AutoCAD Map 3D can export objects as an .

sdf file, which can then be connected as a feature source

in both AutoCAD Map, and Autodesk MapGuide. SDFs are a single file which contain both geometry

and attribute data.

To start off, select one of these polygons, then right-click and select Properties. In the Properties

Palette, you can see that this is a closed polyline object. When you scroll down, you can see the

Object Data that is attached to this polygon, which you will include in the export. Once you have

completed the export, you will connect to the resulting SDF and review some of the data that came

with that export. Close the Properties Palette.

At the command line, enter "MAPEXPORT." In the Export Location dialog, you're prompted to choose

where you want to create the export file. Navigate to the folder that you want to use. Set the File of

type to Autodesk SDF. For the Name, type "Parcels", and click OK.

In the Export dialog, in the Selection tab, click Select Manually, then click the Select Objects icon. In

the drawing screen, select a few of these parcels with a crossing window, and then press ENTER.

Back in the Export dialog, you can see how many objects were selected. Next, you need to set up the

target feature class, so click the Feature Class tab. Here, you can set up your object data to feature

class mapping. There are two options: to create a single class, or to create multiple classes. Be

aware that .sdf files support multiple classes within the same file. But for this export, you are only

exporting a single class, so leave this set to Create a single class from selected objects.

Not only does SDF support multiple classes, but it also supports multiple geometry types within each

class. Under the Geometry column, you can see that this is currently set to Point, Line, and Polygon.

For this export, you want to limit this to recognize the geometry as being polygons only, so expand

the drop-down and select Polygon.

Next, set up the attributes. Click Select Attributes, expand Object Data, and expand the Parcels

Object Data table. You could select any of the fields in the table individually, but for this exercise, you

want to export all of the data, so select the PARCELS table, and click OK.

Next, click the Options tab, and at the top you can see the coordinate system assigned to this

drawing. You could convert the exported geometry to another coordinate system, but for this lesson,
you will not convert the geometry.

The last thing you need to do is to select Treat closed polylines as polygons. And with all of that set,

click OK.

AutoCAD Map performs the export, and the command line reports the number of objects exported.
Next, connect to the .sdf file that you just created. Start a new drawing, and in the Map Task pane,

Map Explorer tab, click Data and then click Connect to Data. In the Data Connect palette, select Add

SDF Connection. For the Connection name, enter "Parcels", and click Browse for Source File. In the

folder that you exported this to, you can see the SDF that you exported. Select it, and click Open.

Once the Open file dialog closes, then you can click Connect in the Data Connect palette. Under Add

data to map, you can see the single feature class that you exported, and the coordinate system that

you used during that export. Click Add to map, and close the Data Connect palette.

In the Drawing Editor, you can see the parcels that you exported, and in the Display Manager is the

new feature layer.