scConverter SDK Updates

• Added support for conversion of Autodesk Inventor IDW (2D) files by using Autodesk Apprentice Server.
  You can download Apprentice Server directly from Autodesk.
• The converter is now using a new Gerber parser that solves all reported Gerber macro issues (same as GerbView 11).

• 1644 A PDF file from a customer was not identified as PDF file format.
• 1639 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1628 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1627 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1623 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1613 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1603 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1597 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1590 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1580 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1552 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1551 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1522 Gerber files failed conversion (exception error).
• 1513 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1634 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1473 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1464 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1381 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1300 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1119 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 1026 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.
• 710 Gerber macro apertures were not converted correctly.

• Added support for conversion to and from AVIF image file format. Read more about the AV1 Image File Format on Wikipedia.
• Added support for conversion from SVG to image file formats.

• ConvertSVGToImageFile - Convert a SVG file to image file format (e.g. PNG).
• ConvertSVGToImage - Convert a SVG file to an image and return it as IPicture.

• scConvertSVGToImageFile - Convert a SVG file to image file format (e.g. PNG).
• scConvertSVGToDIB - Convert a SVG file to a device independent bitmap (DIB).

• SetConfigValue - Added setting 20 to select quality level for exported AVIF files.
• SetConfigValue - Added setting 21 to select alpha quality level for exported AVIF files.
• SetConfigValue - Added setting 22 to set compression speed for exported AVIF files.

• scSetConfigValue - Added setting 20 to select quality level for exported AVIF files.
• scSetConfigValue - Added setting 21 to select alpha quality level for exported AVIF files.
• scSetConfigValue - Added setting 22 to set compression speed for exported AVIF files.

• ConvertGerberLayersToMP - Convert loaded Gerber, Excellon and HPGL/2 files into a multi-page file where each layer is placed on a separate page.
• PDFForceOrientation - Convert a PDF file into a new PDF and force all pages to landscape or portrait orientation.
• PDFRotatePages - Convert a PDF file into a new PDF and roate a selection of pages, or all pages, using a given rotation factor.
• PDFScale - Convert a PDF file into a new scaled file PDF. The scaled PDF file will maintain all content (e.g., text and geometry).

• scConvertGerberLayersToMP - Convert loaded Gerber, Excellon and HPGL/2 files into a multi-page file where each layer is placed on a separate page.
• scPDFForceOrientation - Convert a PDF file into a new PDF and force all pages to landscape or portrait orientation.
• scPDFRotatePages - Convert a PDF file into a new PDF and roate a selection of pages, or all pages, using a given rotation factor.
• scPDFScale - Convert a PDF file into a new scaled file PDF. The scaled PDF file will maintain all content (e.g., text and geometry).

• 1635 Some images in a DWF file were converted to PDF using wrong colors.
• 1633 Converting PDF files with more than 2500 pages caused an exception error.
• 1631 Several CGM files from a customer were converted with incorrect extents or failed completely.
• 1629 Excellon files from customer were not converted correctly.
• 1572 Excellon files with .txt extension were converted as plain text files.

• Multi-page, or multi-picture, CGM files are now supported.

• SetConfigValue - Added value 18: Set JPEG XL compression quality.
• SetConfigValue - Added value 19: Enable or disable JPEG XL lossless compresion mode.

• scSetConfigValue - Added value 18: Set JPEG XL compression quality.
• scSetConfigValue - Added value 19: Enable or disable JPEG XL lossless compresion mode.

• 1630 Multi page (multi-picture) CGM files were not supported.

• Added support for reading and writing JPEG XL file format.
• The AddGerberLayer method now accepts HPGL/2 files in addition to Gerber and Excellon.
• The scAddPCBLayer function now accepts HPGL/2 files in addition to Gerber and Excellon.
• Added Excellon drill output format. It is now possible to merge several Excellon files into a single file by using the ConvertGerberLayersToCAD method.

• 1621 Some text elements were incorrectly included after converting from PDF to DWF (PDFToCAD).
• 1619 Excellon G84 command (Canned Circle) was not supported.
• Creating a searchable PDF from a raster file (e.g. CALS) could sometimes result in a PDF with wrong page size.

