It's all probably related to .AI file versions.

Many apps wont accept .ai files older than version 8 or earlier.
You may need to have a copy of Illustrator to enable resaving the file in a version compatable with a particular app.

A VERY crazy world.
Brian

Michael

Am I correct in reading that MoI saves AI files as version 13?

Brian

Hi Michael, could you please post the .ai file that Inkscape won't open over here so I can take a look at it?

Which versions of Inkscape and Corel Draw are you using? The version of Inkscape I have over here does not seem to support .ai format directly, so that may be something they have added pretty recently.

- Michael

Hi Brian, MoI saves AI files in the AI version 7 format.

It's the most widely used AI variant between different programs - I think at Adobe Illustrator version 10 (or 9, right around there anyway) the format had a big change to be PDF based instead which changed the structure of the file significantly and they became quite a bit more complex to read.

- Michael

Hi Michael T., I downloaded the most recent version of Inkscape, and according to their file dialog, they only support "Adobe Illustrator 9.0 and above".

MoI exports AI format 7 files, which for most programs are more compatible than the newer style ones, but not in this particular case I guess.

It looks like they may have added a PDF importer, and so then I suppose they got the AI 9 and above bundled along with that as well, but they have not done a reader for the older AI 8 or lower format which is actually a lot more simple to read... So that's kind of surprising.

I also tested Inkscape with a bunch of sample AI files that I have that were saved from various versions of Illustrator, and it is not able to load the older AI files there either, so that is definitely the problem.

I would like to enable saving PDF and also SVG files from MoI but it may take me a while before I can make that happen.

I guess the same problem may be happening to you with Corel, although I am kind of surprised that it would not be able to handle the older AI format there. If Corel has an option to load AI version 8 or lower, then give that a try.

- Michael

I can open MoI's ai files in Corel 10. Would you like me to try in x3? What version of corel are you using?

Burr

AI 7---thats good Michael.

My current version of Illustrator CS3 says it saves as version 13!

I generally save from Illustrator as V8 but I guess I need to save for MoI as 7---good to know.

Brian

Hi Brian,

> I generally save from Illustrator as V8 but I guess I need
> to save for MoI as 7---good to know.

Actually, you don't need to do that unless you're having a problem.

MoI can read in any AI format, including both old style, and the new style PDF version.

So you should be able to save as AI CS3 and have it come in ok.


MoI only writes AI7 though - the AI writer is different from the AI reader.

- Michael

HA!
Life is SOOOO complicated!
Good to know that export/import difference Michael.

When! will the 3D world get Collarded!

Brian

Thanks everyone!

This is all very useful. My version of Adobe Photo Deluxe is quite a bit older than my Inkscape and Corel Photo programs.

I believe this explains it.

Attached is the exported ai file.

I created it in beta V2.

Thanks again for all the help.

Hi Michael T. - do you have CorelDraw or do you have the Corel "Photo" program?

If you have CorelDraw, try loading it into there instead of the Photo program - it should have better support for this format.

For now you'll probably need something like Corel Draw, Adobe Illustrator, or Xara to work with this 2D file currently - these programs are more focused on dealing with 2D vector graphics data so they should be able to open this file.

Many photo programs are only focused on bitmap handling and not so much on vector graphics data.

Inkscape is a vector graphics program but unfortunately they have not yet supported this older kind of AI file.

I guess the other approach you could do is to open it with Adobe Photo Deluxe and then save it out from there as a bitmap and then open that up in your Corel Photo program.

- Michael

Thanks Michael G.

I have the Corel photo program, not draw.

I will look ito those other applications as well.

Again, everyones help is appreciated.

Michael T.

I updated the ai file to version 9. Can go up to cs3 if you want. What format do you want it in? Did you want it converted to a bitmap (photo)? which program do you want to use your ai file in? I'll convert it for you.

Burr

Thanks Burr.

I tried to read the updated.ai file into Inkscape and Corel Paint Shop Pro X. It did not give me any errors, but nothing appeared after opening it. I will continue to play around with the settings maybe.

Thanks again!

That would be a version miss-match. For instance, if you try to read it into moi, it will be blank also, no error.

Trying to figure out version for version etc is your task. Your corel is an old package, probably not your best bet. Inkscape is a whole other animal.

Are you on Linux or just that it's free?

Inkscape strives for svg. Try to open this in inkscape.

If the svg file works for you, then you may want to go to the inkscape site and read up on there ai convertor. Since they want to do svg and adobe handles it differently (by keeping the ai and svg seperatly in binary) then there is a process to make your inkscape compatible with other packages.

Hope this helps!

Here is a link from the inkscape wiki. The program you want is called "uniconvertor". It imports ai files up to version 9 and exports the ai as version 5, which inkscape can then deal with.

Again, scroll to the "existing conversion tools" and look for "Uniconvertor"

http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/FileTypes

Burr
[EDIT] But then again, Inkscape wants to be an svg program so use this tool to import your moi file then convert it to svg.
[EDIT]

Thanks Burr, I'll check that out later tonite.