Table of Contents
Summary
Here are important guidelines for architects, engineers, space managers and other CAD authors who maintain CAD files for your building portfolio.
Although the process of importing and using CAD files in Space Management is not complicated, there’s more to it than just throwing any CAD file into the application and then hoping for the best. Some preparations must be made beforehand.
Supported file formats and versions
File format | Versions | Notes |
|---|---|---|
DWG | AutoCAD 2018 and higher | Vendor specific |
DXF | AutoCAD 2018 and higher or from any other compatible CAD vendor | Vendor neutral |
SVG | Version 1.1 | Vendor neutral |
Minimum requirements
Each CAD file must have a minimum set of layers that contain information which are needed for space management.
Layer purpose | Mandatory? | How | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
Shapes for Spaces | YES, IN ALL CASES | Create a dedicated layer with closed shapes that represent the contour of each Space. Shapes can be
This layer will be used to represent Spaces on a Layout. | Free choice of layer name – must be mapped during import |
Shapes for Subspaces | YES, IF YOU WANT TO MANAGE SUBSPACES | Create a dedicated layer with closed shapes that represent the contour of each Subspace. Shapes can be
This layer will be used to represent Subspaces on a Layout. | Free choice of layer name – must be mapped during import |
Shapes for Construction | YES, IF YOU WANT TO SUBTRACT CONSTRUCTION AREAS | Create a dedicated layer with closed shapes that represent the contour of each construction area. For example:
This layer will be used to subtract the area of construction shapes from the actual Space areas. | Free choice of layer name – must be mapped during import |
Space Identifiers | NO, BUT HAVING THEM IS ESSENTIAL FOR AUTO-DETECTION | Create a dedicated layer with texts that represent the Space Names.
| Free choice of layer name – must be mapped during import |
Subspace Identifiers | NO, BUT HAVING THEM IS ESSENTIAL FOR AUTO-DETECTION | Create a dedicated layer with texts that represent the Subspace Names.
| Free choice of layer name – must be mapped during import |
Example
Best practices
Units and Scale
The Space Management version of April 2026 only supports metric units (meters, cm, mm,…).
Imperial units (inches, feet, …) may be supported in later versions.
Make sure all drawings are available in metric units so that space areas can be computed correctly.
The drawing scale is derived from the drawing during import preparation, but must always be crosschecked and adjusted if needed:
Model space / Paper space
Space Management ignores all paper space geometry.
Only entities in model space are taken into account.
After importing a drawing, you will not see the paper space layouts in the application.
Colors
The colors of layers and individual entities are inherited from the drawing. No color mapping or conversion takes place when importing in Space Management.
Drawings are visualized in Space Management on a white background. Therefore, it is advised to use dark colors and avoid yellow, cyan and other very light colors.
Space Management users are no architects, they benefit from seeing the floor plan in neutral colors (black, greyscales, etc).
Linetypes
Space Management has limited support for linetypes.
Simple linetypes with dashes and dots are supported; linetypes with special shapes are not.
Texts
Space Management has limited support for texts and fonts.
Simple TEXT and DTEXT entities are rendered properly when using ASCII text styles. Avoid using MTEXT entities and exotic fonts with non-ASCII characters (e.g. Chinese, Japanese, Korean etc) that are not in the standard text styles file (simplex.shx).
Blocks
Blocks are rendered normally in Space Management.
Nevertheless, blocks that represent “assets” (equipment) must never be scaled or mirrored.
Hatches
Space Management has limited support for hatch patterns.
Solid hatches and simple hatch patterns are rendered properly.
Avoid using exotic hatch patterns with special shapes.
Purge before use
As the last step before importing a CAD file in Space Management, always purge unused entities from the file. This purge action removes unused entities, drastically reduces the file size and improves the rendering performance.
Things to avoid
Drawing clutter
Most architectural drawings contain many layers with construction details, annotations, dimensions etc.
Example:
Importing such drawings in Space Management will technically work, but users will perceive them as ‘complicated’.
Spacewell recommends removing all clutter that is not relevant for space management, such as:
- Annotations
- Dimensions
- Balloons and most texts
- Title sheets and legends
- Layers that represent floor or ceiling grids
- Technical details
- etc
Example after removing some clutter:
Redundant details
Architectural drawings often contain details that are not relevant for space management, and are often unnoticed.
Example:
This drawing may look clean, however it’s not lightweight. When zooming in on the exterior wall, several technical details become visible such as the wall insulation and the window extrusion profiles:
Such redundant details will be imported and rendered properly, but they make the drawings heavy and slow when viewing and exploring in Space Management.
For performance reasons, Spacewell recommends removing unnecessary details whenever possible.
Another example of redundant details is in furniture, equipment and interior ornaments. For example, the plant in the lower left corner is an exploded block which contains 1750 entities that represent all its small leaves.
This example floor contained 28 of these plants, which is 49000 entities in total, only to show the plants…
After deleting them, the file size was reduced by 2 MB and considerable performance gains were observed.
Known limitations
File size
When importing a drawing, the maximum file size is 50 MB.
Disclaimer
The Space Management application has been tested rigorously using a variety of drawings. In most cases, the import is successful and rendering on screen gives satisfactory results.
Nevertheless, there is always a risk that some specific drawings fail during import or are not rendered correctly after import. In such cases, Spacewell can investigate the issue upon demand and give advice on how the CAD author can correct them in the drawing file.
Spacewell cannot be held accountable for such cases and does not have the obligation to adjust its software accordingly.