MicroStation File Locations and VBA

Q

Current DGN File

There's an undocumented configuration variable _dgnfile. It's updated automatically each time you open a DGN file. It points to the active DGN file's location. So the answer to the question is simple: evaluate_dgnfile …

' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
'   ShowCurrentDgnFile
'   Shows how to find the current DGN file path
' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
Sub ShowCurrentDgnFile()
    Dim path                                As String
    Const CurrentFile                       As String = "$(_dgnfile)"
    path = ActiveWorkspace.ExpandConfigurationVariable(CurrentFile)
    Debug.Print "Variable '" & CurrentFile & "' evaluates to " & path
End Sub

Current DGN File Location

There's an undocumented configuration variable _dgnfile. It's updated automatically each time you open a DGN file. It points to the active DGN file's location. So the answer to the question is simple: evaluate_dgnfile …

' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
'   ShowCurrentDgnFolder
'   Shows how to find the current DGN file folder
' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
Sub ShowCurrentDgnFolder()
    Dim path                                As String
    Const CurrentFolder                     As String = "$(_dgndir)"
    path = ActiveWorkspace.ExpandConfigurationVariable(CurrentFolder)
    Debug.Print "Variable '" & CurrentFolder & "' evaluates to " & path
End Sub

DGN File Search Paths

MicroStation looks for DGN files in the folders indicated by configuration variable MS_DEF. There's more information about configuration variables and configuration files in MicroStation help.

MS_DEF points to a single folder or a list of folders. You would normally set MS_DEF per project, in your project configuration file or perhaps your user configuration file.

MicroStation Location

MicroStation is the executing application that hosts your VBA run-time environment. Every application that hosts VBA has an Application object. The Application object has a Path property.

So, whether you're writing VBA for MicroStation, Excel, Word, or something else, you can find the host's location using Application.Path …

Dim path                                As String
path = Application.path
Debug.Print "Application.Path '" & path & "'"

MicroStation stores VBA projects in various locations. Those locations may be in one of MicroStation's workspace folders (e.g. \Bentley\MicroStation\WorkSpace\System\Vba) or in your own project-specific folders. See configuration variable MS_VBASEARCHDIRECTORIES in MicroStation VBA help for more information.

VBA Project Location

By default, VBA provides to way to find the location of the executing project at run-time. However, that information is available via the deftly-named Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications Extensibility 5.3. This is a VBA project, which you can find in C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Bentley\MicroStation\WorkSpace\System\Vba. Use the VBE IDE menu Tools|References to pop the VBA References dialog. Browse through the list to find the VBE Extensibility module and check the box to add it to your project …

Now you've referenced the VBE Extensibility module, you can use it in your code. In this example, we want to get the location of the currently-executing VBA code …

' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
'   ShowVbaProjectFolder
'   Shows how to find the folder where your VBA Project is located.
'   This is different to the Application.Path, which is the folder
'   where the executable that hosts the VBA run-time is located
'
'   The code that gets the VBA Project path requires a reference to
'   another project, 'Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications Extensibility 5.3'.
'   You reference another project using the VBA IDE menu Tools|References
' ---------------------------------------------------------------------
Sub ShowVbaProjectFolder()
    Dim path                                As String
    path = Application.path
    Debug.Print "Application.Path '" & path & "'"
    ' The next statement uses the VBE Project reference 
	Dim oVB                                 As VBProject
    Set oVB = ExecutingVBProject
    path = oVB.FileName
    Debug.Print "VBA Project path '" & path & "'"
End Sub