DWF Writer for 64bit ??

Though we have had many requests to offer the DWF Writer for 64bit, it is not certain that this is becoming a reality, yet.

At this point our DWF Writer for 32bit does not install on a 64bit system and no workaround is available.

The experts are still out to determine as to how useful such a printer driver will really be. Many believe that users are making it part of the design process - instead of using the built-in publish feature functionality offered in our Autodesk design applications - given they are part of the process.

I am a proponent of the 64bit DWF Writer but have still some distance to go before all hurdles are cleared. Needless to say that it would be extremely useful to hear from you.

Why do you think that we should offer a DWF Writer for 64bit platforms?

You can post your comments in this forum or email me directly at volker.joseph@autodesk.com. We are looking for your vote, telling us as to why you think that we should (absolutely!) introduce this printer driver.

It would also be helpful to understand as to what applications are used as part of your design process. And why, if you are using Autodesk applications, you think that the built-in publish features are not sufficient and require the DWF Writer for the design process.

DWF Writer for 64bit to the rescue!

--Volker

Comments

[Robin Capper]

I don't use DWF Writer with Autodesk CAD but find it useful for cad related stuff. How else can I integrate a word page or spreadsheet with a drawing sheet in a DWF?
Besides, it's desirable for all workstations to be set up with the same applications/capability regardless of OS for consistency. Do we have to keep a 32bit box just for DWF Writer?

[Scott Sheppard]

I would be curious to know what 64-bit applications our customers are running that do not already have built-in DWF publishing. Using the PUBLISH process from Autodesk applications instead of the DWF Writer produces smaller DWF files with additional metadata: http://dwf.blogs.com/beyond_the_paper/2006/04/dwf_writer_is_n.html

[Russell Holzinger]

I would like to upgrade all my mechines to 64bit ASAP but the whole industry is dragging thier feet. I can't beleive Revit is not running on 64 or even supported by Autodesk. 32bit is just to limited/slow for BIM. We already have major headaches on our 64 systems with other vendors so show your support and do everything you can to help 64 users. We have work to get done and we pay Autodesk to make that easier for us so get with the program. ;)

[Chad Smith]

We run Revit on all our production PC's, but have no need for a 64bit for at least another 2 years, as that's when we are due for our next scheduled hardware upgrades.

What would be great though, would be to get a proper working 32bit DWF driver for Revit first. One that actually prints in vector with intelligent objects that have useful data.

[Robin Capper]

We are hitting 32 bit memory limits with some designs. Just starting to consider a shift to 64bit if/when we go to Vista.

[Russell Holzinger]

I would like integrate my specs into the DWF that contains the drawings. We would need the DWF Writer to work in SpeckLink and MS Office on 64-bit OS's. We are working to have the detail callouts hyperlinked to the spec section like the section heads in Revit do when in DesignReview. We have accelerated our move to 64-bit OS so that we can use more RAM. Revit really needs to get there ASAP.

[wcrane]

We need a 64 bit driver. 90% of our workstations use XP x64 (~250 units) because of the memory limitations of XP 32. The driver would help me further promote the use of DWF for all documents that normally would be converted to PDF. In my opinion DWF is more extensible and for us represents more potential for all of our processes related to design/documentation.

Please provide the driver. Or, at very least, ensure that DWFx has the same capabilities.

[Ian Nelson]

Yes please, ASAP. I thought this would be a great work around for REVIT to embed fonts into DWF's that we send to consultants and external print companies.

[Jeff Ward]

We take pdf, Word, Excel and other files output to embed within a review set of drawings in dwf format. Since there is no work around to using the DWF Writer, how else can we incorporate sketches and notes that were not originated in AutoCAD? The promotions for Autodesk Viewer listed this option as one of its good features - why would Autodesk provide for 32-bit users but not 64-bit users?

[Matt Turner]

We use ProEngineer Wildfire 3.0, but since our upgrade to 64-bit Windows XP we haven't been able to distribute in DWF format. Very sad. A 64-bit compatible DWF writer would be very useful.

[Michael Coviello]

We are rapidly moving towards x64 on all our production pc's to take advantage of Revit x64 and increased memory usage.
We create dwf's from other sources such as ms office, IE and others.
Currently the dwf for the other apps(excel, word etc) has to be created on a 32bit machine which soon will be a rare thing.
It is promising that Autodesk just released x64 versions of Revit Architecture and Revit MEP. Please make the dwf writer next.

[paper shredders]

I am really pleased to post my comment on this blog . It helped me with ocean of knowledge so I really belive you will do much better in the future . Good job web master .
http://www.shredderwarehouse.com

[Tim Catalano]

I'm just wondering why it's such an issue, obviously the dwf writer works on the 64 bit OS because i'm able to print to dwf from autocad. i would like to be able to print to dwf from all my office applications because i really don't like pdf, but i guess i'll be stuck with it till autodesk lets us print to dwf... lame.

[Volker Joseph]

Thank you for your feedback.

AutoCAD ability to publish to DWF is not affected by this issue since the application does NOT make use of the DWF Writer but uses a build in publish engine instead.

[jmdaia]

Since there are other ways to publish, I guess the concern is why but another hole in AutoDesk programming

[Volker Joseph]

Thank you for your feedback.

Other ways of publish, as highlighted by you, only apply to Autodesk products itself.

It does not apply to non-Autodesk applications, such as Microsoft.

[Karl]

We use the DWF writer to convert PDFs to DWFs so we can xref them. This has proven helpful, but now, with 64 bit systems, we are looking for a viable solution

[Mark Randa]

Yet another Autodesk product I cannot use because it is 32 bit only (many of the Inventor Lab products were only 32 bit).

I create furniture and other plans for direct sale to the public, and would have liked to have done it in DWFx, but it looks like PDF will have to do. I find it very hard to believe Autodesk does not see a problem here......

[William Johnson]

We have upgraded over half of our design staff to 64bit and we rely HEAVILY on DWF for in-house design changes and have been hindered to some extent by not being able to aggregate smoothly due to the lack of a DWF Writer for 64bit.

I have been a LOOOOOONG time supporter of DWF ( as far back as r14.01 ) and would love to see the format and programs continue to evolve and mature.

[Jason]

We are also moving to 64 bit in the future, and will be in need of a DWF Writer for non-Autodesk applications (such as Word) on those machines.

[Michael Coviello]

Has there been any status update regarding this?
Most of our issues would be solved if this were possible or..
Revit had most all of the capability of excel
and
All ADSK products could insert DWF's (not just the markups)

my .02

[Jason B]

I'm the IT guy at our office and I have some users requesting the ability to print Excel spreadsheets to DWF, but they use x64 Vista machines, so in order to print they have to hijack a 32 bit user's PC and use it to print. More than just a little bit annoying for both parties. I don't understand why this hasn't been released yet, clearly people have been requesting this feature since 64 bit OS came out, and with it being a year and a half after this blog was posted and still no 64 bit support, well that just gives me one more thing to gripe about Autodesk.