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SVG Now a W3 Recommendation 81

Posted by michael from the macromedia-trembling-in-boots dept.
Bob_Juanita writes: "The W3C has finally made the Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) format an official recommendation." I'm looking forward to this - SVG looks to have a lot of potential for web development. Easy, dynamic, scalable graphics from database data - nice.
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SVG Now a W3 Recommendation More

SVG Now a W3 Recommendation

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  • Yes, an assembly product like this exists. It's been around for a quarter of a century. It's called "C".
  • Okay, so what are the best tools to use? I know Mozilla has an SVG plugin for _displaying_ vector graphics, but which drawing programs have good support for saving and loading in this format?

    • Re:Tools? (Score:3, Informative)

      by disc-chord ( 232893 )
      Adobe GoLive 5.0 and Illustrator 9.0 are the choice options for professional development.

      I've been playing with GoLive 5.0 for about 2 months since I first heard about SVG and I've played with Illustrator. I'd have to say I prefer GoLive 5.0... but only slightly. If you already have a PhotoShop license get GoLive. If you don't have a Photoshop licesne get Illustrator.

    • Re:Tools? (Score:5, Informative)

      by crisco ( 4669 ) on Thursday September 06, 2001 @10:25AM (#2259397) Homepage
      On Windows? Tons of tools. On the high end, Adobe seems to be embracing SVG, possibly as something to break Macromedia's stranglehold on .swg. Their Illustrator has support for SVG and they are probably the ones doing the most to effectively promote the format by distributing a SVG viewer plugin with the Acrobat 5 reader. Corel Draw and even Macromedia's vector drawing tools also support SVG. Going a bit easier on the pocketbook, JASC software has done work on a tool to do SVG and I believe there is a very nice free tool to do at least basic vector drawings.

      On the Linux side of things, there is something called Sodipodi that has great promise as a SVG tool, unfortunately it isn't close to being done. Kontour has support for SVG. There are also a myriad of command line tools for conversion from other vector formats.

      Want links? start with the DMOZ [google.com] category.

      • Re:Tools? (Score:4, Informative)

        by bherzog ( 132580 ) on Thursday September 06, 2001 @02:53PM (#2259560) Homepage
        My vector drawing program Sketch [sourceforge.net] also has some SVG
        support, although the SVG import/export filters are still incomplete,
        unfortunately. The program itself is quite usable, though. Since Sketch
        is Free Software, help is always welcome, of course.
        • Cool! I've got the Debian package installed, didn't even think to check it for SVG support. The fact that it is implemented in Python is an added bonus!
      • There are a great many SVG authoring tools. Adobe has been shipping Illustrator and GoLive for almost a year now with SVG support. As has been mentioned, Corel, JASC, and others have tools. There are also several open source projects like Batik. See http://www.adobe.com/svg/community/external.html and http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/SVG-Implementations .htm8.

        Michael Bierman

        Senior Product Manager, SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics)
        Adobe Systems "everywhere you lookTM"
        http://www.adobe.com/svg [adobe.com]

    • Re:Tools? (Score:2, Interesting)

      by reg ( 5428 )
      Not a drawing program, but one that I'm sure will find very wide use is GNUPlot. The CVS versions (http://sourceforge.net/projects/gnuplot/ [sourceforge.net]) have a SVG terminal. I've not tried it yet, but I'm hoping to use it in a project where I need high quality graphs on a web page. I noticed that in the latest GhostScript/GSView under windows that one of the conversion options is PS->SVG via the GNUPlot driver...

      Regards,
      -Jeremy

  • Why the push for yet another standard?

    Flash SWF format already has widespread installation... SVG has about 0%.

    The SWF format is already open standard, letting Flash vector animation files be created by anybody who is willing to create a program for it. There are a number of such programs available, including several open source linux varieties...

    Flash SWF also has very powerful Object Oriented programming features available with Actionscript. You can do amazing things with it, especially for custom applications.

    Don't get me wrong, I think most of the Flash used currently is wasteful, annoying crap! But there are some really great applications of Flash that I have seen, and many more are emerging.

