DesignXML is the first phase of Autodesk’s comprehensive strategy for representing DWG drawing data in XML channels. XML is the lingua franca of data communication on the Internet, and DesignXML provides the ability to represent fully both graphical and nongraphical data using a published XML schema.

It can be considered as a “web aware” version of Autodesk’s DXF™, with the advantages of openness and widespread support. The definition of DesignXML (that is, how DWG entities are represented in XML) is published on the Web and is accessible to anyone. XML is easily parseable and searchable, allowing applications to quickly access needed information without having necessarily to move whole files around the network.

There are many tools that work with XML, and many programmers are familiar with XML. Hardware vendors, too, are developing XML-specific products—Intel, for example, has developed a series of XML accelerators that intelligently classify, route, and cache XML data streams.