In the NET-Hook API Reference…

I drilled down to Mastercam.Operations

Selected the Operation type I’m interested in (e.g. ContourOperation)

and in its Methods section I see GetChainArray – “This method retrieves the Chains in this operation.”

What are you trying to do with the Chains?

What type(s) of Operations are you "processing"?

Do mean the tools contained within a DrillBlock tool?

If so, the answer is no.

Chad,

Check this thread over at the forum on mastercam.com

http://forum.mastercam.com/Topic8177.aspx

It sounds as if this may be what you're referring to ?

In X9 

Settings - Customize and under the Category "Router C-Hooks" you should find Rast2Vec.

Add it to a toolbar / right-click menu / keystroke as you desire.

Only bug1$ and putting the bug1$ setting in the PSB doesn't sound like a good idea to me.

In the Post Processor (PST) that is being used...

Is bug1$ defined? And if so, is it set to a value other then '0'?

You are looking to remove just the "names" (and level set names?) of all of the levels in a file?

In X9, in a NET-Hook you cannot really know when all of the operations have completed (or not) .

In Mastercam 2017 there will be a new Notify method jut for this purpose ->

I just downloaded it 'mastercamx9-md-cd-pst-rename.zip'

from the web site (http://www.mastercam.com/en-us/Support/Downloads/Mastercam)

and it contains the MD_CD_PST_Rename.msi (installer) as expected.

Is there a way to turn a level visibility off in the nethook such that the mastercam user will be able to toggle it back on with one click in the level manager?

Doesn’t appear to be. I was a bit surprised myself.

It must have never come up before. (The behavior was the same in X8.)

I’ll log a request that this be investigated further to see what can be done in the future.

Is there a way to create geometry on an invisible level then chain it using the references?

You can create geometry on an invisible level, but you cannot chain entities that are not visible.

Roger Martin

CNC Software, Inc.

API/SDK support survey

I'd have to say that I do not recall anyone asking about this before!

You cannot rearrange the order of the operations in the tree programmatically with a NET-Hook add-in.

It may be possible with a C-Hook, but I'd have to confirm that.

SetEntityLevel sets the level of an entity.

​You have not told it which entity to alter.

You need to run through the entities that you've 'selected' and change them.

'////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
'// File Name:  MoveToLevel.vbs
'// Date:       02/19/2016
'//
'// Description:   
'// This script demonstrates changing the Level of entities.
'// So we are "moving" all entities (that are NOT on Level #1) to Level #6 
'//
'//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// 
Const DEF_GIVE_ME_EVERYTHING = -1

' -- Start Script
Call Main()

' ////////////////////
' Sub Declaration
' ////////////////////
Sub Main()   

Dim bRet

' Turn off Level #1 so we do NOT select anything on this level
Call SetLevelVisibleByNumber(1, False)

' This selects all "visible" entities
SelectAll

' Run through the database looking for selected entities
bRet = StartDBSearch(mc_selected, DEF_GIVE_ME_EVERYTHING)

If bRet Then
Do 
 ' Change the level on each "selected" entity that we find. 
  Call SetEntityLevel(6) 
  bRet = NextDBSearch    
  Loop While bRet  
End If

' Like is says...
UnselectAll

' Here we assume that the data we "moved" was on Level #7
' So we want to remove that level from the levels list.
' Usually we do not need to do anything as the level has no entities, but...
' If a level has a name, Mastercam will not auto-purge it as an empty level
Call SetLevelName (7, "")

' Refresh (and FIT) the graphics display
Call RepaintScreen(True)

End Sub

Forget about *UpdateToolSettings, as it’s not going to do anything useful for  here.

Even if it actually completely successfully…

It updates the tool info in the operation, except for these Operation values ->

LengthOffset

DiameterOffset

SpindleSpeed

FeedRate

PlungeRate

RetractRate

op.OperationTool = tool;
op.Commit();
bool result = op.UpdateToolSettings(); // Check the return of this method. It is true?

Do what you're doing.

 No => ...if there's a more elegant solution that I missed.

I'll investigate the possibility of have some way to do "re-initialize feeds and speeds", in a future version.

Settings - Customize-Options (tab)

Indeed it does fail when attempting to process a Makino TECH file.

There are some thickness values in those Makino TECH files that fail this 'convert text to double' -

let t = Convert.ToDouble(record.Element("thickness").Value)

So... if wish wish to process those files, we'll need some additional logic it determine the thickness value(s).

Try it on one the Mitsubishi named TECH files and it works. [e.g. Mitsubishi (FA-S).tech]

*You may not see any difference the _OUT file, as most (if not all) of the TECH files are already ordered by increasing material 'thickness'.

You can launch a NET-Hook from within a PST.

For manipulating XML data, .NET is the easy way to go.

This (C#) method reorders the <record> items within each <record_block> by the Material Thickness.

You can find examples of the data this works with in ->

C:\Users\Public\Documents\shared mcamx9\wire\Power

Those .TECH files you see there are XML data.

You can use the free Visual Studio Community Edition to build NET-Hooks ->

bool ReorderByMaterialThickness(string inFile, string outFile)
    {
        bool result = false;
        try
        {
            XDocument document = XDocument.Load(inFile);

            foreach (var rb in document.Descendants("record_block"))
            {
                // A LINQ statement to select and sort the record items in the TECH (XML) data file.
                var records = from record in rb.Elements("record")
                    let t = Convert.ToDouble(record.Element("thickness").Value)
                    orderby (t)
                    select record;

                int cnt = 1;
                foreach (XElement rec in records)
                {
                    // reset the num attribute on the record
                    rec.Attribute("num").Value = (cnt++).ToString();

                    // We've done something, so assume that it's good. 
                    result = true;
                }

                // We need the reordered data to be an Array format.
                var reordered = records.ToArray();

                // Reove the old records.
                rb.Elements("record").Remove();

                // And repalce them with the new reordered ones.
                rb.Add(reordered);
            }

            document.Save(outFile);
        }
        catch (Exception ex)
        {
            MessageBox.Show(ex.Message, "ReorderByMaterialThickness");
        }

        return result;
    }

You wish to manipulate XML data from within a PST ?

The MP Post language does not have XML specific functions, as it never deals with XML.

Manipulation XML is fairly simple using .NET (C#) 

Maybe a NET-Hook Add-In solution would get you what you need.

Creating NET-Hooks does not require a specific "Platform Toolset" as is the case for C-Hooks.

You can use the free Community Edition of Visual Studio for building NET-Hooks (not C-Hooks).

Visual Studio Community Edition 2015

... create threadmill operation with the net-hook -  I have mastercam X6 

No, as the NET-Hook API did not yet support the Thread Mill toolpath in X6.

I am unable to duplicate what you are describing.

I dropped this code into a NET-Hook and running it in X9 I get=>
If no Machine Group, exists, a “default” Mill group  will be created for the new Pocket Operation.

If a Machine Group, already exists, another is not created and the new Pocket Operation is added to this existing Machine Group.

StartTransaction / CommitTransaction is not enough handle this situation were you modify an existing entity.

I see that the ability to flag this special type of UnDo transaction is not supported in the NET-Hook API

I've entered an enhancement request into our system to see if that can be added.