Tutorial - Validation your first DXF file

Let’s learn by example.

In this tutorial, we will learn how to validate a parametrized DXF file.

We’ll assume you have QSketchMetric installed already as well as QCAD Professional

First (If you don’t have already from other tutorials) download the tutorial.dxf file from the QSketchMetric repository. It is an example of a DXF file that we will validate in this tutorial.

To do so, open it and click Ctrl+S to save it to your computer. As a convention, we’ll assume you saved it in a file called tutorial.dxf.

First, let’s open the file in QCAD Professional. (File -> Open)

As you can see, it is a simple drawing of a chalice. It is parametrized depending on the chalice height. Changing the chalice height h variable will render the drawing accordingly.

Let’s validate the drawing. To do so, open the QSketchMetric Validator and login using your GitHub account. It is as simple as clicking the GitHub button. The first time you login, you will be asked to authorize the application to access your GitHub account.

After logging in, you will see the following screen:

Click the choose a file button and select the tutorial.dxf file you saved earlier.

Next, click the Validate button. And what this! An error!

The error is telling us that the h variable is not defined. This is because the validator does not know what the h variable is while calculating the chalice_foot_radius variable.

Download the debug report by clicking the Debug report button and open it in QCAD Professional.

We can see that every entity got greyed out accept of the MTEXT entity. It is because the MTEXT entity is the place where the error occurred while calculating the chalice_foot_radius variable. Also the error message is displayed in the right bottom corner of the drawing.

Let’s fix the error!

To do so, we need to define the h variable. Click the validate another file button and select the tutorial.dxf file again. This time, before clicking the Validate button, click the set vars button. The modal window will appear.

Add new variable using the + symbol. In the name field, type h and in the value field, type 50.

Close the modal window and click the Validate button. A success!

Entities, Variables and Cohesion checks are all green and we are presented with a success message.

Congratulation you validated your first parametric DXF file!