# File format parity

> **Last reviewed:** 2026-10-10 · **Last updated:** 2026-10-24 · **Change:** minor (EPS, EMF/WMF and legacy `.ai`: type with ruby keeps the reading (legacy `.ai`: as outlines); previously: PDF export: pattern fills are written as tiling patterns, #3849; previously: SVG: type written as outlines stacks its colour glyphs under their run's paint, as the canvas does; SVG keeps attributes in other applications' XML namespaces on their objects from import to export, the rest of #522; PDF import: a line's spacing is measured from the file's own glyph widths and kept within a hundredth of an em of where the file puts each glyph, so type opens as one run where it is placed; previously: PDF text opens where the file draws it, #722; PDF/X-1a and PDF/X-3 flattening keeps a CMYK document's inks where it rasterizes, #2160; EPS and `.ai` editing data: type keeps stacked art styles as a live appearance; point type frames without a matrix read; `editingData: "always"` for EPS; PDF invisible text, as a scanned page's recognized text is, opens as type with no fill or stroke and is written back as invisible text, #2675; DXF circular cubic paths export as native CIRCLE/ARC where stroke semantics permit (R13–2018 for weighted strokes; R12 weighted strokes remain POLYLINE) (#1299); non-circular curves stay SPLINE; scores and hours unchanged; an Illustrator 3 file without layers, as image editors export their paths, opens with its art on one layer, storytold/photocraft#6036; EPS editing data: legacy mesh corners, vector opacity masks and compound member paint retained; raster page comparison filters minification without relaxing limits; scores and hours unchanged; batch exporting, #1935; legacy `.ai` runs as PostScript with a prolog of its own, #868; legacy `.ai` of version 7 saved, with type as text, hidden objects and an artboard picker, and its type read, #868; PDF.R1: shared PDF reader with windowed content scanning and explicit incomplete-content errors; scores and estimates unchanged; PDF.W1: guarded shared PDF writer; output behavior, scores and estimates unchanged; later 2026-10-14 merges: SVG `:not()` selectors, #1557, stacked selectors, #1703, linked files, #1870; DXF VPORT, #1789; nesting caps, #1852; hostile PDF, `.ai`, EPS, Affinity and native data, #1862, #1863, #1871–#1873; failed saves, #1685, #1693, #1694; type in symbols after reopening, #1738; scores unchanged; verified PngSuite downloads, #1729; EPS stitched shadings, #1653; oversized images in WMF/EMF refused from the header, #1776; PDF name trees with shared nodes, #1781; native size limits for files read from memory, #1783; private temporary files on Unix, #1778; ruzstd 0.9.1, #1807; scores unchanged; SVG import: CSS transforms and the `font` shorthand, #1565, percentage lengths in symbols, #1596, Inkscape flowed text and pages, #1568, #1601, filter warnings, #1598; type on a path from PDF and `.ai`, #1585, #1586; ICC tag alignment in JPEG, TIFF and PSD, #1584; saves to folders that refuse the temporary file, #1620 in part; scores unchanged; TIFF is available in Export for Screens and Asset Export with shared format settings; scores and hours unchanged; compact native saves for documents with a lot of path data, #1492; PDF and EPS paste as vector art, #1499; `.ai` gradient stops listed upwards, #1530; SVG text on basic shapes, #1527; PDF soft masks drawn as images, #1551; Type 42 fonts in EPS, #1553; clips that only seem to cover the page, #1542; images too large to decode are reported, #1540; a `.ai` page's art past its artboard no longer lies over the page before it when read as its PDF part; grayscale TIFFs with an alpha channel or extra channels place and open, #1466 in part; a faded or masked fill keeps its stroke apart on PDF and `.ai` import, #1434; SVG knockout groups without masks, #1435; Affinity import: a text frame too short for its first line is made taller, #1423; `.ai` editing data: a compound path takes its last path's paint and keeps paths grouped inside it, #1410; a `.ai` whose PDF part is only text opens from it, #1387; PDF and `.ai` import keep overprint, #1388; `.ai` editing data: gradients with middle stops, #1390; type of objects with an appearance, hidden layers and later artboards, #1391; area type in a frame too short for the fallback font, #1392; `.ai` editing data: placed (linked) files read, #1264; gradient-filled shapes import as paths, #1304; white constant alpha soft masks, #1286 in part; DXF control-point SPLINE closure read, #1299 follow-up; `.ai` and PDF trim and bleed boxes as artboard and bleed, #1266; `.ai` gradient matrices, meshes and artboard names from the editing data; `.ai` art styles, clipping fills and compound looks from the editing data; `editingData: "always"` opens a `.ai` from its editing data; a `.ai` whose PDF part is only text opens from it, #1387; PDF and `.ai` import keep overprint, #1388; `.ai` editing data: gradients with middle stops, #1390; type of objects with an appearance, hidden layers and later artboards, #1391; area type in a frame too short for the fallback font, #1392; `.ai` editing data: placed (linked) files read, #1264; gradient-filled shapes import as paths, #1304; white constant alpha soft masks, #1286 in part; DXF control-point SPLINE closure read, #1299 follow-up; `.ai` and PDF trim and bleed boxes as artboard and bleed, #1266; `.ai` gradient matrices, meshes and artboard names from the editing data; `.ai` art styles, clipping fills and compound looks from the editing data; a `.ai` whose PDF part is only text opens from it, #1387; PDF and `.ai` import keep overprint, #1388; `.ai` editing data: gradients with middle stops, #1390; type of objects with an appearance, hidden layers and later artboards, #1391; area type in a frame too short for the fallback font, #1392; `.ai` editing data: placed (linked) files read, #1264; gradient-filled shapes import as paths, #1304; white constant alpha soft masks, #1286 in part; DXF control-point SPLINE closure read, #1299 follow-up; `.ai` and PDF trim and bleed boxes as artboard and bleed, #1266; `.ai` gradient matrices, meshes and artboard names from the editing data; a `.ai` whose PDF part is only text opens from it, #1387; PDF and `.ai` import keep overprint, #1388; `.ai` editing data: gradients with middle stops, #1390; type of objects with an appearance, hidden layers and later artboards, #1391; area type in a frame too short for the fallback font, #1392; `.ai` editing data: placed (linked) files read, #1264; gradient-filled shapes import as paths, #1304; white constant alpha soft masks, #1286 in part; DXF control-point SPLINE closure read, #1299 follow-up; `.ai` and PDF trim and bleed boxes as artboard and bleed, #1266; SVG knockout groups of opaque art without masks; a `.ai` whose PDF part is only text opens from it, #1387; PDF and `.ai` import keep overprint, #1388; `.ai` editing data: gradients with middle stops, #1390; type of objects with an appearance, hidden layers and later artboards, #1391; area type in a frame too short for the fallback font, #1392; `.ai` editing data: placed (linked) files read, #1264; gradient-filled shapes import as paths, #1304; white constant alpha soft masks, #1286 in part; DXF control-point SPLINE closure read, #1299 follow-up; `.ai` and PDF trim and bleed boxes as artboard and bleed, #1266; `.ai` keeps its RGB numbers; PDF import keeps a stroke apart from a fill masked or faded by its group) · **Target:** Adobe Illustrator 2026 (30.x)