    Have you ever tried to make dynamic web-based applications that run in a browser using javascript, java, DHTML, etc? Almost impossible to get anything that runs cross-browser/platform without writing multiple versions of it.. FLASH works great on Netscape, Explorer, Linux, PC, Mac, etc.

    Flash already supports XML data transfer and when used in conjunction with a Database on the webserver, *powerful* apps emerge! For any application involving more than static text on a screen, Flash excels...

    I didn't feel this way a few months ago, I just thought flash was annoying for animations... ..then when i looked into Flash to solve some web-based app problems I was having with cross-broswer DHTML, etc, I was convinced! Properly used Flash is great!

    So why use another standard proposed as SVG when there is already a great vector graphic system available that has lots of features: O.O. scripting, XML, huge user base, cross-platform compatibility?

    • Re:Why not FLASH SWF? (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      > Why the push for yet another standard?
      > Flash SWF format already has widespread
      > installation... SVG has about 0%.
      Adobe's SVG viewer is bundled with all new Reader, Illustrator and GoLive. They also have a deal with Real Networks to release the plugin with realplayer.

      > The SWF format is already open standard,
      > letting Flash vector animation files be created
      > by anybody who is willing to create a program
      > for it. There are a number of such programs
      > available, including several open source linux > varieties...
      SVG is XML based so any XML tools that can create XML documents can be used to create SVG documents. There are also several SVG specific tools and viewers such as Apache's Batik project. See http://xml.apache.org

      > Flash SWF also has very powerful Object
      > Oriented programming features available with
      > Actionscript. You can do amazing things with
      > it, especially for custom applications.
      OO features are also available with SVG, using ECMAScript [aka JavaScript]

      > Don't get me wrong, I think most of the Flash
      > used currently is wasteful, annoying crap! But > there are some really great applications of
      > Flash that I have seen, and many more are
      > emerging.
      I believe SVG and Flash will coexist, they'll both have appications that they are better suited for.

      > Have you ever tried to make dynamic web-based
      > applications that run in a browser using
      > javascript, java, DHTML, etc? Almost impossible > to get anything that runs cross
      > -browser/platform without writing multiple
      > versions of it.. FLASH works great on Netscape, > Explorer, Linux, PC, Mac, etc.
      How many web-based Flash applications are there besides a few trivial Flash based games? I agree with you point though, SVG is not well suited for complex web based applications.

      > Flash already supports XML data transfer and
      > when used in conjunction with a Database on
      > the webserver, *powerful* apps emerge! For any > application involving more than static text on > a screen, Flash excels...
      You forgot to mention that these "apps" and their database integration is flaky at best. SVG is text based making server side generation of SVG with database data is trivial.

      > So why use another standard proposed as SVG
      > when there is already a great vector graphic
      > system available that has lots of features:
      > O.O. scripting, XML, huge user base, cross-
      > platform compatibility?
      A few points.
      Flash is binary, making changes difficult. To make a change to an SVG document just open it up with a text editor.

      Flash doesn't support CSS well, SVG does.

      Flash doesn't integrate well with HTML documents.

      It is much easier to generate SVG dynamically then it is to generate Flash.
      • "SVG is not well suited for complex web based applications."

        it friggin is!

        (Flash/SWF's XML support (definitely was and probably still) is a joke)
      • How many web-based Flash applications are there besides a few trivial Flash based games?

        There are a ton of great full featured web applications out there which function soley in Flash. For example, here is a fully functional online bank USA Banc Shares [usabancshares.com]. There are plenty of ecommerce examples as well.

        I don't know enough of the coding details of SVG to say whether any of this is possible with the new format
      • >I believe SVG and Flash will coexist,
        >they'll both have appications that they,
        > are better suited for.

        True - no single tool is every the best tool for every job.. Using what's suited for your goal is always the best choice!

        >How many web-based Flash applications are
        >there besides a few trivial Flash based games?

        I've been developing a very powerful web-based graphic design application this year. Flash was on the only way I found that allowed all the flexibility and power I needed to maked it totally browser based. There are also more Flash apps emerging in the near future.

