Modification of the Registry at ObjectARX Application Installation

AutoCAD uses the Windows system registry to locate ObjectARX applications for demand loading. A part of the AutoCAD section of the registry is used for information about the location of ObjectARX applications' registry information.

The installation program for an ObjectARX application must create the specific keys and values in the system registry that are required for demand loading. Some of the required keys and values must be created in the AutoCAD section of the registry, and others must be created in the ObjectARX application's section of the registry.

If the ObjectARX application is designed to run with more than one version of AutoCAD (that is, different language versions or related products, such as AutoCAD Map), the installation program must add the appropriate information to the section of the registry for each version of AutoCAD.

The installation process for ObjectARX applications must therefore include:

• Verification that the sections of the system registry for the appropriate version of AutoCAD exist. (If the AutoCAD section of the registry does not exist, the user should be warned that a compatible version of AutoCAD has not been installed, and the installation should be aborted.)
• Creation of a specific set of keys and values for the application within the section(s) of the system registry for the appropriate version(s) of AutoCAD.
• Creation of a major key for the application itself, and population of that key with another set of specific keys and values.

See the samples\entity\polysamp\demandload directory of the ObjectARX SDK for information about how the system registry is modified for demand loading the sample program polysamp.

The following sections describe how an application's installation program should create the system registry information required for demand loading. The ObjectARX samples\entity\polysamp\setup directory contains sample installer projects.