Why bobcad doesnt read in DXF files properly?

[airbrush]

Was curious as to why bobcad doesnt read in dxf splines properly.

As an example from a previous post....I do my drawing of splines in 3dmax and export as dxf from there and merge or open in bobcad...but anything arced comes in as tiny straight line segments rather than a smooth arc segment.

If i export a dxf out of bobcad and import that into 3dmax it comes in just as it was in bobcad, smoothed bezier curves....

...so that leads me to thinking that bobcad is not reading in dxf filetypes correctly then??

EDIT: ...well it could be the other way around the exporter out of max doing something funny? no way to really tell i suppose...only options i get when exporting are for different autocad versions 2010 , 2013 etc...all seem to give the same result...

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[magicniner]

Although lots of people think it's a standard it isn't as Autocad change their proprietary format more often than their socks, somewhere it should be stated which version(s) BCC will correctly handle but as Help is sketchy and technical documentation is non-existent you may have to ask support.

If it's a job for a customer that can't/doesn't/won't understand that they should expect to distribute work between different companies in a non-proprietary format then they should be expecting to pay you enough to reflect that you maintain a license for all known CAD systems ;-)

- Nick

[ger21]

Although lots of people think it's a standard it isn't as Autocad change their proprietary format more often than their socks

They don't "change" the format. When AutoCAD gets new entity types, these additional entities are added to the .dxf format. Nothing that was in the .dxf format 20 years ago is any different today. The difference between formats is the types of entities that are supported.

Now, when any application other than AutoCAD is saving the .dxf, you really don't know what you're going to get, as each application typically imports and exports a subset of the entire .dxf format. And they don't always write the files exactly the way they are supposed to, either. I'm not sure I've ever seen anything follow the .dxf format to the letter.

[magicniner]

They don't "change" the format.

So a copy of Autocad from 20 years ago will open a DXF from the latest version saved without using options to achieve compatibility?

[Superman]

Was curious as to why bobcad doesnt read in dxf splines properly.

As an example from a previous post....I do my drawing of splines in 3dmax and export as dxf from there and merge or open in bobcad...but anything arced comes in as tiny straight line segments rather than a smooth arc segment.

If i export a dxf out of bobcad and import that into 3dmax it comes in just as it was in bobcad, smoothed bezier curves....

...so that leads me to thinking that bobcad is not reading in dxf filetypes correctly then??

EDIT: ...well it could be the other way around the exporter out of max doing something funny? no way to really tell i suppose...only options i get when exporting are for different autocad versions 2010 , 2013 etc...all seem to give the same result...

Do a test to find which is incorrect

3Dmax spline ....export as DXF ..... import back into 3Dmax.....are the splines retained ?
--- do the same for BC
......is there an option to set the DXF export release version on each?

I have used software that cannot use splines,( nurbs, polylines etc). So they have to be exported in the most earliest DXF vesrion ( R13 I think ), so the spline ARE needed to be converted to short line segments....in other words, I had to make the translator more dumber


A DXF file can be viewed using a text editor, you could compare each file as to what they contain.

[airbrush]

Do a test to find which is incorrect

3Dmax spline ....export as DXF ..... import back into 3Dmax.....are the splines retained ?
--- do the same for BC
......is there an option to set the DXF export release version on each?

I have used software that cannot use splines,( nurbs, polylines etc). So they have to be exported in the most earliest DXF vesrion ( R13 I think ), so the spline ARE needed to be converted to short line segments....in other words, I had to make the translator more dumber


A DXF file can be viewed using a text editor, you could compare each file as to what they contain.

Exporting out of max and reimport into max produces the segmented curves....tried all export option versions...all same results

[airbrush]

searching more on max issue...seems to be an issue with dxf and max ...others working with cad, one user using rhino had same issue...exporting as .AI worked for him....but bobcad doesn't import .AI ... as far as i can see arc fit is my only work around.

[airbrush]

more tests...seems to be dxf exporter out of max...doesn't give you any options other than autocad 2010 versions etc....

as an example...i can export out of sign software and gives me 4 different option types for dxf....(line/polyarc/polyline/spline)

looks like dxf exporter out of max is just doing a "line" type of export option....

[BurrMan]

exporting as .AI worked for him....but bobcad doesn't import .AI ... as far as i can see arc fit is my only work around.

BobArt module will import ai files if you had it. Can get errors with that on some files too.. pdf is more robust.

Also, Max handles NURBS curves. Look at an iges export. I'm not sure if it would require you to convert the splines to nurbs or not. It may surface closed, planar curves, but BobCad can deal with that side of it...

[airbrush]

nurbs didn't work either...i can convert to nurbs in max...but again nothing works on the export/import end of things...

[Superman]

nurbs didn't work either...i can convert to nurbs in max...but again nothing works on the export/import end of things...

So, this ends up being NOT an issue for BobCad at all.....problem exists entirely with 3Dmax on how it exports DXF polylines etc.

Is the cad system 3Dmax or is it the 3ds max from Autodesk

I would expect the "el cheapo" one to be very lacking

[airbrush]

So, this ends up being NOT an issue for BobCad at all.....problem exists entirely with 3Dmax on how it exports DXF polylines etc.

Is the cad system 3Dmax or is it the 3ds max from Autodesk

I would expect the "el cheapo" one to be very lacking

yah its more of an exporter issue...dxf exporter for max is made by a third party....just has no options at all....

[BurrMan]

yah its more of an exporter issue...dxf exporter for max is made by a third party....just has no options at all....

DWG?????

[airbrush]

tried that too...no dice

[magicniner]

They don't "change" the format. When AutoCAD gets new entity types.

Even if 90%+ of the information remains in the same place and format, adding new types of data to a file in such a way that it becomes impossible to open it with existing software is a "file format change", the definition for the file format is what you use to identify what data is where and how to interpret it.

- Nick

[BurrMan]

Thats odd. Make sure you dont have any modifiers applied to things in max. If do, collapse them and try.

May want to take it to a max forum and ask about it...