• AddGerberLayer and scAddPCBLayer can now be used to add transparent layers.
  Check out the following page for more information about conversion of Gerber layers with transparency.
• ConvertGerberLayersToImage and ConvertGerberLayersToImageEx can now use the margins set by the SetMargins method.

• SaveCompareResultEx - Same as as SaveCompareResult but you can also change the color for unchanged content.
  Check out the following page for more information about file compare.
• SetGerberLayerVisible - Toggle visibility for a layer added with scAddPCBLayer.

• scSaveCompareResultEx - Same as as scSaveCompareResult but can also set the color to use for unchanged content.
• scSetGerberLayerVisible - Toggle visibility for a layer added with scAddPCBLayer.

• PDFConform - Added option value 7 (PDF/A-4e) for conform type parameter.

• SetConfigValue - Added value 17: Control if transparent layers should be included when ConvertGerberLayersToCAD is used.
• scPDFConform - Added option value 7 (PDF/A-4e) for conform type parameter.

• PDFWriteFormat - Added option value 7 (PDF/A-4e).

• 1617 DWF file from customer was converted with invalid dimensions.
• 1616 Missing line style in DWF file from customer.
• 1615 Extra unwanted content were included after conversion from DWF to PDF.
• 1612 An image in a DWF file was lost after conversion to PDF.
• 1611 Missing line styles in a DWF file from a customer.
• 1610 Margins set by for SetMargins were not used for PDF to Raster conversion.
• 1609 After conversion from PDF to DWF some extra unwanted content were included.

• scResizeImage2 - Resize an image using input and output DIB (HGLOBAL) with high quality.

• 1608 Design Review Markups were displaced in DWFX file from customer.
• 1607 Design Review Markups were displaced in DWFX file from customer.
• 1606 Transparency was lost when converting 32-bit PSD files to other 32-bit image formats (e.g. PNG and TIFF).
• Some files were incorrectly identified as PSD file format.
• Setting DWFLoadMarkup to 0 (false) did not turn off Design Review markup for DWFX files.

• This update includes support for converting Adobe Photoshop (PSD) files.
• Windows Vista is no longer supported.

• 1600 Excellon drill files from customer were converted with wrong extents.
• 1599 Trying to obtain number of pages in, or convert, a PDF file from customer caused an exception error.
• 1569 Text in a DWF file from customer were too narrow.
• ConvertPageToImage failed with higher DPI settings (was not able to use the same values as the other convert functions).

• This update includes several new image processing methods, please see the documentation for more information.

• BinarizeImage - Convert an image file to black and white only. This filter can also be used to remove stain from a scanned image.
• BinarizeImageEx - Same as BinarizeImage but processing a file previously opened with OpenFileEx.
• CleanupImage - Remove noise from an image file.
• CleanupImageEx - Same as CleanupImage but processing a file previously opened with OpenFileEx.
• DefoxImage - Remove stain, also known as foxing from an older scanned document.
• DefoxImageEx - Same as DefoxImage but processing a file previously opened with OpenFileEx.
• DeskewImage - Deskew, or straighten, an image file.
• DeskewImageEx - Same as DeskewImage but using a file previously opened with OpenFileEx.
• GetDeskewAngleEx - Calculate deskew angle for an image file previously opened with OpenFileEx.
• ResizeImage - A new high-quality image resize method that supports two different algorithms: Avir and Lanczos.
• ResizeImageEx - Same as ResizeImage but processing a file previously opened with OpenFileEx.
• VBSResize - Same as ResizeImage but processing a file previously opened with VBSOpen.

• scBinarizeImage - Convert an image file to black and white only. This filter can also be used to remove stain from a scanned image.
• scCleanupImage - Remove noise from an image file.
• scDefoxImage - Remove stain, also known as foxing from an older scanned document.
• scDeskewImage - Deskew an image file.
• scResizeImage - A new high-quality image resize method that supports two different alogrithms: Avir and Lanczos.

• 1596 A CGM file from customer was not converted correctly.
• 1593 Added support for DWF and DWFX hyperlinks. Any hyperlink from source file will now be included in exported PDF files.
• 1592 Transparent markup images lost transparency after conversion to DWF.
• 1586 DWF file from customer failed to open.

