SHEETECHO copies objects to the same position on other paper space layouts. The use is anything that has to appear identically on every sheet: a revision cloud, a north point, a preliminary stamp, a client logo, a standard note block. Draw it once and echo it to the rest.
What SheetEcho does
SHEETECHO lets you choose target layouts from a list. SHEETECHOALL copies to every other layout with no dialog.
Everything lands at identical coordinates on each sheet, which is the whole requirement — a stamp that is 3 mm out on sheet four is worse than no stamp, because it looks like nobody checked.
How to use it
- Load the routine with
APPLOAD, or put it on your support file search path. - Go to the layout holding the objects. This will not run in model space.
- Type
SHEETECHOand choose the target layouts, orSHEETECHOALLfor all of them. - Select the objects to copy.
How it works
Both commands refuse to run in model space, and the reason is not arbitrary. Model space is a single shared space, not one of a series of sheets, so “copy to all layouts” has no sensible meaning from there.
The source layout is also excluded from its own target list, since copying objects onto themselves would just produce duplicates stacked exactly on the originals — invisible until somebody moves one and finds another underneath.
The copy is done through the ActiveX CopyObjects method rather than by COPYCLIP and PASTECLIP. That means the clipboard is never touched, and coordinates transfer exactly — no rounding, no paste offset. Whatever you had on the clipboard is still there afterwards.
The dialog is written out at run time and deleted immediately after use, so this remains a single self-contained file with no companion .dcl to deploy.
Notes and limits
- Paper space only. It will not run from the Model tab.
- The source layout is never a target, so you cannot stack duplicates on the originals.
- Coordinates transfer exactly. Anything positioned against a title block lands correctly on every sheet that shares it.
- The clipboard is not used, so nothing you had copied is lost.
Download and details
| Name | SheetEcho — copy objects to the same position on other paper space layouts |
| Download | SheetEcho.lsp — 9.4 KB, plain AutoLISP source. Downloads directly; no zip to unpack. |
| Type | AutoCAD AutoLISP routine |
| Commands | SHEETECHO, SHEETECHOALL |
| Requires | the ActiveX layer (loaded automatically by the routine with vl-load-com); nothing extra — the dialog is written to a temporary file at run time and deleted again, so there is no .dcl to install. |
| Source size | 9.4 KB, 243 lines |
| Error handling | Yes — a *error* handler restores every system variable it changed, on cancel as well as on error. |
| Undo | The whole operation is wrapped in a single undo group, so one U reverses all of it. |
| Compatibility | AutoCAD (any release with AutoLISP), BricsCAD, ZWCAD, GstarCAD, ProgeCAD and other IntelliCAD-based platforms. AutoCAD LT needs a LISP enabler. No .NET, no ObjectARX, no installer. |
| Author | YZ, August 2026 |
| Licence | Free to use, supplied “as is” with no warranty. |
References
- DWGPUSH LISP — the same idea across separate drawing files
- SHEETNUMBER LISP — numbering the sheets you have just echoed onto
- PORTLOCK LISP — lock the viewports once every sheet is set up
- More free AutoLISP routines on this site
- Wisey’s Steel Shapes — free structural steel section drawing program