        >You forgot to mention that these "apps"
        >and their database integration is flaky at best.
        >SVG is text based making server side generation
        >of SVG with database data is trivial.

        There are solid implementations of database driven flash out there, including the project i've been working on.

        >Flash is binary, making changes difficult.
        >To make a change to an SVG document just open
        >it up with a text editor.
        Good advantage for SVG, I admit.. Although if you have parts of an app you don't want revealed to the public, then binary is preferred.. (i'll get flamed for mentioning closed-source, but hey, it's true)

    • Re:Why not FLASH SWF? (Score:4, Informative)

      by tobi_pinkjuice.com ( 519728 ) on Thursday September 06, 2001 @03:17PM (#2259857)

      Would any of you use Dreamweaver without being able to view and edit the source? So why would anyone create vector animations in Flash without being able to view and edit the source?
      SVG code is a little verbose, but very human readable. Check out a preview version of WebDraw: http://www.jasc.com/webdraw.asp [jasc.com] One can also view source of online SVGs; fun.

      It's XML, so parse/manipulate/generate it with any of your favourite XML tools in any of your favourite programming languages. XML content can be transformed to visual versions for different environments.
      (how fast can you say "QuickJugglingMarkupLanguageViaXSLTtoSVGAnimation" or
      "myOwnSlideshowMarkupLanguageViaRubyOrPythonToVect orAnimations" in the Flassh/SWF world?)

      Since dynamic generation is so convenient, and SVG is a truly high quality format, you can internationalize and personalize content without too much fuss, using all the open source technologies that don't even have to know about SVG. It has Unicode, it's own font format, is searchable and indexable, and works well with CSS, XSLT, RDF, later SMIL and XForms. I'm trying to avoid the word "professional", but don't succeed.

      Give it a try, check the spec (not to say RT*M)), and basically have great fun.

      The spec: (pretty readable)
      http://www.w3.org/TR/SVG/ [w3.org]
      W3's SVG page:
      http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/ [w3.org]
      More links: (mine)
      http://www.pinkjuice.com/SVG/SVGlinks.htm [pinkjuice.com]

    • Re:Why not FLASH SWF? (Score:2, Interesting)

      by maxdunn ( 233763 )
      Andreas Neuman has a pretty great summary [carto.net] of the differences between SVG and Flash. I know if you have any suggested changes to this he'd welcome feedback. I think it clearly shows the superiority of SVG in the long term: the only current obstacle to SVG is the installed base of browsers/viewers.
    • >Flash SWF format already has widespread installation... SVG has about 0%.

      This sounds good, but is actually false. Adobe has been shipping SVG with Acrobat Reader, and Acrobat since about June (I'd have to look up the specific date) Photoshop, Illustrator, GoLive, etc. for almost a year. I don't have the precise number, but I know we have already distributed more than 35 million viewers. I don't think this includes any of the OEMs that distribute Acrobat free from Adobe so the number is probably much higher if anything.

      > Have you ever tried to make dynamic web-based applications that run in a browser using javascript, java, DHTML, etc? Almost impossible to get anything that runs cross-browser/platform without writing multiple versions of it.. FLASH works great on Netscape, Explorer, Linux, PC, Mac, etc.

      I agree, DHTML has been problematic for many reasons. This is a topic for another time. I would suggest you look at examples found on http://www.adobe.com/svg/demos/main.html. It is quite possible to create Web applications with SVG and JavaScript, Java, Visual Basic, Perl, etc. However, I believe that JavaScript is the only scripting language required by the W3C's SVG Recommendation. There are several advantages to SVG for Web applications including:

      1. Vector graphics. (compared to all bitmaps)
      2. Graphics that can be created in an advanced drawing tool by a graphic designer (not a programmer) (an advantage over Java)
      3. The division of Business logic (scripting), Content (data), and Presentation (graphic). (superior to SWF, Java, rasters...)
      4. Graphics that can be dynamically created or updated with live data. (a map, a stock chart, or an inventory control system, for example)

      > So why use another standard proposed as SVG when there is already a great vector graphic system available that has lots of features: O.O. scripting, XML, huge user base, cross-platform compatibility?

