Civil 3D 2017 is not backward compatable.

[ChrisRS]

Civil 3D 2017 is not backward compatable.

I suspect that this is the cost of progress, so it OK. Just be aware.

When 2016 was backward compatible with 2015, AutoDesk clearly said so. It would be nice if they spoke as clearly now.

From the help File:

Interoperability Between Versions

This topic describes the behavior when an AutoCAD Civil 3D 2017 drawing is opened in prior versions of AutoCAD Civil 3D.

Objects in a drawing saved in AutoCAD Civil 3D 2017 are available only as proxies when the drawing is opened in a prior version of the software.

Within AutoCAD Civil 3D 2017, set the PROXYGRAPHICS drawing setting to 1 to save the graphics with the drawing, otherwise a bounding box is displayed where the object is located when the drawing is opened in a prior version of the software.

Notice whenyou open an older version file:

[dsimeone]

Hi folks - Sorry if I'm confused but i wanted to clarify the process of taking a C3D drawing (objects) into a "vanilla" AutoCAD drawing (lines and arcs vs. C3D objects).

Over the past years we've been making improvements to the EXPORTC3DDRAWING command. This is available in the Output ribbon and is tuned to give you visual fidelity in the resulting .DWG.  You can export to a variety of .DWG versions and there a options for handling of xrefs, etc. This is also the best option if you want to create a .DGN file. This tool replaced the EXPORTTODWG command that was originally in C3D.

As far as getting the model back to R2016-2013, LandXML is you're best bet.

Thanks

Dave Simeone

[JamesMaeding]

Thanks for commenting Dave.

We use the civil batch converter as generally we have several dwgs from outsiders to get down to vanilla acad.

I don't even care about getting to lower version, just want the aec objects exploded.

In 2015, it sometimes drops xrefs that 2014 properly converts.

Also, if the UCS is user and the view was twisted, the end result is rotated by the twist.

This is because the batcher forgot to switch to world coords for its operations.

Its an awesome tool though, super fast.

I know I have got several companies to buy at least one seat of civil3d just for that tool.

Is the EXPORTC3DDRAWING doing what the batcher uses?

Sounds like you have to open each drawing to use EXPORTC3DDRAWING (coreconsole way is still slow comared to batcher).

thx

[jporter]

Dave,

Yes, thanks for posting.  Much appreciated.  

So it appears that the process has changed slightly then.  In the past we would just use the export tool from the application menu or the output tab (both are the same - EXPORTC3DDRAWING) and be able to open the AutoCAD file as a plain AutoCAD (lines, arcs, circles, etc.) file and go forth from there.  If we needed the Civil 3D data that has always been resolved by the export to LandXML.  

Now, if we want that AutoCAD drawing. . .after we export it out of Civil 3D we must then begin a new drawing in a lower version of Civil 3D, insert and explode the exported file, then insert the LandXML file, and then re-export to AutoCAD from there.  

That's a lot of extra work to get the file to an AutoCAD user, but I guess it is what it is.  

Thanks to everyone for their responses. 

[AllenJessup]

I don't have 2017 installed yet. Does it include any of the EXPORTTOAUTOCAD[VER] commands? Do any of those work?

[rkmcswain]

Include them? Yes.

Sorry, I don't have time to try each one and test the results - right now.

[AllenJessup]

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@rkmcswain wrote:

Include them? Yes.

Sorry, I don't have time to try each one and test the results - right now. 

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I wouldn't expect that. I just thought that since I've occasionally seen cases where the command line version works better (or worse) than the dialog box. There might be some difference here.

[JamesMaeding]

"and then re-export to AutoCAD from there"

why would you re-export to acad, once you had your drawing all set up in lower version?

That implies you want no civil3d objects in that lower version file, which is what you could get in one step using EXPORTC3DDRAWING.

As I am reading this, it only reinforces the decision I made years ago to not version civil engineering data in the software my company uses.

Even Landxml has a few versions.

Think about this - what if you could hook to any landxml's you wanted, and have the objects show in prospector.

Your designers could split up design data how they wanted, and there would be no heavy data reference objects needed to share them.

You could display them as an object - alignment or surface - but you would not have to.

Starts to sound like good old land desktop eh? without the versioning though, and the ability to hoook to multiple external datasets.

That's what we have, and it beats the heck out of civil3d sharing methods.

[jporter]

@JamesMaeding, I think you missed the second point of my post.  That point was to get the data back into Vanilla AutoCAD.  I'm actually discussing two workflows here. . .the first it go from Civil 3D 2017 to earlier versions of Civil 3D. . .the second is to go further and take it back to AutoCAD.  

When you use the EXPORTC3DDRAWING command in 2017 and then open that file in AutoCAD you don't have the "dummied down" Civil 3D objects. You get the proxy boxes as I explained in the Screencast on page 1 of this discussion:

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/community/screencast/7bac8fc2-3859-4214-a874-1a36f872298c    

[JamesMaeding]

I see, so EXPORTC3DDRAWING leaves the objects intact (as you explain it, I have not tried).

I'm getting lost now, as what is the point of EXPORTC3DDRAWING when you get the same thing using SAVEAS to lower version?

I'm not confused on the dwg vs c3d object format issue, and proxies. We have dealt with those for years.

The big need is a tool to batch through files and explode the aec objects, and the civil batch converter is the only decent one I have seen.

Etransmit, dwg converter, coreconsole running, and other ways all have major drawbacks.

The last thing I expected was another EXPORT* command that does not explode the objects. Are you sure on that?

