AutoCAD DXF (Drawing Interchange Format, or Drawing Exchange Format) is a

computer-aided design Computer-aided design (CAD) is the use of computers (or ) to aid in the creation, modification, analysis, or optimization of a design. This software is used to increase the productivity of the designer, improve the quality of design, improve c ...

(CAD) data

file format A file format is a Computer standard, standard way that information is encoded for storage in a computer file. It specifies how bits are used to encode information in a digital storage medium. File formats may be either proprietary format, pr ...

developed by

Autodesk Autodesk, Inc. is an American multinational software corporation that provides software products and services for the architecture, engineering, construction, manufacturing, media, education, and entertainment industries. Autodesk is headquarte ...

to enable

CAD data exchange CAD data exchange is a method of Engineering drawing, drawing data exchange used to translate between different computer-aided design (Computer-aided design, CAD) authoring systems or between CAD and other downstream CAx systems. Many companies us ...

and interoperability between AutoCAD on different

computing platform A computing platform, digital platform, or software platform is the infrastructure on which software is executed. While the individual components of a computing platform may be obfuscated under layers of abstraction, the ''summation of the requi ...

History

DXF was introduced in December 1982 as part of AutoCAD 1.0, and was intended to provide an exact representation of the data in the AutoCAD native file format, DWG (Drawing). For many years, Autodesk did not publish specifications, making correct creation of DXF files difficult. Autodesk now publishes the incomplete DXF specifications online.

Compatibility

Versions of AutoCAD from Release 10 (October 1988) and up support both American Standard Code for Information Interchange (

ASCII ASCII ( ), an acronym for American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is a character encoding standard for representing a particular set of 95 (English language focused) printable character, printable and 33 control character, control c ...

) and

binary Binary may refer to: Science and technology Mathematics * Binary number, a representation of numbers using only two values (0 and 1) for each digit * Binary function, a function that takes two arguments * Binary operation, a mathematical op ...

forms of DXF. Earlier versions support only ASCII. As AutoCAD has become more powerful, supporting more complex object types, DXF has become less useful. Certain object types, including

ACIS The 3D ACIS Modeler (ACIS) is a geometric modeling kernel developed by Spatial Corporation (formerly Spatial Technology), part of Dassault Systèmes. ACIS is used by software developers in industries such as computer-aided design, computer-ai ...

solids and regions, are not documented. Other object types, including AutoCAD 2006's dynamic blocks, and all of the objects specific to the

vertical market A vertical market is a market in which vendors offer goods and services ''specific'' to an industry, trade, profession A profession is a field of Work (human activity), work that has been successfully professionalized. It can be defined a ...

versions of AutoCAD, are partially documented, but not well enough to allow other developers to support them. For these reasons many CAD applications use the DWG format which can be licensed from Autodesk or non-natively from the

Open Design Alliance Open Design Alliance is a nonprofit organization creating software development kits (SDKs) for engineering applications. ODA offers interoperability tools for CAD, BIM, and Mechanical industries including .dwg, .dxf, .dgn, Autodesk Revit, Aut ...

. DXF files do not directly specify the units of measurement used for its coordinates and dimensions. DXF files have a HEADER section where a $INSUNITS variable may specify the intended unit (e.g., 1 for inches, 4 for millimeters). However, not all DXF files contain this information, and some software ignores it. Most CAD systems and many vector graphics packages support the import and export of DXF files, notably

Adobe Adobe (from arabic: الطوب Attub ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for mudbrick. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is use ...

products,

Inkscape Inkscape is a vector graphics editor. It is used for both artistic and technical illustrations such as cartoons, clip art, logos, typography, diagrams, and flowcharts. It uses vector graphics to allow for sharp printouts and renderings at ...

, and

Blender A blender (sometimes called a mixer (from Latin ''mixus, the PPP of miscere eng. to Mix)'' or liquidiser in British English) is a kitchen and laboratory appliance used to mix, crush, purée or emulsify food and other substances. A stationary ...

. Some CAD systems use DXF as their native format, notably

QCAD QCAD is a computer-aided design (CAD) software application for 2D design and drafting. It is available for Linux, Apple macOS, Unix and Microsoft Windows. The QCAD GUI is based on the Qt framework. Description QCAD is partly released under t ...

and

LibreCAD LibreCAD is a computer-aided design (CAD) Application software, application for 2D design. It is free and open-source software, free and open-source, and available for Unix/Linux, macOS, and Microsoft Windows operating systems. Most of the inte ...