      Be sure and compare apples to apples here. SWF has no DOM (Document Object Model). It has some limited ability to do text substitution (XML is text) but it is not a structured format and lacks many of the niceties of having a full DOM.

      There is then the issue of a proprietary de facto standard (albeit one that is commonly used) and an open standard. SVG is quickly catching on. Even though it has just become a W3C Recommendation, there are hundreds of SVG web sites, and probably close to a hundred SVG tools. I won't begin to preach the value of Open standards in a forum like this one because I assume that most people here appreciate their value. Having said that, I'm the first to say that SWF has appropriate applications. Authors should choose the tool (and format) that best suits their purpose.

      As for the user base, I think you have over looked a few things. SVG can be easily picked up (with great success I might add) by any JavaScript programmer. I have seen first hand JavaScript programmers become quite proficient in very short time because there is a DOM in SVG. One must also include XML enthusiasts in the list of potential SVG-enabled develoeprs.Because SVG is XML (unlike SWF) it is easy for XML hackers (I use the term with the utmost respect of course) to jump in running. Then comes database experts. Oracle and the like have been on the XML bandwagon for a long time. With native XML support, one can bring the full power of an Oracle application to bear on a problem and paint the data into pretty pictures. XML is not unlike HTML in many ways so many of the people who are used to hand coding HTML are going to be at home with SVG. (Note that SVG also supports CSS, XLINK, HREF, etc, just like HTML and XHTML.) Now, when you add all of these talented people together and arm them with Design oriented tools (Illustrator, CorelDraw, JASC, etc.) and Developer oriented folks (with everything from XMetaL from SoftQuad to their favorite text editing and version control systems) you have a pretty awesome development opportunity. Oh, that's right version control!! Just try to check in a SWF project into a version control system, then check it out for a late stage edit (say to change some text element) and check it back in. Then show me a delta of the change. In SWF that little exercise is impossible. But I digress...

      I urge people to look http://xml.apache.org/batik/ and http://xml.apache.org/fop/svg.html as just two open source SVG projects that do an excellent job of showing some of the value that dynamic, interactive, personalized web graphics can offer.



      Michael Bierman

      Senior Product Manager, SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics)
      Adobe Systems "everywhere you lookTM"
      http://www.adobe.com/svg [adobe.com]
  • I hope this new standard has a compressed version like DisplayPostscript. XML is nice, but all of those chew up bandwidth.

  • I'm looking forward to the demise of Flash too, but is this really any better?


    SVG Enjoys Broad, Continued Industry Support [w3.org]


    Correct me if I'm wrong, but not a single current browser supports the format natively.


    Of course "Adobe is very pleased that the SVG specification has been officially approved as a W3C Recommendation. SVG is a fundamental element of Adobe's Network Publishing strategy." You must download their flaky, propietary, plug-in [adobe.com]. To even check it out...

    • Correct me if I'm wrong, but not a single current browser supports the format natively.

      Most browsers did not support PNG's natively until their 4.0 versions. Tables until 2.0, etc...

      Undoubtedly, incompatiable version of SVG format will make it into IE 6.5 or 7.0 and Mozilla 9.3.4... if Moz ever gets that far.
    • I don't agree that the SVG viewer is flaky: the implementation is proprietary, but SVG itself is an open standard and this free software lets one "View Source" which alone far surpasses Flash: the "View Source" aspect of HTML is in large part responsible for its success as a language authored effectively by a large number of people.

      The Adobe Viewer is only one of many ways to enjoy SVG. The Batik [apache.org] project is a fantastic Open Source implementation.

      There is a Mozilla build [croczilla.com] by Alex Fritze that facilitates inline SVG (something that the Adobe Viewer is just starting to support in IE). That is an example of a "single current browser supporting SVG natively"... of course it's not yet in the main Mozilla build.

      But SVG is not just for browsers: it can run in applications and on the server. It is far more than just a replacement for Flash...