Every format Illustrator opens, places, saves or exports, against VectorCraft's format table (`FORMATS`,
`OPEN_EXTS`, `PLACE_EXTS` in `crates/engine/src/cmd/fileio/mod.rs`). Illustrator's list comes from its public
documentation (helpx "file formats" and Save/Export pages), not from its installed bundle: the clean-room rule
forbids reading the install. Part of [target-app-parity.md](target-app-parity.md).

**Fidelity** is estimated unless a test is named. Test sources: unit and property tests per crate
(`crates/svg/tests`, `crates/pdf/tests`, `crates/format/tests/prop_format.rs`), import fuzzing
(`crates/engine/tests/import_fuzz.rs`), the Affinity corpus (`cargo xtask corpus --affinity`, 51 pinned public
files, CI job `affinity-corpus.yml`). There is **no real-world Illustrator corpus**: test inputs are written
from the public specifications, and users' own `.ai` files are used locally only.

## Summary

| | Illustrator | VectorCraft | Notes |
|---|---:|---:|---|
| Formats opened or placed | ~30 | 25 | missing: FreeHand, CorelDRAW, DWG, HEIC/HEIF, JPEG 2000, PICT, PCX, Pixar, Word `.doc`, PS |
| Formats saved (Save As) | 6 (AI, AIT, PDF, EPS, SVG, SVGZ) | 6 + native | `.ai` written PDF-compatible (no Illustrator editing data) or as legacy version 7 (layers and groups, one artboard per file) |
| Formats exported | ~16 | 17 | missing: DWG, 3D (OBJ/USDA/glTF); extra: GIF/PNG-8 palette export, DXF up to 2018, layered PSD |
| **Overall (weighted by use)** | | **~75%** | `.ai` and PDF dominate the weighting |

EPS editing-data follow-up (2026-10-16): both mesh-corner layouts (with and without opacity)
read in RGB, CMYK and gray. Vector opacity-mask art and its Clip, Invert, Disabled and Linked
flags are retained. Winding-declared legacy compound member groups keep their shared paint even
when followed by `9 () XW`. Fully rasterized print pages are compared using the same filtered
minification for both representations; the existing error thresholds and ordinary vector-page
checks remain. Synthetic regressions reject truncated meshes, non-unit rational weights,
unbalanced mask art, unknown mask operators, missing artwork and wrong page framing. Real
user files remain local; no SVG replacement or tracing is used. Small rendering differences
continue to produce import warnings.

