Moving an engineering application from standalone to internal to CAD

Question

I have a large MFC C++ application that I would be very keen to port into AutoCAD and IntelliCAD. AutoDesk offer Object ARX for this purpose, which replaces the older and slower ADS technology. IntelliCAD, afaik only supports ADS. Has anyone out there done this, and if so which tools did you use and what pitfalls did you encounter?

I'm specifically interested in resources that will simplify the transition, and allow me to maintain seperate CAD based and standalone versions going forward.

Answer 1

Have a look at my answers to a couple of previous AutoCAD questions

Open source cad drawing (dwg) library in C#

.Net CAD component that can read/write dxf/ dwg files

If you were looking for the same code base to work both inside and outside of AutoCAD then the RealDWG approach may work for you since the code is the same - RealDWG doesn't need AutoCAD as a host application. The open Design Alliance libraries are for making stand-alone applications. Both have supported C++ for years & can be considered stable - well, as stable as CAD gets.

This blog (http://through-the-interface.typepad.com/) is a good one for RealDWG

Answer 2

One option to consider is to target AutoCAD and Bricscad. Supporting AutoCAD and IntelliCAD requires essentially two versions of code. Bricscad's goal is to be completely compatible with ObjectARX, and in my experience they are pretty close.

This at least simplifies the problem from supporting three instances (your standalone version, AutoCAD, and IntelliCAD) to supporting two instances (your standalone version and AutoCAD/Bricscad).

Answer 3

"DWGdirect is not just a SDK to read and write DWG files. It actually offers a full blown framework that can be used to develop a professional CAD application, complete with plug-in architecture and all." quote source