      Max [siliconpublishing.org]

  • Finally! (Score:4, Interesting)

    by maggard ( 5579 ) <michael@michaelmaggard.com> on Thursday September 06, 2001 @10:28AM (#2259430) Homepage Journal
    At long last we've got an officially blessed vector format.

    I'm sick to death of getting maps and charts as honking big ugly GIFs. They invariably come off looking poorly on screen, printing them out only makes their 72 DPI origin more uglily apparent, and just suck up bandwidth. Finally at 256 colors and without embedded gamma they're always off visually to some large percentage of folks.

    PDF's were touted as a replacement but that format has become overloaded with gadgets and dubious features, the plug-in is enormous and invariably buggy plus only works on a few platforms. Also aside from Apple creating their own implementation for MacOS X (Quartz) I don't know of any second source for the technology other then Adobe.

    SVG is far lighter weight and far more accessable, now the question is when will decent plugins arrive and how soon 'till support is built-in to the major browsers? Adobe's SVG plug-in just went to v.3beta for a few platforms but I've been unable to find anything open (in either sense) or more cross-patform yet.

    Finally my fear is that SVG will become like PNG - a great format that's poorly supported in differently broken ways so it's just not worth the hassle. Does anyone have any insight on how easy/hard SVG support will be to roll into tools & browsers, what producers of such tools timelines are?

    • Re:Finally! (Score:3, Informative)

      by psavo ( 162634 )
      check out mozilla, 5 months ago I loaded some build and there was svg-enabled one. I'd bet it has matured by now.
      http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla/releases/mozi ll a0.9.3/mozilla-win32-0.9.3-MathML-SVG.zip could be the one.. (linux version somewhere there..)

      • Re:Finally! (Score:2, Informative)

        by vondo ( 303621 )
        Check out these two bugzilla bugs for how SVG support is coming along:

        Initial request [mozilla.org]
        and
        Actual work [mozilla.org].

        This is to get SVG into the main develpment line, it seems things are mostly working in branches.

        Mozilla also has quite good PNG support.

    • Also aside from Apple creating their own implementation for MacOS X (Quartz) I don't know of any second source for the technology other then Adobe.
      Ghostscript and xpdf are nice, free ways to deal with pdfs. I agree that pdfs are a pretty wanky way to do graphics.
    • The KDE nonbeta branch has SVG implementation done already for Konqueror/KHTML engine(need only few fixes), so I guess that on the next version of KDE you'll see SVG supported..

    • Finally my fear is that SVG will become like PNG - a great format that's poorly supported in differently broken ways so it's just not worth the hassle.

      Err, PNG is broken how? Every browser I use handles it just fine. PNG is quite obviously here to stay.

    • PDF's were touted as a replacement

      PDF was never intended to be a format for displaying graphics in a web page, and likewise it doesn't sound like SVG is intended to compete with PDF as a format for books and articles.


      but that format has become overloaded with gadgets and dubious features, the plug-in is enormous and invariably buggy
      Just because Acrobat Reader 5.0, and the corresponding plug-in, are bloatware, that doesn't mean there's something wrong with PDF. By the same logic, Internet Explorer and Mozilla are bloatware, so there must be something wrong with HTML. The MacOS Preview app loads in a fraction of a second on my machine.


      plus only works on a few platforms

      What platform can't handle PDF? Windows, MacOS, and Linux are covered, although I believe only Acrobat Reader 4.05 is available on Linux, not 5.0.

    • I was working on ArgoUML SVG export for a while and also had big problems to find crossplatform viewers. IBM's viewer crashed and the Csiro viewer doesn't seem to support any recent SVG features.
  • The Effects of a W3C SVG Standard:

    Positive: Flash plugin will eventually no longer be needed for vector
    graphics as a key set of vector standards will be integrated with browsers.
    Ensuring that fonts are on the users system will no longer be an issue.
    Font embedding can be standardized.

