Re: removal of dxf term from default build

[sfeam <sf...@us...>]

On Saturday, 20 May 2017 08:22:41 AM Karl-Friedrich Ratzsch wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> last week two old legacy terminals were removed from the default
> target in the 5.1cvs tree. While corel is indeed likely not useful
> any more, I wanted to point out that Autodesk's dxf is still the
> standard 2D vector exchange format, that can be read in by every
> program in the CAD/CAM business.

Excellent.  My sneaky scheme to flush out potential maintainers
for ancient terminal types is succeeding :-) :-)

Can you confirm that at least one of the current generation of CAD
programs can import something useful from gnuplot?    

Any other gnuplot + CAD users out there?


The limit of my  ability to check functionality was to confirm that
gnuplot 5.0.6 produces essentially the same output as gnuplot version
3.7.2 from 2002.  But the dxf driver code itself is older yet.
The code in current cvs is only trivially different from the code initially
imported into "gnuplot beta" in 1998 to start the SourceForge repository.
Comments in the header push it back another 3 years at least.

So on the one hand it's great if code from 23 years is still useful,
but are there no features from decades of gnuplot development 
that would make it just a little bit more useful?

In other words, if the terminal is going to be including in the current
default build don't you think it should support current default features?

Wouldn't it be more useful if it handled (off the top of my head)
  - rectangles/circles/objects in general
  - control of linetypes, dot-dash patterns, etc

By the same token, the gnuplot source code says it adheres to the
format for Autocad Release 10 (1988) format DWGR10).
Autocad is now at release 32 and uses DWG2018 file format.
If we're going to continue to claim support for autocad output, wouldn't it be nice
to check if there are matching capabilities on both sides that have
been introduced over the last 20 years?

	Ethan

> Especially some of the freeware CAD suites just cannot construct
> lines via mathematical formulas, and it's still a hassle imo with
> e.g. Inventor.
> 
> So, unless it becomes really broken, it'd be nice to keep it at
> least in future binaries, for those who cannot easily make their own
> build. As long as you can do simple black and white line plots, it's
> still useful.
>
> Best, Karl