Intaglio
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DXF Import
One of the main uses I have for Illustrator (although I have more of a hate relationship with it than even a love/hate one) is the import of mapping data. The only common format for this data other than GIS-specific formats (which I don’t have any great expectation of support for!) is DXF.
Without DXF support I am unable to switch from Illustrator to Intaglio, much as I might want to. Any chance of a DXF import function?
Illustrator does support DXF import, albeit in a pretty basic form.
You could import dxf to Illustrator and then export it as svg (or pdf), which Intaglio supports. I have done this on occasion.
Thanks for the suggestion, but that is definitely not as convenient as direct import into Intaglio. Besides which it depends on Illustrator (and its basic DXF import) which I am trying to get away from if at all possible!
So, once again, any chance of this functionality within Intaglio??
That’s somewhat encouraging. Presumably there must be some libraries out there for importing DXF format files which you could use?
Illustrator is a lot of App, both for what one gets and pricewise. And if you own illustrator, there is imho, little point in owning Intaglio (apart from Intaglio being about 10 times faster to use in many situations!)
I use a CAD app called QCad, which costs about £14 (that’s English money), and converts dxf to svg, and imports into Intaglio (very well in fact).
I hope that helps.
Tom
On 13 Apr 2010, at 18:15, amtravco wrote:
You could import dxf to Illustrator and then export it as svg (or pdf), which Intaglio supports. I have done this on occasion.
I like the idea of Intaglio because it is quicker in many ways than Illustrator, not least in launch time and time to display the print dialog. Also you can set a scale for the drawing which inexplicably you still can’t do with Illustrator and saves endless calculations of line lengths.
Another app which I have been looking at recently is Ortelius which is great for mapping but also does not import DXF at present. They have said that they will implement DXF import in the near(ish) future so it looks like it’s a race!
Yes, I was impressed with Ortelius too. In fact it was me who asked the developer for DXF/DWG import. ;)
On 21 Apr 2010, at 23:16, nickcoll wrote:
Another app which I have been looking at recently is Ortelius which is great for mapping but also does not import DXF at present. They have said that they will implement DXF import in the near(ish) future so it looks like it’s a race!
Personally, while Illustrator supports DXF import I will continue to use it. If another “lighter-weight” product introduces support for DXF then I will probably swap. But I am not interested in using another product as a go-between - it’s just too much hassle and Illustrator fits the bill for now even if somewhat imperfectly.
I downloaded a sample DXF file from the web, opened it in CADintosh, chose Preview in the print dialogue box and saved as a PDF. The PDF could be edited in Intaglio. http://www.lemkesoft.com/content/189/cadintosh.html
Canvas also opened and edited the same DXF file.