    Negative: Netscape and IE will both bring "enhancements" to the base SVG
    models. Of course none of those "enhancements" will be present in BOTH
    browsers. IE will allow for basic SVG 3d shapes, though no applications
    will currently support the creation of those shapes. IE will also allow for
    very loose coding to create the SVG shapes. If you accidentally put a
    single co-ordinate set into your file, IE, instead of telling you that there
    is a stray point. Will assume that you wanted to create a MSN logo and
    subsequent link to MSN.Com. Microsoft Word will support SVG export,
    including in the source file a bunch of code that noone has any bloody idea
    where it came from, what it is supposed to do, or how to get rid of it.
    Thirteen years later, Microsoft will take over the US Government and we will
    find out that the "miscellaneous code", has been stealing our personal
    information for years. Microsoft will call it "A bug". Netscape, on the
    other hand, encountering a stray co-ordinate pair, will assume that the
    "clean-coding" standards of the internet development community are going
    straight to hell in a hand basket and that the world is coming to an end.
    "That being the case," it will logically decide, "this poor bloke is about
    to meet his maker and doesn't need to be squandering his last few minutes
    with his peepers fixed on a computer monitor now does he? Best he be off to
    the local pub for a pint or two while he still has the chance". Netscape
    will them proceed to crash your operating system. Netscape will also do
    wonderful little tricks like incorrectly display circles as parallelograms,
    Render every font as 16 point Times New Roman, and completely leave out the
    bottom half of your document for some obscure reason that you will spend 13
    weeks trying to track down before you finally come to the conclusion that
    "There really aren't that many Netscape users out there anyway". AOL will
    just compress the heck out of everything it encounters and render every SVG
    image as a Dot.

    Insignificant: Someone somewhere on a UNIX machine will be writing Plain
    Text news articles about how SVG is the worst threat to web usability since
    the invention of JPEG compression. They will urge the development community
    to avoid SVG because compatibility will still not be standard across all
    computers. They themselves will be ample proof of this fact only because
    their 28.8k external modems will not facilitate the download of the newest
    version of Netscape (God forbid a UNIX user should install IE) and even if
    they could get it installed, their 16mhz 1987 computer wouldn't know how to
    run it. The general population will promptly ignore these articles as they
    click yet another accidentally generated MSN logo link, leaving the insecure
    author to return to Usenet and his IRC client.
    • ...nice long diatribe...

      One thing...what about all us "God forbid a UNIX user should install IE" geeks who are pushing for OPEN standards? There has NEVER been a concensus amongst graphical browsers about handling images, much less the HTML which lays them out. Why should they start now?

      I am in agreement that having vector art displayable on graphical browsers is an imporant issue, but what's really WRONG with having a 28.8K SLIP (or, better yet, SHELL) connection to the Internet? Are the buzzards circling over our heads now because we prefer to use character-based terminals?

      Last I heard, you could start Lynx *significantly* faster than you could start IE...

      -PONA-
    • Amen! Preach it, Brother!

      (OK, OK, I know that this is just a 'me-too', but that rant expresses so many 'truths'...)

  • Start SVGing! (Score:5, Informative)

    by Boiotos ( 139179 ) on Thursday September 06, 2001 @02:48PM (#2259507) Homepage

    Browsing SVG

    The only browser plug-in for SVG right now is Adobe's [adobe.com], and it only works in NS4 and IE5 for Mac and Win32. However, there is a rapidly-developing Win32 SVG-savy branch [croczilla.com] of Moz by Alex Fritz. No text support yet, alas, but the author suggests that it should be easy to port to other platforms.

    Generating SVG

    Sodipodi [sourceforge.net] is a Win/Linux vector graphics program with SVG at its heart -- well worth a look. Sketch [sourceforge.net] runs in Python and includes SVG in its import/export set. I've had good luck transforming complex Illustrator diagrams into SVG using Sketch.

    On the Win platform, I'm quite fond of Jasc WebDraw [jasc.com]; it's in beta and a fully functional demo is provided.