Dave, what is the advantage of EXPORTC3DDRAWING over SAVEAS?

[jporter]

Yes, sadly I'm sure on that.  I tested this on several computers with several users in several offices.  I've tested with the client of ours who brought this to our attention. They tested it on several systems in their office.  

It's a pain, but the method I described seemed to the only solution I had.  They work in Civil 3D and have to send their files to their client in AutoCAD format with no Civil 3D objects.  They wanted to make the move to 2017 but this has hindered that idea.  

[rkmcswain]

jmaeding wrote:

I see, so EXPORTC3DDRAWING leaves the objects intact (as you explain it, I have not tried).

In my testing...

1. If you open a pre-2017 C3D drawing and run EXPORTC3DDRAWING and export to 2013 format, the C3D objects are left intact.
2. If you open a pre-2017 C3D drawing and run EXPORTC3DDRAWING and export to an earlier format (2010 for example), the objects are exploded into native AutoCAD geometry
3. If you save the DWG to 2017 C3D format, and then run EXPORTC3DDRAWING and export to ANY format, the objects are exploded into native AutoCAD geometry.

I don't know if scenario 1 above is intended behavior or not, but the documentation is clear that EXPORTC3DDRAWING explodes C3D objects.

C3D 2017 Documentation says:
The command explodes all AutoCAD Civil 3D objects into AutoCAD entities so that they can be viewed in AutoCAD without an object viewer.

[Anonymous]

Hi Apologise but i'm a little confused at this point.

I wish to export a C3D 2017 drawing to vanilla autocad while maintaining the z value of the feature lines/corridor feature lines, ie i would be left with polylines with a z value or even a 3dpoly line. Is this possible. They introduced this as far as i could see in 2016 but have taken it away again in 2017.

Once again apologise if this has been answered but as mentioned above I'm confused.

[dsimeone]

Hi folks - We do have a way to get geometry to export as 3D vs. 3D plines. For a number of reasons we didn't include this in the UI - but we will at the next logical release point.

• Create a file called “ExportToDWGDGNFeatureLineAs2D.txt” in the C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2016 folder. Note that the file doesn't need to include anything... We use it's existence as a toggle
• C3D will use this to control the export “arc/tessellation” behavior…  If we find the file, you’ll get arcs (2D plines). If it’s not there, the exported entities will be tessellated (3D plines).

1. With the Text file - you will end up with 2D plines that include curves
2. Without the text file - you will end up with 3D tesselated plines

Obviously not an ideal user experience but at least you can get what you need.

Hope that helps.

Dave Simeone

[Anonymous]

Is Autodesk working a fix to make this work with previous versions? References and Sheets are looking incorrect between different versions. If I would of known about this I would of stayed w/ 2016. Now I have to painfully fix all the drawings that were saved in 2017 so they will work/look right in previous versions. This also makes it even more difficult to send this out to clients and other consultants. 

I strongly believe this needs some kind of fix because to me its looking like a way to force others to upgrade/migrate to 2017.

[Jeff_M]

@Anonymous, first, welcome to the forums. Second, no, there will be no 'fix' as far as I know, since it's not broken and was a planned change.

[JamesMaeding]

Its kind of always been that way - if you rely on C3D for anything, your entire team must be on that version.

I must say though, to have a dwg version stay the same but aec objects specific, is about as complicated as it could be.

Its like if every mp3 player required a specific codec used to make the mp3, you would stop callling mp3's "mp3's".

You would call them evil excuses for song files, and abandon that format forever.

But the masses seem to think versioned c3d data is ok? The third party civil software providers are loving it, as they know better.

[Anonymous]

There is a developer in Autodesk looking at my issue as we speak as he does not seem to have the same issues we do. I will post solution when we come across it.

[jporter]

Even if that developer finds a solution, it has never been recommended to take a project back and forth between versions.  Even though the format states its 2013 that is only for the AutoCAD objects (lines, polylines, arc, circles, etc.) and not the Civil 3D objects (points, surfaces, alignments, etc.).  Every release of Civil 3D upgraded the Civil 3D objects.  The Civil 3D objects are not backward compatible.  So even going back and forth between 2015 and 2016 (though both are 2013 dwg format) is not recommended. This is similar to Revit files (you cannnot take Revit file backwards, only forward).  

Even though we can use the SAVEAS command to save our drawing to earlier AutoCAD formats that doens't mean the Civil 3D objects will convert.  I wish Autodesk would change the file extension for Civil 3D drawings to something else (say c3d) so that we know we cannot simply open the file in AutoCAD.  

So within an office environment it is recommended that all users work off the same version of Civil 3D.  If not, then it is recommended that the group of users who are using one version continue with the project in that version, but make sure the users with the newer version never open and save that project in the newer version.  I guarantee you that taking a project back and forth between versions will only lead to disaster.  

However, I still hope that Autodesk addresses this as an issue because even though an entire office may be on the newer version some of their subs or clients remain on older versions and we need to get those drawings back to them.  

[Cadguru42]

@Anonymous C3D 2013-2016 are backwards compatible, other than 2015 changing the survey database format. We had no issues going back and forth between them. 2017 is a different matter, though.

[jporter]

@Cadguru42 yes, I've seen some instances where going back and forth from 2016 back to versions 2015, 2014, or 2013 there were no issues.  But I've also see others where it was a disaster.  I'm very happy to hear that your company is not having any issues.  My "safety net" is to just not go back and forth. I believe that's more of a gamble.