Recently, Product Support has seen cases where AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 is failing to retrieve a license on launch. Installation of Raster Design runs without incident but when launching the integrated product, the following message displays:

In most cases this is the result of AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 having a different license type than the product to which it was integrated. Here are some examples of this kind of mixed-license scenario:

• AutoCAD 2010 Stand-Alone with an AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 Network license
• AutoCAD 2010 Network with an AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 Stand-Alone license
• AutoCAD 2010 Multi-Seat Stand-Alone (MSSA) with an AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 Stand-Alone license

AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 must be installed using the same license type (or deployment method – depending on the mix of license types) as the AutoCAD-based product to which it was installed. The requirements are as follows:

Network and Stand-Alone Products

• An AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 Stand-Alone license must be used with an AutoCAD 2010 Stand-Alone license.
• An AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 Network license must be used with an AutoCAD 2010 Network license. The exception to this requirement is if the Raster Design 2010 Hotfix has been applied, which allows AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 network deployments to be installed with supported Stand-Alone AutoCAD products.

Multi-Seat Stand-Alone (MSSA) Products

In the case of MSSA products, AutoCAD Raster Design can fail to retrieve a license if the license type is mismatched during the installation of AutoCAD Raster Design and the accompanying product. For example, when AutoCAD is installed from the physical media but AutoCAD Raster Design is installed from an administrative deployment, or vice versa.

The workaround for this scenario is to use the same deployment method for both products. For example:

• If AutoCAD was installed from the physical media, you need to install AutoCAD Raster Design from the physical media.
• If AutoCAD was installed from an administrative image, you need to also install AutoCAD Raster Design from an administrative image.

I've referenced AutoCAD 2010 in these examples but the same requirements apply to any products based on AutoCAD, e.g., AutoCAD Map 2010 or AutoCAD Civil 3D 2010.

This information is also available in the following technical solution:
AutoCAD Raster Design 2010 Licensing Mismatch

A new version of Update 1 has been released for the Multi-Language Distribution versions of AutoCAD LT 2010:

AutoCAD LT 2010 Update 1

The MLD version of AutoCAD LT 2010 (build D.59.0.0) enables language packs for the following regions:

Americas
English, French and Spanish languages

Asia-Pacific (except Japan)
English, Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese and Korean

You can determine your version of AutoCAD LT by entering _VERNUM at the command prompt.

If your product is version D.55.0.0 (UNICODE), use the following files:

• autocadlt2010update1.exe
• autocadlt2010update1x64.exe

If your product is version D.59.0.0 (UNICODE), use the following files:

• autocadlt2010update1mld.exe
• autocadlt2010update1x64mld.exe

I'm sure many of you are familiar with the INPUTHISTORYMODE system variable, first introduced AutoCAD 2006. This sysvar controls the content and location of the display of a history of your command input and allows you to decide if your command input history gets displayed and where (command line, tooltip, context menu). It doesn't affect the display of commands that you entered, it affects the display of input values that you provided to commands, e.g., points that you picked during a LINE command.

If you're one of those people that sets INPUTHISTORYMODE to 0 because you don't like AutoCAD offering you a history of recent input values, you will have a problem recording macros with the Action Recorder. If INPUTHISTORYMODE is not set to at least 1, the Action Recorder will not properly record input. It seems to record some input from using the Properties Palette but it doesn't play back reliably.

At present, the only workaround for this is to set INPUTHISTORYMODE to an acceptable positive value prior to recording an Action Macro. The INPUTHISTORYMODE setting does not affect playback of Action Macros - only recording.

I posted a new video to the Autodesk section of YouTube:

The video is about 8 minutes in length and is intended to provide an overview of how to download and install language packs for use in installations and deployments.

I used AutoCAD 2010 for the demonstrations but support for language packs also extends to the AutoCAD Electrical, AutoCAD Mechanical, Inventor and Navisworks products. AutoCAD LT 2010 does not support language packs.

Note: Support for language packs does not currently extend to products that ship to Eastern and Western Europe.

In AutoCAD 2008, the Layer States Manager was updated to automatically convert existing Express Tools LMAN layer states and Architectural Desktop Snapshots into AutoCAD layer states. This conversion happens automatically when the Layer States Manager is opened in a drawing containing these legacy types of layer states. After conversion, the old layer states are deleted from the drawing.

Occasionally, we receive a report from a customer that the Express Tools LMAN layer states are being converted every time the Layer States Manager is run, resulting in a new set of converted layer states being created every time. The only time we’ve seen this problem is when customers have a very large quantity of LMAN layer states.

LMAN data was stored on individual layers as xdata and there is a limit to how large the xdata can be. After each layer state is converted, the Layer States Manager deletes each layer state from the blob of xdata and then reapplies that truncated xdata back to the layer.  However, when that xdata exceeds the size limits, the truncated data is rejected and the original xdata is restored (LMAN was an AutoLISP routine so it seems that xdata limit did not apply as strictly to AutoLISP as it does to the ObjectARX app doing the converting).  This is why it keeps converting the LMAN layer states - because it can't successfully delete them.  If you have less than about 100 layer states  this conversion process should work without issue but when you have large numbers of LMAN layer states it's just too much xdata.

If you've experienced this problem with duplicate conversion of LMAN layer states, the workaround is a two-step process:

1. Start the Layer State Manager and let it do the conversion.
2. Run the following AutoLISP routine (LMANKILL) immediately after the conversion.

Download LMANKILL.LSP

LMANKILL.LSP will remove all Express Tools LMAN layer states from the current drawing.  It is quick and complete.  In fact, if you don't want any of those LMAN layer states to be converted, you could run this first and be done with them for good.

Again, this problem should only present itself when there is a large number of LMAN layer states being converted.