• PDFWriteFormat - You may now choose between all the supported PDF/A variants and use it as default PDF output variant. The following values are now supported:
  0. PDF 1.7 (normal/editable)
  1. PDF/A-1B
  2. PDF/A-2B
  3. PDF/A-3B
  4. PDF/A-2U
  5. PDF/A-3U
  6. PDF/A-4
  Previously only values 0 (editable PDF) and 1 (PDF/A-2B) were supported.
• SetLoadPassword - This is a new method that let you set a password before loading password protected PDF, DWF and DWFX files.

• GetLastError - Trying to load a password protected file without setting the correct password will fail and error code 15 will be returned.

• scSetPDFWriteFormat - You may now choose between all the supported PDF/A variants and use it as default PDF output variant.
  Previously only values 0 (editable PDF) and 1 (PDF/A-2B) were supported.
• scSetLoadPassword - This is a new function that let you set a password before loading password protected PDF, DWF and DWFX files.
• All conversion functions will return error code 15 if a password protected PDF and DWF/DWFX file is loaded with wrong password.

• 1589 An image was missing after conversion from PDF to DWF using PDFToCAD.
• 1588 Password protected DWF, DWFX and PDF files were not supported.
• 1587 Trying to usePDFConform with Normalize flag on a PDF file that could not be repaired, created a corrupt output PDF file. The method will now return an error message and no output PDF file will be created if such files are encountered.

• SetConfigValue - Added value 16: Enable or disable creation of progressive JPEG files.

• 1585 Some filled elements in a DWFX file were missing transparency.
• 1584 Line merge mode was lost after converting a HPGL/2 file from customer to PDF.
• 1582 PDF to DWF conversion of a file from a customer caused an exception error.
• 1579 SetPDFProperty settings didn't have any effect if PDFRASTER export format was selected.

• 1578 32-bit HEIC images was loaded as 24-bit which caused transparency (alpha channel) to be lost.
• 1573 Missing images in CGM file from customer.
• 1567 PDF file from customer failed to convert.

• 1568 Missing image after conversion from PDF to PLT using PDFToCAD.
• 1564 Missing holes after converting an Excellon drill file to PDF.
• 1563 Some lines had wrong line style after conversion from PDF to PLT using PDFToCAD.

• SetConfigValue - Added value 15: Set rendering quality for arcs when converting to raster formats.
  Default value is 360 (total number of line segments for a full arc).
• PDFConform - Added option to conform PDF files into PDF/A-4 standard.

• 1562 Converting a 24-bit image to 32-bit PNG/BMP/WEBP/TIFF/HEIC file created only a blank image.
• 1561 Some of the text in a DWF file were displaced.
• 1557 An image was missing in a CGM file.

• 1550 DWF file caused floating point exception error during conversion.
• 1549 DWF file were converted as a blank file.
• 1547 One of the pages in a DWF file was converted with wrong extents.
• Files with HEIF extension were not recognized as valid HEIC files.

• VBSCreateGUID - Create and return GUID as Variant data type.

• 1546 Converting 32-bit PNG to HEIC caused transparency (alpha channel) to be lost.
• 1545 PDF to PNG conversion created only a blank image.
• 1543 Freehand text annotations in a PDF file contained invalid characters after conversion to any format.
• 1529 16-bit BMP files became only black if rotation was used during conversion.

• scConverter is now built using Visual Studio 2022.
• Windows XP platform is no longer supported.
• You can now create a searchable PDF from a scanned document using OCR.
  This feature requires that the Tesseract OCR engine is installed on the system.
• New method to compress files using compression methods supported by the HTTP protocol (Brotli and GZIP).
• All sample applications have been migrated to Visual Studio 2022.

• CompressFile - Compress a file using Brotli, GZIP, BZIP2 and ZSTD compression methods.
• CreateSearchablePDF - Can create a searchable PDF file from a scanned document if Tesseract OCR engine is available.
• DetectQREx - Search for QR codes in a file opened by OpenFileEx.
• GetQRTextEx - Return decoded text for a QR code previously found by DetectQREx.

• OCRAvailable - Check if Tesseract OCR engine is available.
• VBSPixHeight - Return height of file opened with VBSOpen in pixels.
• VBSPixWidth - Return width of file opened with VBSOpen in pixels.

