LaserUser.com Forum (formerly RDWorksLab)

Hello,

I'm having a problem importing .svg files. They are not fully importing. Parts are missing. Seems to be missing the center portions of letters.

Using RDWorks 8.01.49-20200713

Is there a more stable version recommended?

TIA

I have been hip deep in the Graphics industry and software for 25 years and have never received a .SVG file- so I know nothing about them- my suggestion would be try the free trial of Lightburn software. You may find that LB will be more capable than whatever you are using to generate the .svg files, and also has a better file importing engine.

older versions of rdworks do not even open/import svg at all. mine, at least, does not. this may be a recent addition in rdworks, thus still "work in progress"

SVG is pretty standard among all people that DO NOT have hundreds of bucks to pay adobe and friends every year. Inkscape does pretty decent job for vector drawing without paying for illustrator, and also works perfectly on all platforms.

there is a strong movement toward free software, as inkscape (vector drawing), blender (3D modeling), krita (digital painting). More and more people are reluctant to the golden cages of the software editors with recurring fees.

as for SVG, i recommand using Lightburn which imports those files without any problem (exception being text, that must be converted to path, but same problem for DXF for example). LB is also far beyond RDworks in a lot of domains (UI, editing, variety of supported lasers, file formats, speed and memory usage, ...)

Yeah, graphics and graphics software aren't my strong suit.

I was developing statistical models in Fortran in the mid-70s for DoD for biological, chemical and radiological warfare.

Had a 4 handicap playing with Wilson Staff 'blades'. Bought a set of Calloway Big Berthas and Taylor Made woods about 10 yrs ago. Were the hell were these back in the 70s??!!

Lightburn, no thanks. Was using that with my diode laser on my CNC. They claim you don't have to renew, but it quits if you don't, contrary to their license agreement. They got me a year ago. not happening this time.

Thomas Dukes wrote: Sun Apr 11, 2021 Lightburn, no thanks. Was using that with my diode laser on my CNC. They claim you don't have to renew, but it quits if you don't, contrary to their license agreement. They got me a year ago. not happening this time.

obviously, they (lightburn) have to get some money for a living. LB is a pretty good program for the money. last time i was out of the renewal period, it still functioned correctly, so you just might want to get in touch with them to check. i remember that they may have changed the license servers (can't remembe when); so it may be the reason for your LB failing to start. they are pretty happy to extend trial periods and/or add a licence for free (they added me a third licence free, as i use 2 computers for designing, and one for controlling the laser)

also, 30$ / year is very low money considering the time spent (lost) working on RDworks for things that are native in LB... i remember the time spent for writing/testing the scripts for exporting SVG to EPS then convert for DXF, as RDworks would not eat my native SVG... well worth 30$. just the code that handles removing duplicate lines, or the abiliity to snap figures, or the grouping of scan, or the print&cut... a full lot of features that i do not expect to see on RDworks soon.

>>last time i was out of the renewal period, it still functioned correctly, so you just might want to get in touch with them to check.<<

I had the same experience when I let mine expire for a while.

Email them at support@lightburnsoftware.com with a complete description of the problem, the computer and OS specs of your system + laser, AND a copy of your license key. I bet they will have you up and running again. They are pretty busy right now, I think they are moving again, so their response may take a day.

I also am having trouble importing .SVG files in RDWorks (.48 and .55) when I create them in any of the free Vector software products. So from what I get here is that the resolution is to not use RDWorks but go to Lightburn?

Does that mean that there basically is no RDWorks resolution? A simple yes/no will let me know if I need to shell out another $120 so that I can do vector files that are imported from freeware.

I have been working with our little laser here at the Akron MakerSpace for a number of years now but the usage has been very light especially the last 2 years (go figure). Our usage has increased greatly in the last several months as many more members have started using the laser. We have a number who have Adobe Illustrator and their .AI files work wonderfully. We don't have Illustrator available at the Space though so that constrains the rest of us. It sorta seems to come down to rent Adobe Illustrator at $11 a month ($132/year) or pop for the $120 + yearly maintenance.
Any and all advice joyfully accepted.

TIA
Mike

I gave up on RDWorks for graphics file importing a long time ago, so I can't answer your yes/no question.

I do suggest you try the 30 day free trial period for LightBurn and test it on all of the file types you plan to import. Not all .svg files are created equally. LightBurn has tried to adapt to all of them but you need to test and confirm your files will import correctly without issue.

RDWORKS does import ai files fairly well - I would try an on-line file converter like
https://theonlineconverter.com/convert-svg-to-ai

they are free