## The main format: `.ai`

The format that decides beta. Illustrator's `.ai` is a PDF (or, for old files, PostScript) plus Illustrator's
private editing data. VectorCraft:

- **Reads** the PDF page (vectors, text, images, colour, transparency, layers via optional content) and the
  *structure* of the editing data (below). Opens Illustrator EPS the same way through its own PostScript
  Level 3 interpreter. A `.ai` in PostScript form (versions 3 to 8, and what Rhino and other CAD apps
  write) is its own editing data: it opens through the layers its program has, compared with its page
  when the program runs, from the layers alone when it names its prolog without including it (#1027), and with its art on one
  layer when it has no layers (Illustrator 3, and image editors' exported paths: storytold/photocraft#6036).
  RGB in the PDF page's `ICCBased` spaces keeps the file's numbers in a `.ai` (the `uncalibrated_rgb`
  import option, on for editor documents, off for PDFs), so `.ai` files tagged with a non-sRGB RGB profile
  open with different, unconverted RGB colours than before.
  A PDF-compatible `.ai` opens on its PDF part's trim boxes (its artboards), the bleed boxes round them
  becoming the document's bleed, so art in the bleed shows outside the artboard, within the bleed guide (#1266).
  A PDF saved with its editing data (`AIPDFPrivateData`) opens the same way.
- **Writes** a PDF-compatible `.ai` (Save As › `ai`): Illustrator opens it as plain art. It never writes
  Illustrator's private editing data, which is undocumented.
- **Writes** a legacy `.ai` of version 7 (Save As › `ai` › Version: Legacy (version 7), `aiVersion: "7"`): the
  PostScript form, from the published *Adobe Illustrator File Format Specification* version 7.0
  ([PRONOM fmt/423](https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/PRONOM/fmt/423)), which apps reading `.ai` open with its
  structure (#868). It keeps layers (names, order, visibility, lock), groups, compound paths, clipping groups,
  solid colours, linear and radial gradients and RGB images. The format has one artboard: each artboard chosen in
  the options dialog's artboard picker (thumbnails to check, default all) is a file of its own,
  `{name}-{artboard}.ai` when there are several. It has no transparency: objects are written opaque, and images
  with see-through pixels, opacity or a blending mode are flattened (an opaque image of themselves and the art
  under them, clipped to where they show; that art stays) or omitted (Transparent Images,
  `transparentImages: "flatten"|"omit"`). Type is written as editable text objects (point type, area type and type
  on a path, with their fonts' PostScript names, sizes, colours, alignment, indents, leading, tracking and
  scaling), which the reading app sets in those fonts; characters outside Windows-1252, vertical type, ruby, inline
  graphics and gradient or pattern fills make that type outlines, and Text: Outlines (`outlineText: true`) writes
  all type as outlines. The format can hide only layers: hidden objects go to a hidden layer of their own above
  their layer, are omitted, or are made visible (Hidden Objects, `hiddenObjects: "layer"|"omit"|"visible"`).
  Sublayers become groups; appearances, effects and brushes are expanded; object names are left out; layer
  names, spot color and gradient names and the title are written in Windows-1252, with `?` for characters outside
  it (two spot colors or two gradients whose names become the same are numbered).
  The file is also a PostScript program that runs: its prolog, a procedure set of VectorCraft's own written from
  the PostScript Language Reference, gives the format's operators their meaning, so it prints and previews
  (gradients filled with their first stop's colour, type left to the apps that read the format). VectorCraft
  opens a file with that prolog from its program, as the format.
- **Known failures in users' files:** layer structure flattened or multiplied (#951: 109 layers instead of
  14; #868: round trip with Illustrator 2018 loses layers and groups), guides and non-printing construction
  lines lost (#779), some files 4× slower to open since the editing data is read whole (#758), live effects,
  brushes and symbols come in as their drawn look (#637; pattern fills are read since #1025); legacy `.ai`
  without the prolog opens since #1027, its legacy type (`To` … `TO`) since #868.
- Estimate: **~65%** for real exchange with Illustrator users (open: ~75%; save: PDF-compatible, or legacy
  version 7 with layers and groups; not yet tested by users who hand files back).
  Closing the open-side issues: 10–20 h with users' files.

