Program libraries support latest AutoCAD format
An
Open Design Alliance product story
Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team
May 23, 2003
The OpenDWG Alliance has updated its DWGdirect program libraries to support AutoCAD 2004.
The OpenDWG Alliance has updated its DWGdirect program libraries to support AutoCAD 2004.
This announcement is a confirmation of the Alliance's dedication to providing long-term support for DWG, the file format defined by AutoCAD, and accepted as a de-facto standard for data interchange by millions of CAD users throughout the world.
"Although we had no significant concerns about being able to implement support for the AutoCAD 2004 DWG file format, there were enough variables that the task was not trivial", said Evan Yares, president of OpenDWG.
AutoCAD 2004 is the first version of this best-selling CAD program to implement significant forms of data compression and header encryption in its file format.
Earlier versions of the AutoCAD implemented basic compression forms to reduce file size, and included trivial encryption of embedded ACIS solid-model data.
In AutoCAD 2004 DWG, a comprehensive compression algorithm is applied to almost all data structures, and the file and section headers are encrypted using a magic-number/XOR algorithm.
According to Yares, "A month ago, when we first raised the issue of DWG compression and encryption, we'd already completely reverse-engineered the encryption, and had enough of the compression done that we were confident we could rapidly complete it.
We have now delivered high-quality libraries that cleanly support 2004 DWG.
Despite the fact that we support the format, users should continue to be cautious about using AutoCAD 2004 DWG files for projects which require long-term data access as the format does contain encryption".
The DWGdirect libraries have been under development for several years, and were designed to accommodate substantial changes to the DWG file format, while being easier to integrate and support than the older OpenDWG Toolkit and Viewkit libraries.
The DWGdirect libraries are written in object-oriented C++, and have a well-structured and powerful API designed to meet the needs of professional software developers.
AutoCAD is a product of Autodesk, Incorporated, and DWG is the principal proprietary file format used by AutoCAD.
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