I just experienced the round trip to autocad. The design development was done in VW 8.5, translated to DWG and sent to an Autocad 14 drafting consultant.
It was then returned for final corrections.
In summary, it was a miserable and costly experience.
1.The settings dialogs for the translation process are quirky for both export and import.
2. Line weight and text formatting is lost
3. Patterns are lost, hatches are lost.
4. Arrows from ACAD are lost
5. Budget time at both ends to reformat all line weights, text styles, text placement in call out targets.
6. Unless you restart VW and start the import process with a new drawing, there is a high likelihood of VW freeze.
7. All in all a timeconsuming and hair raising experience.
8. The profession is so heavily dominated by autocad that a high level of compatibility is essential for VW and hopefully the programmers will keep this near the top of their agenda.
9. The introduction of "classes" as ACAD "layer" equivalents is a start. To be effective, the designer must be vigilant in working in the correct class at all times so that line weights can be easily identified(assuming the translators work seamlessly which they dont). Personally, I cant be bothered to do this .
10. One of the great assets of working in VW is the ability to draw lines the way you want to without categorizing them by layer or using colors (which have nothing to do with the output) to represent line weights. (In ACAD 2000i it is now possible to view actual line weights on screen.)
11. I hope that VW 9 will represent a great leap forward in working on this problem.
12. DataCad has just introduced a built-in PDFroutine for sharing drawings and Acrobat 6 supposedly has mark up capabilities.
13. VW must be able to share files over the net easily.
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JR Merrick AIA
I just experienced the round trip to autocad. The design development was done in VW 8.5, translated to DWG and sent to an Autocad 14 drafting consultant.
It was then returned for final corrections.
In summary, it was a miserable and costly experience.
1.The settings dialogs for the translation process are quirky for both export and import.
2. Line weight and text formatting is lost
3. Patterns are lost, hatches are lost.
4. Arrows from ACAD are lost
5. Budget time at both ends to reformat all line weights, text styles, text placement in call out targets.
6. Unless you restart VW and start the import process with a new drawing, there is a high likelihood of VW freeze.
7. All in all a timeconsuming and hair raising experience.
8. The profession is so heavily dominated by autocad that a high level of compatibility is essential for VW and hopefully the programmers will keep this near the top of their agenda.
9. The introduction of "classes" as ACAD "layer" equivalents is a start. To be effective, the designer must be vigilant in working in the correct class at all times so that line weights can be easily identified(assuming the translators work seamlessly which they dont). Personally, I cant be bothered to do this .
10. One of the great assets of working in VW is the ability to draw lines the way you want to without categorizing them by layer or using colors (which have nothing to do with the output) to represent line weights. (In ACAD 2000i it is now possible to view actual line weights on screen.)
11. I hope that VW 9 will represent a great leap forward in working on this problem.
12. DataCad has just introduced a built-in PDFroutine for sharing drawings and Acrobat 6 supposedly has mark up capabilities.
13. VW must be able to share files over the net easily.
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