### Illustrator's private editing data

the app's own editing copy of a file (an EPS after its `%%EOF`, a `.ai`'s `AIPrivateData` streams, a PDF's `AIPDFPrivateData` streams when it was saved with the editing data (#868), Zstandard or zlib, the EPS's in ASCII85) is not documented as a whole. VectorCraft reads its structure: layers and sublayers (names, order, visibility, lock, printing, preview, dimming, colour), groups as they were nested, compound paths (painted by their last path, or the last painted one, with the paths of groups inside them kept as their paths: #1410), clipping groups and layer clipping, object names, hidden and locked objects, fills and strokes (grey, CMYK, RGB, named and spot colours, spot colours defined in Lab with their Lab values (#1032), global process colours as global swatches at their tint), linear and radial gradients, pattern fills with their patterns as pattern swatches (#1025), opacity, blend modes, isolation and knockout, embedded images where their matrix puts them, rotated ones too (#2269), with their alpha channel (CMYK images keep their ink amounts, as they do when a `.ai` opens from its PDF part, and an alpha channel that hides part of a CMYK image becomes a grayscale opacity mask), placed (linked) files as linked images in their place, each showing the low-resolution preview the file keeps of it until its file is found or relinked in the Links panel (#1264), guides, and every artboard where it is. A gradient with stops in the middle runs its whole ramp across its shape, and a gradient object does not pass its fill to the next path (#1390). An object whose art style is one fill and one stroke at most (solid colours, its own gradient, a variable-width profile) with an Outer Glow or Drop Shadow comes in as itself with them; one with more, other effects, a brush or dashes aligned to corners comes in as its drawn look (a group named after it). Type keeps its art style as a live appearance whatever its stack, so it can be retyped: each fill and stroke of the style's stack (solid colours, gradients and pattern fills, placed as the drawn look places them) with its own opacity, blend mode and effects, the effects on the whole object, and where the characters paint among them; the effects read are Warp, Offset Path, Transform (with copies), Drop Shadow, Outer Glow, Feather, Gaussian Blur and Bas Relief (its settings at their defaults), and a style with others keeps the type's drawn look. The page's drawing of such a style isn't held to look like VectorCraft's where its drawn look lay. Gradients take their matrix (`Xm`, radials and skewed ones too), focal point and the order of stops sharing a ramp point; gradient meshes, a clipping path's own fill and the artboards' names are read too. `editingData: "always"` (`convert --editing-data`) opens a `.ai` or an Illustrator EPS from its editing data even where it draws differently from its page, which can be older, with a note. Type is made from the file's text document, whole and editable, shown or not: point type (its frame's matrix, which newer files leave out when it is neither turned nor scaled, read as none), area type (a story in several frames as threaded type) and type on a path, with its characters, fonts, size, leading, tracking, scaling, baseline shift, fill and stroke (grey, RGB or CMYK), alignment, indents and paragraph spacing; the page's drawing of it (often in pieces) is left out. Where the text document can't say (a frame of another kind, or a document that doesn't agree with the page), type that shows comes from the page into its text object's place (no group around it), and hidden type is left out with a note. Kerning, underline and the other character and paragraph options aren't read yet. A `.ai` saved without PDF compatibility (a placeholder page) opens from its editing data alone, its point type, area type and type on a path made from the text document. A `.ai` whose PDF part shows only text isn't taken for that placeholder when its page states an art, trim or bleed box: it opens from its editing data alone where that reads, else from its PDF part (#1387). Text objects with an appearance keep their own text and frame, type of hidden layers stays hidden, and type on later artboards lands on its text objects (#1391); area type whose frame is too short for a line of the fallback font shows its first line (the frame is made taller, with a warning in the open result) (#1392). Symbols, pattern fills whose pattern it can't read, placed files the data keeps no preview of and anything else it doesn't read make the file come in as its page (on a layer that doesn't show, they are left out of that layer), with a warning saying what. The layers' art is also compared with the page (by lightness, so colours written as their CMYK equivalents compare alike, and by whether a pixel is inked at all); the page is used when they differ by more than 5%, where one draws an object the other doesn't (away from type, whose lines may be laid out afresh), and when an EPS whose page is its art's box has art printed outside it (#735). An EPS whose page is its art's box keeps that page when it comes in through its layers, not the editing data's artboard, and a text object counts as drawn by the page by its colours, not only its lightness, so a red stroke stacked over a dark red one stays (#1102). `textAs: "outlines"` opens a `.ai` whose type shows from its PDF part, which has the outlines; `editingData: false` opens any of them as its page or PDF part only, for print pipelines (#735). A file whose import left something out (hidden text, art or layers) is never written over by an export or Save As to its own path unless `acknowledgeLoss: true` (`convert --replace-lossy`), so the original keeps what the document lacks. Where a `.ai` can't be read that way (or its layers are turned off in the import options), we read its PDF-compatible part, so Illustrator-only live objects arrive as appearance, and plain groups arrive ungrouped: that part draws each object on its own and marks only layers, clipping groups and groups with opacity, blending or a mask (those come back). Art outside the artboards isn't in that part at all (Illustrator's PDF part leaves it out), so it doesn't open; the import says so in a note (#472). Its pages still go where the editing data puts the artboards (a grid stays a grid), with the art on each, when it has as many artboards as pages, of the same sizes (#1068). Its pages are laid out so that art one of them draws past its artboard (notes beside a design, which the part doesn't clip) doesn't lie over the page before it in the row, where it was taken for that page's art: the check against the editing data then found art its layers don't have there and opened the file as its PDF part, without the art outside the artboards. That part also has no paragraphs: area type is written line by line, and comes back as area type only where its font is installed and lays the lines out with the same breaks, else as a point type object per line (#508). Art off the page that a PDF does draw opens on the pasteboard.