    Finally, the versitility of the Batik [apache.org]library is staggering. Written in Java, it includes a viewer, transcoders to png and jpg and a very cool Graphics2D implementation. The latter allows anything graphics that can be drawn to a java G2D panel to be instead output as SVG. This is a great way to get font dimension info for precision layout of SVG, as we've done building dynamic timelines at the Historical Event Markup Project. [heml.org]

  • CAD vectors? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by digitect ( 217483 ) <digitectNO@SPAMdancingpaper.com> on Thursday September 06, 2001 @03:12PM (#2259796)
    Does anybody know if SVG addresses CAD vector files? If not, could it be adapted? It sure would be nice to have a "blessed" standard other than the proprietary (AutoDesk's AutoCAD) .DWG.
    • Not directly, though Autodesk was involved in the spec (Milt Capsimalis, Autodesk Inc. ).
      I am almost finished with a conversion program for our internal use that will export Autocad 2000 (Architectural Desktop) to XML. The xml is used to generate SVG images via Java Server Pages. This program also retains space links from AD so we can query against a database and generate thematic images. This would work for other variants of Autocad too (like Map). I wanted to use an open standard xml file format like the one being pushed by opengis.org, but simply don't have the time to develop that level of compliance.
      Autodesk has the Mapguide suite for rendering drawings via the web with a free plug-in. This is a good solution for many, and we use it here, but it has too many limitations to do all that we need.
      I spoke to an Autodesk engineer a few weeks ago about this topic and it seems that Autodesk isn't sold completely on the thought of XML document formats, though there does seem to be some interest. Their big fear (reading between the lines) is that if they have a true open standard for their file formats, then they wouldn't be able to lock their customer base in any more.
      To me this seems silly. I want to be able to move their files to something better than the whip viewer without paying a per seat license. But I wouldn't dream of going to a different product for editing the source drawings. Contact your Autodesk rep and let them know how you feel about having the ability to export into a true open standard format that isn't bastardized like DXF. If it's XML, then it becomes really easy to convert to SVG.

      • Wow, I would love to see what you're working on... is it Open/Free? Please email me with details.

        The new AutoCAD ADT 3.3 is all XML, including the new (unreleased) Mechanical/Plumbing add-on tools to ADT. (Not Mech. desktop, though.) I saw a preview a week ago by an AutoCAD rep and they will shortly be releasing full, huge libraries of XML objects for use with this module.

    • We actually render to both SVG and DXF from a proprietary format... For our CAD Application.

  • Since it's XML, you can transform it! (Score:3, Informative)

    by Lally Singh ( 3427 ) on Thursday September 06, 2001 @03:27PM (#2259921) Journal
    Actually, one of the best features of SVG is that it's XML. You can generate some XML data from a database, transform it into SVG (possibly with also with a template) via XSLT, and then render it into a graphic file (like JPEG or PNG with Batik).


    And support is pretty good -- XML libraries are bountiful, and reading/writing SVG won't be too painful (now knowing what to do with that data once you've read it is another story....).


    Pretty cool stuff in my opinion.

  • just check it out (Score:3, Insightful)

    by tobi_pinkjuice.com ( 519728 ) on Thursday September 06, 2001 @03:32PM (#2259979)

    Would any of you use Dreamweaver without being able to view and edit the source? So why would anyone create vector animations in Flash without being able to view and edit the source?
    SVG code is a little verbose, but very human readable. Check out a preview version of WebDraw: http://www.jasc.com/webdraw.asp [jasc.com] One can also view source of online SVGs; fun.

    It's XML, so parse/manipulate/generate it with any of your favourite XML tools in any of your favourite programming languages. XML content can be transformed to visual versions for different environments.
    (how fast can you say "QuickJugglingMarkupLanguageViaXSLTtoSVGAnimation" or
    "myOwnSlideshowMarkupLanguageViaRubyOrPythonToVect orAnimations" in the Flash/SWF world?)

    Since dynamic generation is so convenient, and SVG is a truly high quality format, you can internationalize and personalize content without too much fuss, using all the open source technologies that don't even have to know about SVG. It has Unicode, it's own font format, is searchable and indexable, and works well with CSS, XSLT, RDF, later SMIL and XForms. I'm trying to avoid the word "professional", but don't succeed.

