Function Entry: GETANGLE

getangle

Function

(getangle [pt] [msg])

• pt: optional base point
• msg: optional prompt string

Autodesk documents pt as a 2D base point in the current UCS; a 3D point may be supplied, but measurement remains in the current construction plane.

Prompts the user to specify an angle.

Real or nil.

The returned angle is in radians.

• prompts the user
• consumes interactive input

• current angle conventions
• current unit settings
• optional base point

Cancel and interactive-input errors are host-dependent.

Part of the standard user-input family and closely related to angle conversion functions such as angtof and angtos.

• AutoCAD 2026: documented (per Autodesk reference page).
• BricsCAD V26: presumed compatible (no contradicting page found).
• Status: AutoCAD documented; BricsCAD presumed-both pending Phase 4 verification.

• [getangle (AutoLISP)](https://help.autodesk.com/cloudhelp/2022/ENU/AutoCAD-AutoLISP-Reference/files/GUID-947F34FA-5E58-4C7C-A169-556D4B8E2208.htm)

• Autodesk documents that the returned value is measured in radians with respect to the current construction plane.
• Autodesk documents that zero direction is ANGBASE, with positive angles increasing counterclockwise.
• Autodesk documents that the user cannot respond with another AutoLISP expression.

clautolisp implementation deviation — not part of the normative specification above. AutoCAD and BricsCAD collect this angle through the graphical drawing editor: a command-line prompt combined with pointer/keyboard interaction in the drawing window (implicitly a GUI). clautolisp has no drawing editor — it writes the prompt to the standard output and reads the answer as one line of text from the standard input (a TUI interaction). Interactively this is the REPL's terminal; for scripted, deterministic runs it is the file attached with --mock-input. A live CAD host, when connected, restores the native GUI behavior.

On the TUI the angle is typed as text and returned in radians. Accepted forms:

• a bare number — taken as radians (e.g. 0.5);
• degrees — deg / degree / degrees (e.g. 45 deg, 45.3321 degree);
• degrees-minutes-seconds — ' for minutes and " for seconds, summed with the degrees, markers accepted in any order (e.g. 43 deg 23' 15");
• radians — rd / rad / radian / radians, where the magnitude may be an integer, a decimal, or a rational (a/b) and may be multiplied by pi (e.g. 2.34 rd, pi rd, 2pi rd, 4/3 pi rd, -3/2 pi rd).

Unrecognized text returns nil rather than re-prompting. (Angles are parsed textually; the optional base point pt is accepted but not used to derive the angle graphically on the TUI.)