## Format by format

| Format | Illustrator | Ours: open/place | Ours: save/export | Fidelity and tests |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| VectorCraft `.vectorcraft` / `.vctemplate` | — | yes | yes | lossless JSON, versioned, save down to v1; property-tested round trips (`format/tests/prop_format.rs`); documents with a lot of path data are written as compact JSON, about a fifth of the size (#1492); a save falls back to a plain fsync and to writing elsewhere and copying in when the folder refuses the usual steps (#1625, #1649, part of #1620; not confirmed on a real network share); the size limits on embedded data also apply to files read from memory (#1783), and saving over a private file on Unix leaves no readable temporary copy beside it (#1778) |
| Illustrator template `.ait` | open, save | yes | PDF-compatible only, from Save as Template (`.vctemplate` stays its default) | New from Template opens a saved `.ait` untitled with its layers and art (`tests_pdfedit.rs`) |
| Illustrator `.ai` | open, save | yes (PDF-compatible + editing-data structure, File Info) | PDF-compatible, or legacy version 7 (layers and groups) | see above; no real-file corpus |
| PDF | open, place, save | yes (layers, masks, editable text, security, overprint, File Info from the XMP packet and the document information dictionary; Crop To › Trim takes the bleed box as the document's bleed) | yes (presets, PDF/X-1a/3/4, layers, marks and bleed, ICC, fast web view, 1.3+) | fuzzed import; shared guarded writer and windowed reader ([pdf-backend.md](pdf-backend.md)), metadata, incomplete-content and dependency-source regressions; PDF text opens where the file draws it, glyph by glyph (#722: kerning or none, spacing per character, text rise as baseline shift, vertical writing, justified text boxes); alpha soft masks drawn as images import with the mask (#1551); a clip only counts as covering the page when its shape does (#1542); a PDF another app copied pastes as editable vector art (#1499); letter-spaced type on a path keeps its length and its glyph-by-glyph stroke comes in as one text object (#1586, #1585); a crafted name tree with shared nodes no longer takes exponential time on open (#1781); invisible text (rendering mode 3: a scanned page's recognized text) opens as type with no fill or stroke and saves back as invisible, searchable text (#2675); PDF/X-1a and X-3 flattening in a CMYK document keeps CMYK inks where it rasterizes (#2160) |
| EPS | open, place, save | yes (own PostScript L3 interpreter, Illustrator EPS editing data structure) | yes (L2/L3, TIFF previews) | CID-keyed CJK type not read; #505; images encoded with `CCITTFaxDecode` (ITU-T T.4 Group 3 and T.6 Group 4, with `K`, `Columns`, `Rows`, `EndOfBlock`, `EndOfLine`, `EncodedByteAlign` and `BlackIs1`) draw, and damaged data keeps the rows decoded before its first damaged row; Type 42 (TrueType) fonts set type at its size (#1553); a clip only counts as covering the page when its shape does (#1542); an EPS another app copied pastes as editable vector art (`clipboard.importEps`, #1499); a stitched shading keeps its hard colour changes on import (#1654); CMYK images, CMYK JPEGs included, keep their ink amounts on import, as from PDF, and the pixels a `MaskColor` or `ImageType 3` mask hides become a grayscale opacity mask; ruzstd 0.9.1 for compressed editing data (#1807, RUSTSEC-2026-0344) |
| PostScript `.ps` | open, place | yes (the EPS reader reads its first page; `.epsf` files open and place as EPS) | via Print to PostScript | `tests_epsimport.rs` |
