What's the best way to hide block text attributes in modelspace ?

[Gorgious56]

I'm writing a script where I initialize blocks and text attributes inside them but I don't want the text attribs to appear in modelspace. I've found that the invisible attribute seems to do what I'm going after, but I can't make it work. I'm opening the file in Acad afterwards and the text is still visible.

Here's a simple script that creates a blockdef, instance a blockref and populate its attribute. I expected the text not to appear in modelspace. I've looked around a bit but couldn't find a workaround.

import ezdxf

dxf_file = ezdxf.new(dxfversion="R2010")
block_def = dxf_file.blocks.new(name="Test")
block_def.add_attdef("test_attr", dxfattribs={"invisible": 1})
block_instance = dxf_file.modelspace().add_blockref("Test", (0, 0, 0))
block_instance.add_attrib("test_attr", "test")

dxf_file.saveas(r"C:\path\to\file.dxf")

Thanks for the awesome library btw ! It saves me countless hours of tedious work :)

[mozman]

By using add_attrib() you create a new ATTRIB from scratch, so you have to set all DXF attributes by yourself including the location, in your example, you also have to set the invisible flag like you did for the ATTDEF entity.

But I assume this is what you want:

    block_instance.add_auto_attrib({"test_attr", "test"})

This adds new ATTRIB entities based on template ATTDEF entities at the same relative location as the ATTDEF and the same settings.

See docs for more information.

[Gorgious56]

Hello ! Thanks for the quick reply. :)

I have to say I have tested pretty much all matters of combinations, including add_auto_attribs but none of them seem to be setting the invisible flag to the attrib when I open the file.

If I follow correctly this should create a block with no geometry and an invisible attribute in modelspace, but I can still see the attribute :

import ezdxf

dxf_file = ezdxf.new(dxfversion="R2010")
block_def = dxf_file.blocks.new(name="Test")
block_instance = dxf_file.modelspace().add_blockref("Test", (0, 0, 0))
block_instance.add_attrib("test_attr", "test", dxfattribs={"invisible": 1})
dxf_file.saveas(r"C:\path\to\file.dxf")

Am I still missing something ?

[mozman]

The invisible flag is the usual flag to set DXF entities invisible and seems not to work for ATTRIB entities.
The ATTRIB entity has a special visibility flag which is stored in the DXF flag attribute but can be set by the property is_invisible:

...

block_instance = dxf_file.modelspace().add_blockref("Test", (0, 0, 0))
attrib = block_instance.add_attrib("test_attr", "test")
attrib.is_invisible = True
dxf_file.saveas(r"C:\Users\manfred\Desktop\Outbox\attribs.dxf")

[Gorgious56]

Awesome, that did the trick ! Thanks :)

For reference this is where I'm using this : https://github.com/Gorgious56/dotbim_io_dxf
It's a converter script between dotbim and dxf.

Cheers !

[mozman]

dotbim is a nice idea and the complexity of IFC is really overwhelming, but BIM is much more than exchange of 3D meshes ...

[Gorgious56]

You're right, the naming is arguably a bit unfortunate but the project seems to receive a decent amount of traction and I see it as a good stepping stone in the world of bim & collaboration. We'll see :)