VBA test if dgn checked out from ProjectWise

Question

I am writing a microstation vba that is only intended to operate on the active dgn file if it hasn't been checked out of ProjectWise. Although I could look at the full filename of the activedgn, that only indicates the path, (like c:\pwise\....) and someone could conceivably copy out a file, or just have a file created in one of the PW working subdirectories. Is there a configuration variable, or some other way I can find out if it the dgn file has been checked out? 
 
 Thanks, 
 Stephanie

Robert Hook · Accepted Answer

Stephanie, 
 There are two cases typically involed with with MicroStation and ProjectWise integration from a VBA perspective. 
 One is how to tell if your MicroStation session is integrated with ProjectWise so your VBA code can react accordingly. 
 The first case is rather easy to do by check to see if ProjectWise's MicroStation integration is actively loaded (mcm.ma). Here is some code to do that check: 
 Sub TEST_MDLIsLoaded()

 Dim bResult As Boolean
 bResult = MDLIsLoaded("mcm")
 Debug.Print "MDLIsLoaded: " & bResult

End Sub

Public Function MDLIsLoaded(sAppName As String) As Boolean

 Dim strExpr As String

 ' Find MDL application by name
 strExpr = "mdlSystem_findMdlDesc(""" & sAppName & """)"
 MDLIsLoaded = MicroStationDGN.Application.GetCExpressionValue(strExpr)

End Function 
 The second is to call/declare Native code C functions from the ProjectWise API in VBA. This gets tricky since you will likely be declaring quite a bit of C code to call in VBA. In fact, most developers in this situation end up coding simple wrapper functions in a C/C++ library (.dll) that can be called from VBA in a simple and more straight-forward sense w/o needing to declare as many external functions and types that will be required. It also makes debugging your code and the ProjectWise API much more simple and straight-forward. 
 WRT your more specific question. Currently there is no MicroStation (or ProjectWise) configuration variable stating which document(s) are checked out on a client. Depending on the workflow and/or restrictions, this could be a very large number of documents and their respective paths. In the ProjectWise API you could use: aaApi_IsDocumentCheckedOutToMe() where you can provide a project number and computer node, or you can check the active MicroStation design file currently open to see if it is checked out (to you) using mdmMain_getActiveMDocument(). 
 HTH, 
 Bob 
 Sub TEST_MDLIsLoaded()
 Dim bResult As Boolean
 bResult = MDLIsLoaded("mcm")
 Debug.Print "MDLIsLoaded: " & bResult
End Sub

Public Function MDLIsLoaded(sAppName As String) As Boolean
 Dim strExpr As String

 ' Find MDL application by name
 strExpr = "mdlSystem_findMdlDesc(""" & sAppName & """)"
 MDLIsLoaded = MicroStationDGN.Application.GetCExpressionValue(strExpr)
End Function