| SVG / SVGZ | open, place, save | yes | yes (SVG Options, Preserve Editing, symbols, filters, rich text) | strongest format; tests in `crates/svg/tests`; text on a path follows basic shapes as their SVG 2 equivalent paths (#1527); CSS transforms and the `font` shorthand (#1565), percentage lengths in symbols (#1596), Inkscape flowed text as area type (#1568) and Inkscape pages as artboards (#1601) import; an unsupported filter is named in its warning (#1598); an artboard exported on its own (Export As with Use Artboards, Export for Screens, Asset Export) has the artboard's name as `<title>`, Save the document's (#3544); attributes in other applications' XML namespaces (`plotter:pen="2"`) kept on their objects from import to export, as `data-*` attributes are (`crates/svg/tests/it/foreign_attributes.rs`) |
| DXF | open, export | yes | yes (R12–2018) | R13–2018 closed SPLINE flags and control-point closure on import verified (#1299); circular cubic paths export as native CIRCLE/ARC where stroke semantics permit; R12 weighted strokes remain POLYLINE while non-circular curves keep the existing fallback (`crates/cad/src/tests.rs`); [Autodesk group 70](https://help.autodesk.com/cloudhelp/2024/ENU/AutoCAD-DXF/files/GUID-E1F884F8-AA90-4864-A215-3182D47A9C74.htm). CNC preset and VCarve QA remain open |
| DWG | open, export | no | no | no open spec; DXF instead |
| EMF / WMF | open, export | yes | yes | an oversized embedded PNG or JPEG is refused from its header, before any pixels are decoded (#1776) |
| PSD | open, place, export | yes (merged image, every mode and depth) | yes (layered, max editability) | placing as layers (Photoshop Import Options) missing; the embedded ICC profile's tags are 4-byte aligned (#1584) |
| PSB | open | yes (merged image) | no | |
| PNG / JPEG / GIF / BMP / TIFF / Targa | open, place, export | yes (Targa: `.tga`, `.vda`, `.icb` and `.vst`, raw or run-length encoded, with a 16-bit file's one-bit alpha) | yes; TIFF is also selectable in Export for Screens and Asset Export with its existing options | Targa: `tests_tiffbmp.rs`, `tests_links.rs`; TIFF: grayscale with an alpha channel or other extra channels reads (#1466 in part), and so do files that store each channel as its own plane (PlanarConfiguration 2), CMYK ones with their ink amounts, and 1-bit files compressed with CCITT Group 3 (Compression 2 and 3, one- and two-dimensional rows); the ICC profiles embedded in JPEG and TIFF have 4-byte aligned tags (#1584); PNG export marks its colours as sRGB (`embedIcc`, an `sRGB` chunk; no ICC profile is embedded, #2221) |
| WebP | export (Export for Screens) | yes | yes (lossless only; lossy written lossless with a warning) | |
| HEIC / HEIF | open, place | no | no | |
| JPEG 2000 | open, place | no | no | |
| PICT, PCX, Pixar PXR | open, place (legacy) | no | no | rarely used |
| FreeHand `.fh*` | open (legacy) | no | no | |
| CorelDRAW `.cdr` | open | no | no | |
| Text `.txt` | place, export | place (Text Import Options) | yes | |
| RTF `.rtf` | place | place (area type with fonts, size, bold, italic, underline, strikethrough, caps, superscript and subscript, color, alignment, indents and paragraph spacing) | no | `tests_textimport.rs`, `place/rtf.rs`; fuzzed (`text_import_fuzz.rs`); `\'hh` bytes read as Windows-1252 or Mac Roman only |
| Word `.docx` | place | place (area type with the document's styles and its fonts, size, bold, italic, underline, strikethrough, caps, superscript and subscript, color, alignment, indents and paragraph spacing) | no | `tests_textimport.rs`, `place/docx.rs`; fuzzed (`text_import_fuzz.rs`); list numbers, pictures and text boxes are left out |
| Word `.doc` | place | no | no | |
| CSS | export (CSS Properties) | — | yes | |
| OBJ / USDA / glTF | 3D export | — | no | needs 3D (gap G3) |
| Affinity `.af`, `.afdesign`, `.afpub` | no | yes (beyond Illustrator) | no (#665) | 51 pinned files, [affinity-validation.md](affinity-validation.md) |
| Clipboard: PDF, SVG, PNG, EMF, text | yes | yes | yes | copied files paste as art |

