Drafix CAD - DFX file format compatability

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wellbands
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Drafix CAD - DFX file format compatability

Post by wellbands » Wed May 28, 2014 10:40 am

Re: QCAD unable to open DXF files

Postby wellbands » Tue May 27, 2014 2:03 pm
Reluctantly abandoning XP, my Drafix CAD will not satisfactorily run under 7, Linux or (memory hungry) emulators. I have used its native .cad file format since 1988 for all my domestic projects (I am not a professional) knowing that it exports format include .DWG and .DFX viz.
“ AutoCAD Conversions
Design CAD 2D Conversions
Drafix CAD Ultra, Drafix 1 Plus, and Drafix Port File Conversions
HPGL and PLT Conversions
IGES Conversions
Planix Conversions
Windows Metafile Conversions”

QCAD writes under ‘QCAD Features’
"Features in italic are available in QCAD Professional only.
Supported file formats:
DWG
read support for format version R2.5 through R27 (2013)
write support for format version R12 through R27 (2013)
DXF
read support for format version R2.5 through R27 (2013)
write support for format version R12 through R27 (2013)[/i]
DXF version R15 (2000) [QCAD Community Edition]"
i.e R15 is not in italics.

Can you tell me whether the Drafix version of DFX can be imported by QCAD Community Edition. Thank you. SW

wellbands
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Clive
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Re: Drafix CAD - DFX file format compatability

Post by Clive » Wed May 28, 2014 1:30 pm

wellbands

Are you able to attach a 'Drafix' dxf for testing?
For the best support please state your operating system, QCAD version and add any supporting DXF/DWG files, screenshots etc...

kazmer
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Re: Drafix CAD - DFX file format compatability

Post by kazmer » Wed Jun 18, 2014 1:23 am

I have just tested two DXFs created with "Drafix Windows CAD 2.1a: October 26, 1992". QCAD Professional (trial) (ie. Teigha) opens them mostly fine (there are accented national characters in texts, those are incorrect, then again, non-ASCII stuff in DXF tends not to be portable anyway, so this is more or less expected).

QCAD Community (ie. dxflib) doesn't open them fine -- things are mostly there, but all texts are stacked on top of each other instead of being in their proper places.

Unfortunately, I am not in the position to share the original .cad or the converted .dxf files (but I can likely create some samples if Andrew wishes to investigate the dxflib issue).

Its "Ultra Drawing (*.DWG)" export format does not appear to be AutoCAD DWG in any way, shape or form.

Hope this helps.

Ed.: The drawings tested are not particularly complex, rather the electric diagram type, but their dxf representation still has layers, blocks and various element types that all seem to be OK.

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Clive
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Re: Drafix CAD - DFX file format compatability

Post by Clive » Wed Jun 18, 2014 9:17 am

kazmer wrote:Unfortunately, I am not in the position to share the original .cad or the converted .dxf files (but I can likely create some samples if Andrew wishes to investigate the dxflib issue).
Thank you for your effort on this,the feedback here I'm sure will be appreciated as well as any sample files you have time to create and submit.
For the best support please state your operating system, QCAD version and add any supporting DXF/DWG files, screenshots etc...

kazmer
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Re: Drafix CAD - DFX file format compatability

Post by kazmer » Wed Jun 18, 2014 6:43 pm

Attached to this post is a zip file contaning a Drafix CAD drawing in it's native .cad format, as it is exported to DXF, and a bitmap image of how it actually looks like in Drafix.

A small amendment to the above test results: if one opens the attached DXF in QCAD (either Teigha or dxflib), one would observe that both of these have problems with the colours as well. What actually happens is, Drafix apparently exports them so bad that even itself can't restore them when immediately opening the just-exported DXF. (Could be that the DXF of the day didn't support colours. I don't know.)

Long story short: there does not seem to be any viable way of converting Drafix CAD files to anything while both 1) keeping it editable and 2) not losing details. This also possibly includes chains of applications and intermediary formats, and this also is what the AutoCAD forums seem to have arrived to.

Edit: This may not be completely true. AutoSketch claims to write DXF OK and claims to be able to read the Drafix CAD v3/v4 formats, which in turn will probably read its earlier formats. So all one appears to need is AutoSketch (about $300 a pop) and Drafix CAD v3/v4 (which seems to be completely impossible to acquire, legally or otherwise) to give things a try. Actual results not guaranteed...

Edit 2: ... or just QuickCAD.
Attachments
samples.zip
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