    Give it a try, check the spec (not to say RT*M)), and basically have great fun.

    The spec: (pretty readable)
    http://www.w3.org/TR/SVG/ [w3.org]
    W3's SVG page:
    http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/ [w3.org]
    More links: (mine)
    http://www.pinkjuice.com/SVG/SVGlinks.htm [pinkjuice.com]

  • I've been playing with SVG for a few months now, and I've been having a lot of fun with it. Some friends and I are using it as our format for an online comic (not yet ready for public consumption). The file sizes are much smaller than with raster-based image files, the images are larger, the resolution is beautiful, and there's more interactivity. I suppose the same could be said of Flash, but I've never used it. I'm also creating some templates for text bubbles, frames, etc., to help other get off the ground with their own comics. Another cool feature of SVG is the searchable (and copy/pastable) text (with embeddable fonts!), which I plan to make use of for a site search engine.

    I'm also trying to convince my company to use SVG to generate charts for our website (and maybe even our PC app); I've made a simple chart generator, and the results are gorgeous (much better than with the buggy, overpriced charting package we currently use). I think I'm starting to wear them down... ;-). Since it's all XML, the same data can be displayed in a variety of different chart styles, rendered client side (or, if absolutely neccessary, rendered server-side and converted to raster), using chart templates sent down with the data. The pages are super-quick, and the hits on our servers would be knocked way low, since the same data would be manipulated client-side. With Adobe's aggressive distribution of their viewer plug-in (sadly, not yet onto *nix system--kick up a stink!), I'm confident that SVG will be a major contender.

    I'm currently working on a small map of my home town, with details filled in as you zoom down. Searchable street and business names, all that jazz. Pretty cool.

  • Using SVG (Score:2, Insightful)

    by jdevons ( 233314 )
    I know that we have actually been using SVG for some time on one of our production sites. But we have been looking into other alternatives such as flash generation.

    So it's good to finally see that this might become a standard. Now, when will IE and Netscape support it?

  • Adobe plugin and more. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by LetterJ ( 3524 )
    Though it's been mentioned in passing, Adobe's SVG viewer, though distributed alone, is also included in the standard distribution of Acrobat Reader 5.

    To those who are predicting SVG's demise, I have several comments.

    1. No, the current versions of the browsers don't support it natively now. However, did those browsers support HTML 4.0, CSS, PNG or any other of a host of open standards as of the week the spec was finalized?
    2. Some people seem to be focusing on an either/or between SVG and Flash. Remember that animation isn't SVG's only purpose. There currently isn't any other open standard graphic format for building charts and graphs while letting the text of those charts be indexable.
    3. For some reason, Macromedia is praised for it's open spec on SWF even though they could close it off. MS has "open" file format specs, but they get bashed. Flash is just like GIF, Fraunhoffer(sp) MP3 codec, Word 6.0, etc. They are controlled by a single company who can change the direction or licensing on a whim. SVG is like HTML, independent and completely open.

  • [SVG] looks like it would be a pretty cool thing. But then, so did VRML (I thought). What ever happened to VRML? And will the same thing happen to this?

  • Yeah yeah, SVG now an official recommendation.

    Call me when mozilla supports it. Even stuff like CSS is still not used pervasively for web design, and how long has it been since it reached 'W3C Official Recommendation' status?

    • There's a market for everything...and I don't use anything but CSS...anyway.


      I'm investigating some problems with document publication, single-source multiple input etc. where I work. SVG appears to have some of the solutions we're looking for. The customer is small enough that we can make the viewer a requirement. And what they do now is probably worse...but anyway. SVG was created out of needs/problems (and partly, like everything, because 'we can'). Those needs/problems mean a market and/or customers. And doing it cuz you can often creates a market (dot.bombs for example...fun while it lasted). Might be enough to carry it, might not be enough....I know I plan on giving it a shot to try and solve our problems. The fact that it's a spec helps me sell it as a solution.


      But on another note...Adobe's download seems to be /.'ed...or just whacked. Can anyone point me to another place to get the adobe viewer/a good viewer?


      Thanks,


      Galego

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