## PDF editable imports

- [x] Place from bytes or unlinked paths, and PDF clipboard paste, keep the selected page's live text. Synthetic two-page regressions in `crates/engine/src/cmd/fileio/tests_pdffidelity.rs` cover both sources, page selection and explicit outlines. The single-page importer honors the same text choice as Open; existing PDF fallback rules are unchanged.

## Corpus download integrity

- [x] PngSuite opt-in downloads are pinned, SHA-256 verified and bounded before publication (#1729); no archive extraction. This secures fixture acquisition and does not raise format-fidelity scores.

## Revision history

| Date | Change | Summary |
|---|---|---|
| 2026-10-24 | minor | EPS, EMF/WMF and legacy `.ai`: type with ruby (ふりがな) is written with the reading's glyphs where the canvas draws them (they were dropped); legacy `.ai` writes such type as outlines, since a text object can't hold ruby. Tests `eps::tests::ruby_is_written_with_its_type`, `tests_legacy_ai::type_with_ruby_is_outlines_with_the_reading`, `metafile::tests::ruby_is_written_with_its_type`; scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-24 | minor | `.ai` import: an image larger than the editing data's reader takes (2^25 pixels, a halftone texture at print resolution) no longer leaves its layer blank: the file comes in as its PDF part, which reads larger images, with a note saying why (#1479). Own-fixture test; scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-24 | minor | PDF export: a pattern fill or stroke is written as a PDF tiling pattern (ISO 32000-1, 8.7.3.1) of one period of the tiling, as the canvas repeats it, so grid, brick and hex tilings and overlapping tiles keep their look in a few kilobytes, and PDF import reads it back as one object with a pattern swatch instead of hundreds of tile paths (#3849). Patterns nested more than four deep, or with tiles beyond a billion points, are still written as their tiles, now with a warning. Tests: the issue's hatch round trip, a brick tiling read back against the canvas, the nesting warning; scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-23 | minor | SVG: type written as outlines stacks each run's colour glyphs (bitmap images, COLR and SVG art) under the run's paint, as the canvas does, so a plain character set over a colour one stays on top; scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-23 | minor | PDF import: a line's spacing is measured from the file's own glyph widths, so type in a font the file doesn't carry, drawn with an installed font whose advances its widths round off (Helvetica on macOS: 2048 units an em), keeps one tracking value on its letters instead of a run per character (#722 follow-up); test with built-in Inter, independent of the fonts installed; scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-23 | minor | SVG: attributes in other applications' XML namespaces (`plotter:pen="2"` with `xmlns:plotter`) are kept on the objects and layers they belong to, saved with them in `.vectorcraft` files and written back on export, each namespace declared once on the root under the file's prefix where it is free. SVG's, XLink's, XML's, Inkscape's and Sodipodi's own aside; at most 64 per object of at most 64 KiB each, with a warning for what is left out (the rest of #522). Scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-23 | minor | PDF import: a line's spacing is measured from the file's own glyph widths, so type in a font the file doesn't carry, drawn with an installed font whose advances its widths round off (Helvetica on macOS: 2048 units an em), keeps one tracking value on its letters instead of a run per character (#722 follow-up); where the widths are a little off the font's advances (up to the 1% that still counts as the same font) and the differences add up along a line, each stretch of the line takes their share after every character, so its glyphs stay within a hundredth of an em of the file's in a run per stretch (one on ordinary text), instead of a run per character, untracked type points off, or a line-wide fit tenths of a point off; tests with built-in Inter and embedded Source Sans 3, independent of the fonts installed; scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-22 | minor | EPS import: a CR LF ending after `readline` counts as one line ending (PostScript Language Reference §3.8), so counted metadata that follows it is no longer shifted by a byte and the editable vectors import instead of the preview; scores and estimates unchanged. |
| 2026-10-21 | minor | PDF export: flattening for PDF/X-1a and PDF/X-3 in a CMYK document draws the areas it rasterizes as ink amounts (a CMYK image), so a CMYK colour under an image with see-through pixels keeps its numbers, K included, instead of going through RGB and back (#2160); own-fixture test; scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-21 | minor | EPS and `.ai` editing data: type with an art style of several fills or strokes, effects on a fill (Offset Path, Transform with copies, Drop Shadow, Gaussian Blur, Bas Relief), pattern and gradient fills, per-fill blend modes and a Warp comes in as type with that live appearance instead of its drawn look (outlines), the style read as a tree of filters; other objects keep the rule for plain styles. Point type whose frame has no matrix (written so by newer files) is read; such stories were left out. Where a styled object's drawn look lay, the page isn't held to look like VectorCraft's drawing of the style. `editingData: "always"` also opens an Illustrator EPS from its editing data. Own-fixture tests; a user's file used locally only; scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-18 | minor | PDF import: invisible text (rendering mode 3, which carries a scanned page's recognized text) opens as type with no fill or stroke instead of being dropped without a word; when it can't be type (text opened as outlines, Type 3 fonts) it is left out with a warning. PDF export writes characters with no fill or stroke as invisible text in rendering mode 3, so a scanned PDF opened and saved keeps its searchable text, in PDF/X-1a and PDF/A too (#2675); own-fixture tests; scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-18 | minor | DXF circular cubic paths export as native CIRCLE/ARC where stroke semantics permit (R13–2018 for weighted strokes; R12 weighted strokes remain POLYLINE); R12 stroked circles/arcs retain their POLYLINE width, and ClosePath geometry with an implicit closing chord is not promoted to CIRCLE (#1299); scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-17 | minor | PDF import: text opens where the file draws it (#722): the font's kerning or none as the file followed it, word and character spacing and `TJ` adjustments kept per character as tracking, text rise as baseline shift in its line, vertical glyphs narrower than an em centred on their column, justified text boxes back as area type; fixtures written from ISO 32000-1 §9; scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-17 | minor | PDF Place and clipboard paste preserve live text; explicit outlines remain supported on Place. Synthetic regressions; scores and hours unchanged. |
