I am a freelance contractor who works with DVSP and MAX. I don’t use Civil 3D at all (yet). 

My situation is this:

My clients, who have their roadway models in Civil 3D, may be hesitant to install the VSP3D exporter. Do they have to have a licensce for DVSP to use the exporter? Or is it a simple and clean install?

If my clients don’t install the VSP3D exporter what is the second best file type to use?  Currently they like using DWG’s but I don’t prefer those as I can’t use DVSP’s scene offset settings and other reasons.  I prefer LandXML(.xml) file type because I’ve used those before with good success.  The issue with LandXML seems to be that most Civil3D folks don’t know how to export or convert to LandXML.  Are there any good tutorial walkthru’s for going from Civil3D to LandXML?

Any comments welcome. thanks

Brian Rogers - 23 September 2008 10:53 PM

My clients, who have their roadway models in Civil 3D, may be hesitant to install the VSP3D exporter. Do they have to have a licensce for DVSP to use the exporter? Or is it a simple and clean install?

Hi Brian - I would strongly recommend that they use the VSP3D Exporter for Civil 3D rather than LandXML. The benefits are huge, and would be best explained by looking at the new DVSP Video Tutorial for Civil 3D Users we posted on this site a couple of weeks ago.

The VSP3D Exporter is an entirely free download - you don’t need a DVSP Licence to use it. You only need a DVSP licence to read the files into DVSP that the exporter creates.  The install is also very simple and clean - just a single DLL which is loaded into Civil 3D.

It’s very easy to uninstall for anybody that decides they would rather not use it. I hope this helps.

Thanks Bruce,

I’ll pass that info along to my client.

Question: Can they use the recent VSP3D exporter and Civil 3D 2008 too.

Also, if they are using Microstation what is the best file type I should ask for? LandXML again?

Hi Brian,

Exporting to LandXML from Civil3D is very easy, they really don’t need any tutorials! Under “File - Export” you can find “Export to LandXML”. Civil3D will show all objects in your drawing that are LandXML compatible and you can choose what you want to export yourself. The new VSP exporter for Civil3D works very good though, so I would rather use that one!

If you need more info about Civil3D just ask!

Great, thanks Remco. Sounds pretty dang easy from Civil3D.

Any tips on how to export to LandXML from Microstation?

Sure, no problem!

I’m totally AutoDesk minded, so I don’t know about the export functions in Microstation unfortunately….

Hi,
I do not think you will be able to export data to XML directly from MicroStation. You can use tools like PowerCivil or InRoads where export to LandXML is included.

We made a few tests in exporting data from InRoads (linestrings) and MicroStation DXF (surfaces) and models work well.

Regards

Yes,

I have received LandXML files from clients using InRoads and the xml format worked great for me. It was a large project too, about 1 million poly’s.

Brian Rogers - 25 September 2008 12:16 AM

Question: Can they use the recent VSP3D exporter and Civil 3D 2008 too.

There is a version of the exporter available for Civil 3D 2008. It doesn’t have quite the same level of functionality and support as the 2009 version, but it will still work with DVSP v3.5/v3.51 and v3.6.