind dissent too much. I am glad that you see the need for "some sort of thing that behaves like that", but I question (just playing the devil's advocate) whether having yet a third type of "block" wouldn't be more confusing than simply extending VISRETAIN to keep the color changes of the layer settings. I can live without the linetypes in R12, but I really think that this ability needs to be in R12, whether it's part of xref's, or some other type of external thingie. As for the request interfeering with a canonical representation of one drawing, it seems to me that meerly changing the color of a layer (to change their entities appearance from solid to screened, for instance), is a *lot* less damaging to that cannonical representation than the *current* provision of COMPLETELY HIDING LAYERS from an xref is. Or is that precicely what you mean when you say "further bastardization…"? Yes, I've heard of the original implementation's goal of simply being an analogy for the pin-bar method of combining files at plot time, but forget about the *intended* design; what do most of the people who are, or would use xref's, want/need *now*? I believe strongly that more people would side with my version than your version. Carefull now, I'm not saying that yours is wrong. I do indeed like it. I'd love to have both, but right now, If I have to choose between them, I want VISRETAIN extended. Yes, I think we need another type of xternal file referencing, but I'd prefer it to be developed in a longer time frame than what a release 12 feature could offer. If it was said many months ago that the feature set of R12 was frozen, surely your wish won't happen in R12, eh? [More]