Modernisation, optimisation and porting of a large existing AutoCAD extension. Extensive code that has grown over the last 12 years and is now being renewed and restructured by us. Porting of the AutoCAD add-in from ObjectARX to ARX.NET and BricsCAD.
Customer: CAD provider
Technologies: AutoCAD, AutoCAD Civil, BricsCAD, AutoCAD .NET API (ARX.NET), ObjectARX, C#, C++, MFC, COM, Visual Studio, TFS and UML.
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As a B2B software service provider, we used our experience in the CAD field to modernise software that had grown over more than 12 years. Our customer, itself a large software company, had developed this add-in for AutoCAD and Civil for civil engineering.
Several hundred thousand lines of code were ported and modernised from C++, COM, MFC and ObjectARX to C#, WinForm and AutoCAD's API. This was preceded by a feasibility study and a financial calculation for this large project. In the financial calculation, we showed how the development effort with C++ for AutoCAD add-ins develops over the years due to high migration costs, and over what period the porting to a modern programming language will pay for itself.
The porting covered the user interface with main and context menus, ribbon, properties window, commands and dialogs. The CAD part included CAD elements (entities), reactors, Xdata and much more. Along the way, it was already apparent that the program code was becoming shorter and simpler.
After the porting, a three-day training course was held to prepare the staff for the switch to the AutoCAD .NET API with C#. We had previously trained them in AutoCAD's ObjectARX and C++.
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