New Exported Functions:

Changes to Methods:

• 1544 PDF to DWF: Some black and white images were inverted after conversion to DWF.
• The values returned by VBSHeight and VBSWidth properties were not correct.

• Added new method: VBSOpen
• Added new method: VBSConvert
• Added new method: VBSClose
• Added new property: VBSDPI
• Added new property: VBSFormat
• Added new property: VBSHeight
• Added new property: VBSWidth
• Added new property: VBSPage
• Added new property: VBSPages

These methods and properties were added to support development environments that cannot use the OpenFileEx based methods.
Please check the documentation for more information.

• 1539 Excellon drill file was converted with wrong extents.
• 1538 Missing markup text in a DWF file from customer.
• 1537 Some of the markup text in a DWFX file from customer had wrong rotation.
• 1536 Missing a stamp in a DWF file from customer.
• 1535 CGM files from customer were not converted correctly. Some of the files could cause a memory error exception.
• 1534 Missing dots in a DWF file from customer.

• Added new method: Convert3

• 1530 Missing raster data in CGM file from customer. The file could also cause memory errors.
• 1527 TIFF files using ZIP type compression were not supported.
• #### Some of the output format identifiers for SaveCompareResult did output wrong file format.

• Added support for reading and writing HEIC file format.
• Added SetConfigValue( 5 ) to control if a temporary user profile should be used during LibreOffice conversion.
• Added SetConfigValue( 6 ) to control HEIC compression level.
• Visual Studio 2010 runtime is no longer required to run scConverter and its components.
• Visual Studio 2010 redistributables are no longer part of the SDK.

• 1525 Converting from 32-bit PNG to 24-bit PNG caused degrading of the quality.
• 1523 A PLT file was converted with wrong color for some of the text.
• 1520 A single page CGM file was loaded as two pages and was missing an image.

• 1514 A DWFX file from customer caused exception error during load.
• 1511 Due a clipping error several images in a DWFX were displayed but should have been discarded.
• 1510 Converting a PLT to DWF caused paper background to be flipped around Y axis due to extreme dimensions.
• 1506 Missing Chinese characters after converting from DWF to PDF.
• 1503 Missing raster images in a DWF file from customer.
• 1502 Missing content on page 2 in a DWF file from customer.

• 1495 PDF to DWF: Some raster images (text) became fuzzy after conversion to DWF.
• 1491 Filled black rectangles in a DWF file were covering other information.
• 1490 Markup approved symbol would be wrong after saving to a new PDF, if the original PDF had page rotation.
• 1489 A raster image was covering other information in a DWF file.
• 1483 PDF to DWF: DWF files had wrong page size after conversion.
• 1482 Some images in a DWF file had greyish background after conversion to PDF.
•          Custom PDF Properties didn't work with the PDFConform function.

The converter may now use TrueType fonts for PDF files converted from file formats that support this, for example DWF.
The use of TrueType will both reduce size of the exported PDF and increase the performance.

• GetQRImage - Create a QR image and return as IPicture.
• SaveQRImage - Create a QR image and save as file.
• SetPDFCustomProperty - Add a custom property to the next exported PDF file.
• PDFSignFile - Add a digital certificate to a PDF file.
• PDFExtractPageEx - Extract a page from PDF file and save as new file.
• CreateGUID - Create a unique identifier and return as string.

• scSetPDFCustomProperty - Add a custom property to the next exported PDF file.
• scPDFSignFile - Add a digital certificate to a PDF file.
• scCreateGUID - Create a unique identifier and return as string.

• SetConfigValue - Added value 4: Enable or disable TrueType text in exported PDF files (if possible).

• scSetConfigValue - Added value 4: Enable or disable TrueType text in exported PDF files (if possible).

• 1475 A text element was displayed outside page area if the PDF file was opened as vector format.
• 1471 Some images were missing if a PDF file was opened as vector format.
• 1467 Text was missing in a DWF file due to clipping error.
• 1466 A signature image had wrong colors when PDF file was opened as vector.
• 1462 Missing alpha mask for an image when the PDF was opened as vector format.
• 1459 Missing filled items in DWFX file from customer.
• 1456 Some Arabic characters in a DWF file were not correct after conversion to PDF. The PDF exporter can now use TrueType to correct this issue.