Using the Inspect Window
Using Inspect Windows
Common Inspect Commands
Understanding Object Element List Formats
The
contents of an Inspect element list vary, depending on the data
type of the object being inspected. The following table identifies
the list contents for each data type.
|
Inspect
element lists
|
|
Data type
|
Contents
of element list
|
|
INT (integer)
|
The various
representations of integers.
|
|
REAL
(floating point number)
|
Empty.
|
|
STRING
|
The sequence
of characters in the string, which may in turn be inspected as integers.
|
|
SYMBOL
|
Three elements:
value, print name, and flags.
|
|
LIST
(for proper lists)
|
Items of
the inspected list.
|
|
LIST
(for improper lists)
|
Two elements:
the car and cdr fields. It serves for all cases that
are not proper LISP lists, that is, where the last cdr is not nil.
|
|
FILE
|
The name
of the corresponding file and the file's opening attributes.
|
|
SUBR,
EXRXSUBR, and USUBR
|
The name
of the function (the name that was specified in defun or at load time).
SUBR refers to internal and compiled functions, EXRXSUBR refers
to external ARX functions, and USUBR identifies user-defined functions.
|
|
ENAME (drawing
entity)
|
The fields
in this element list correspond to the AutoCAD DXF object list,
as returned by the AutoLISP built-in function.
|
|
PICKSET (selection set)
|
List of
selected AutoCAD objects.
|
|
VARIANT
|
The data
type and value of the variant.
|
|
SAFEARRAY
|
The data
type, number of dimensions, and value of the safearray.
|
Sample Inspect windows for each data type follow.
-
INT
-
The INT (integer) Inspect window shows the number
represented in binary, octal, decimal, hexadecimal, and character
formats. Character format means the ASCII character that corresponds
to the number (for large numbers it takes the last byte).
The INT Inspect window does not have
an element list.
-
REAL
-
The REAL Inspect window does not have an element
list.
-
STRING
-
Shows the string as a list of characters represented
as numbers:
Double-click on a listed character to see its number
representation.
-
SYMBOL
-
Contains the symbol name, the symbol value, and
the flags that represent symbol attributes. Flags may be one of
the following:
Pa Protect Assign
Tr Trace
De Debug on entry
Ea Export to ACAD
To change a symbol's value or flag settings,
use the object line menu command Symbol Service, which shows the
Symbol Service window.
Note
that the information supplied by the SYMBOL Inspect window is available
more conveniently through the Symbol Service feature.
-
LIST (properlist)
-
Shows the elements of a proper list:
-
LIST (improperlist)
-
Shows the car and cdr of an improper list. For example,
a list constructed by (cons
4 '(5 . 0)) is represented as follows:
-
FILE
-
File Inspect fields include the following:
File name is the name string used
in the open function.
Mode indicates whether the file
is open for input, output, append, or whether the file is closed.
ID shows the internal file identifier.
Position shows the current position
in the file.
EOF indicates whether or not the
end of the file has been reached. This field does not appear if
a file is open for output.
-
SUBR
-
The SUBR data type represents functions that cannot
be debugged with the VLISP debugging tools (for example, you cannot
set breakpoints). These are internal AutoLISP functions, or functions
loaded from FAS or VLX files.
The
SUBR Inspect window shows a string containing the name of the symbol,
as in the following example:
-
USUBR
-
The USUBR data type represents functions that can
be debugged with the VLISP debugging tools (for example, you can
set breakpoints and view the values of program variables). These functions
are loaded from LISP source code.
The USUBR Inspect window shows the name of the
symbol, a list of function parameters (arguments), and a list of
local variables declared in the function (listed after the “/” in the defun argument list).
The following example shows an Inspect window for a function that
accepts no arguments and declares several local variables:
-
EXRXSUBR
-
The
EXRXSUBR data type represents functions loaded from external ARX
applications. The EXRXSUBR Inspect window shows a string containing
the function name, as in the following example:
-
ENAME
-
The contents of the ENAME Inspect window depend
on the properties of the entity being inspected. The following example
shows an Inspect window for a circle:
-
PICKSET
-
The PICKSET Inspect window lists the elements in
a selection set:
-
VARIANT
-
The VARIANT Inspect window shows the data type
and value of the variant. The following example shows an Inspect
window for a variant that contains an array of doubles:
-
SAFEARRAY
-
The SAFEARRAY Inspect window shows the data type,
number of dimensions, and value of the safearray. The following
example shows a Safearray Inspect window for a single dimension array
of doubles:
You
can also use the Inspect feature to examine ActiveX® objects.
See Using the Inspect Tool to View
Object Properties for
an example of this.
