Can't convert Visio drawing to Autocad

[James]

My firm has received a Visio drawing from a client and we want to be able to use the image in our Autocad drawings. Our client tried the "save as an Autocad drawing" on their Visio program and emailed the .dwg file to us. When I open it up there isn't anything there. The .dwg file is only 22 kb which seemed really small since the Visio file size was arount 600 kb. My firm bought the software so we could at least see the images and maybe have better luck converting the drawing. We haven't had any better luck. Our client isn't the author of the Visio drawing and we weren't sure if we were just doing something wrong or could the original author of the drawing locked it in some way that it can't be converted into a .dwg file.

Thanks for any help and sorry if this question has bee addressed before. I am new to Visio.

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

That is puzzling. What versions of Visio and AutoCAD are you working with?

The only thing that comes to mind is that you possibly had multiple pages in
the Visio drawing. I believe we save out just the current page to DWG.

--
Mark Nelson
Microsoft Corporation

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

My firm has received a Visio drawing from a client and we want to be able

to use the image in our Autocad drawings. Our client tried the "save as an
Autocad drawing" on their Visio program and emailed the .dwg file to us.
When I open it up there isn't anything there. The .dwg file is only 22 kb
which seemed really small since the Visio file size was arount 600 kb. My
firm bought the software so we could at least see the images and maybe have
better luck converting the drawing. We haven't had any better luck. Our
client isn't the author of the Visio drawing and we weren't sure if we were
just doing something wrong or could the original author of the drawing
locked it in some way that it can't be converted into a .dwg file.

Thanks for any help and sorry if this question has bee addressed before.

I am new to Visio.

 

[James]

I am using Visio Professional 2002 and Autocad R14.

----- Mark Nelson [MS] wrote: -----

That is puzzling. What versions of Visio and AutoCAD are you working with?

The only thing that comes to mind is that you possibly had multiple pages in
the Visio drawing. I believe we save out just the current page to DWG.

--
Mark Nelson
Microsoft Corporation

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

My firm has received a Visio drawing from a client and we want to be able

to use the image in our Autocad drawings. Our client tried the "save as an
Autocad drawing" on their Visio program and emailed the .dwg file to us.
When I open it up there isn't anything there. The .dwg file is only 22 kb
which seemed really small since the Visio file size was arount 600 kb. My
firm bought the software so we could at least see the images and maybe have
better luck converting the drawing. We haven't had any better luck. Our
client isn't the author of the Visio drawing and we weren't sure if we were
just doing something wrong or could the original author of the drawing
locked it in some way that it can't be converted into a .dwg file.I am new to Visio.

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

I don't have any general ideas about what the problem might be. DWG Export
capability was significantly enhanced in Visio 2003, but you should get a
decent drawing from Visio 2002. If you want to e-mail me a VSD file, I will
take a look at the problem. (Remove "online" from e-mail address.)

--
Mark Nelson
Microsoft Corporation

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

I am using Visio Professional 2002 and Autocad R14.

----- Mark Nelson [MS] wrote: -----

That is puzzling. What versions of Visio and AutoCAD are you working with?

The only thing that comes to mind is that you possibly had multiple pages in
the Visio drawing. I believe we save out just the current page to DWG.

--
Mark Nelson
Microsoft Corporation

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

My firm has received a Visio drawing from a client and we want to

be able
to use the image in our Autocad drawings. Our client tried the "save as an
Autocad drawing" on their Visio program and emailed the .dwg file to us.
When I open it up there isn't anything there. The .dwg file is only 22 kb
which seemed really small since the Visio file size was arount 600 kb. My
firm bought the software so we could at least see the images and maybe have
better luck converting the drawing. We haven't had any better luck. Our
client isn't the author of the Visio drawing and we weren't sure if we were
just doing something wrong or could the original author of the drawing
locked it in some way that it can't be converted into a .dwg file. before.
I am new to Visio.

 

[Chris Roth]

Did you play with the layer settings (on either end)???

--

Hope this helps,

Chris Roth
Visio MVP
visioguy @ extremely warm mail.com

My firm has received a Visio drawing from a client and we want to be able

to use the image in our Autocad drawings. Our client tried the "save as an
Autocad drawing" on their Visio program and emailed the .dwg file to us.
When I open it up there isn't anything there. The .dwg file is only 22 kb
which seemed really small since the Visio file size was arount 600 kb. My
firm bought the software so we could at least see the images and maybe have
better luck converting the drawing. We haven't had any better luck. Our
client isn't the author of the Visio drawing and we weren't sure if we were
just doing something wrong or could the original author of the drawing
locked it in some way that it can't be converted into a .dwg file.

Thanks for any help and sorry if this question has bee addressed before.

I am new to Visio.

 

[Mark Nelson [MS]]

(Replying for the benefit of anyone following this thread.)

I got a copy of the file and discovered that the Visio drawing was actually
a single shape with an embedded Microstation drawing inside. When Visio
exports the drawing to DWG, it looks at the shape type, sees that it is a
foreign object and skips it. Therefore, the output to DWG is an empty
drawing.

Ideally you do not want to use Visio as a go-between for Microstation and
AutoCAD since AutoCAD can convert DGN files itself. However, it would be
possible to right-click on the embedded DGN drawing, convert it to Visio
shapes and then export it to DWG.

 

[Randall Arnold]

That makes sense! Thanks for the update Mark.

Randall Arnold