File structure

ASCII versions of DXF can be read with any

text editor A text editor is a type of computer program that edits plain text. An example of such program is "notepad" software (e.g. Windows Notepad). Text editors are provided with operating systems and software development packages, and can be used to c ...

. The basic organization of a DXF file is as follows: ; section: General information about the drawing. Each parameter has a variable name and an associated value. ; section: Holds the information for application-defined classes whose instances appear in the , , and sections of the database. Generally does not provide sufficient information to allow interoperability with other programs. ; section: This section contains definitions of named items. # Application ID () table # Block Record () table # Dimension Style () table # Layer () table # Linetype () table # Text style () table # User Coordinate System () table # View () table # Viewport configuration () table ; section: This section contains Block Definition entities describing the entities comprising each Block in the drawing. ; section: This section contains the drawing entities, including any Block References. ; section: Contains the data that apply to nongraphical objects, used by

AutoLISP AutoLISP is a Dialect (computing), dialect of the programming language Lisp (programming language), Lisp built specifically for use with the full version of AutoCAD and its derivatives, which include ''AutoCAD Civil 3D'', ''AutoCAD Map 3D'', ''Aut ...

, and

ObjectARX ObjectARX ( AutoCAD Runtime eXtension) is an API for customizing and extending AutoCAD. The ObjectARX SDK is published by Autodesk and freely available under license from Autodesk. The ObjectARX SDK consists primarily of C++ headers and libraries ...

applications. ; section: Contains the preview image for the DXF file. ; The data format of a DXF is called a "tagged data" format, which "means that each data element in the file is preceded by an integer number that is called a group code. A group code's value indicates what type of data element follows. This value also indicates the meaning of a data element for a given object (or record) type. Virtually all user-specified information in a drawing file can be represented in DXF format."

Criticism

Because comprehensive documentation does not exist, consideration is often given to alternative

open file format An open file format is a file format for storing digital data, defined by an openly published specification usually maintained by a standards organization, and which can be used and implemented by anyone. An open file format is licensed with a ...

s such as Scalable Vector Graphics (

SVG Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) is an XML-based vector graphics format for defining two-dimensional graphics, having support for interactivity and animation. The SVG specification is an open standard developed by the World Wide Web Consortium sin ...

, defined by the

World Wide Web Consortium The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is the main international standards organization for the World Wide Web. Founded in 1994 by Tim Berners-Lee, the consortium is made up of member organizations that maintain full-time staff working together in ...

(W3C)),

Design Web Format Design Web Format (DWF) is a file format developed by Autodesk for the efficient distribution and communication of rich design data to anyone who needs to view, review, or print design files. Because DWF files are highly compressed, they are sma ...

(DWF, defined by Autodesk), or even

Encapsulated PostScript Encapsulated PostScript (EPS) is a Document Structuring Convention (DSC) conforming PostScript document format usable as a graphics file format. The format was developed as early as 1987 by John Warnock and Chuck Geschke, the founders of Adobe, ...

(EPS,

International Organization for Standardization The International Organization for Standardization (ISO ; ; ) is an independent, non-governmental, international standard development organization composed of representatives from the national standards organizations of member countries. M ...

(ISO) and

International Electrotechnical Commission The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC; ) is an international standards organization that prepares and publishes international standards for all electrical, electronics, electronic and related technologies. IEC standards cover a va ...

(IEC) standard 29112:2018). DXF (and

DWG DWG (from ''drawing'') is a proprietary binary file format used for storing two- and three- dimensional design data and metadata. It is the native format for several CAD packages including DraftSight, AutoCAD, ZWCAD, IntelliCAD (and its var ...

) is still a preferred format for CAD files for use by the ISO.

References

External links

AutoCAD DXF Reference (from Release 14, 1998)PDF version from 2012

AutoDesk Online DXF File Viewer
{{Authority control 1982 introductions

DXF AutoCAD DXF (Drawing Interchange Format, or Drawing Exchange Format) is a computer-aided design (CAD) data file format developed by Autodesk to enable CAD data exchange and interoperability between AutoCAD on different computing platforms. His ...

Autodesk products