| 2026-10-16 | minor | An Illustrator 3 file without prolog or layers (an image editor's exported paths) opens with its art on one layer instead of being refused (storytold/photocraft#6036); scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-16 | minor | EPS editing data: legacy mesh corners, vector opacity masks and compound member paint retained; raster page comparison filters minification without relaxing limits; scores and hours unchanged. Synthetic EPS/parser/minification regressions; user EPS/SVG/JPG kept local. |
| 2026-10-16 | minor | Batch exporting in Export for Screens (#1935): a file name pattern (document and item names, a counter, the date), folders per format, item or both, Layers and Selection tabs with thumbnails, EPS, AI and VectorCraft rows, a PDF row with printer's marks, and export presets (built-in Logo Package and Print-Ready PDF, saved ones); scores and hours unchanged (estimated) |
| 2026-10-16 | minor | `.ai` editing data: a rotated embedded image lands where its raster matrix puts it, not turned 180° around its corner; the legacy version 7 writer and its prolog write and draw rotated images with the same matrix (#2269). Scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-14 | minor | Legacy `.ai` of version 7 runs as a PostScript program: its prolog is a procedure set of VectorCraft's own that gives each operator the writer uses its meaning (paths, colours, compound paths, clipping groups, layers that don't print, images; gradients flat, type not set), and the page trailer's `annotatepage` (§3 of the specification) marks nothing; every file the writer's tests write is run through VectorCraft's PostScript reader and must draw what the document it was written from draws (#868) |
| 2026-10-14 | minor | SVG import: `:not()` selectors (#1799, #1557), stacked descendant selectors over deep nesting no longer stall (#1834, #1703), linked files within the automation roots again (#1870); DXF export writes the VPORT view direction once (#1789); nesting capped at 32 objects with self-using symbols and patterns opened without the offending instance (#1852); deep and self-referencing PDF and `.ai` data (#1871), decompression bombs (#1873), self-drawing brushes (#1872), hostile EPS, Affinity and native data (#1863) and huge ids (#1862) handled; a failed save is reported in a dialog and the old file is kept (#1865, #1685, #1693, #1694); type inside symbols gets its layout bounds back on opening a native file (#1833, #1738). Scores unchanged (estimated) |
| 2026-10-13 | minor | Pinned PngSuite HTTPS files verified by SHA-256 before publication; bounded downloads replace archive extraction (#1729). Scores and hours unchanged. |
| 2026-10-14 | minor | EPS import: a stitched shading keeps its hard colour changes (#1654, #1653); WMF/EMF import refuses an oversized embedded PNG or JPEG from its header, before any pixels are decoded (#1776); PDF open no longer takes exponential time on a crafted name tree with shared nodes when it looks for the editing data (#1781); The size limits on a native file's embedded data also apply to files read from memory, not only streamed ones (#1783); Saving over a private file on Unix no longer leaves a readable temporary copy beside it while the file is written (#1778); An Export for Screens suffix can no longer place files outside the export folder (#1777); Package refuses a folder where it would overwrite the open document or one of its linked files (#1786); ruzstd 0.9.1 fixes a decompression bomb (RUSTSEC-2026-0344) reachable from EPS/`.ai` and Affinity import (#1807); File Info dates are stamped only after a save succeeds, so a failed save no longer changes them (#1774); Linked files that change during a drag are updated after the drag instead of being missed (#1773); scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-13 | minor | SVGs that move objects with a CSS transform (`translate(100px, 0)`, `rotate(45deg)`) or style type with the `font` shorthand import as drawn (#1565); SVG symbols whose shapes use percentage lengths import at the size and place they are drawn, the percentages being of the symbol's `viewBox` (#1596); Inkscape's flowed text (`flowRoot`) opens as area type in its rectangle, a paragraph per `flowPara`, instead of being dropped, and a region that can't be read is left out with a warning (#1569, fixes #1568); The warning for an unsupported SVG filter names the filter, its primitives and the object, and says the object is drawn without it (#1599, fixes #1598); The pages of an Inkscape multi-page SVG become artboards, named by their labels (#1603, fixes #1601); SVG export with CSS classes or style entities stays fast in documents with many distinct styles (#1567); PDF and `.ai` import: evenly letter-spaced or tightened type on a path keeps its length along the path instead of closing up to the font's advances (#1586), and type on a path whose stroke is written glyph by glyph comes in as one text object with its stroke, not one object per glyph (#1585); The ICC profiles embedded in JPEG, TIFF and PSD exports have every tag on a 4-byte boundary (ICC.1 §7.1.2), so strict readers accept them (#1589, fixes #1584); GIF, PNG-8 and other indexed exports find each pixel's palette colour through an index instead of a scan, with identical output (#1576); Saving to a network drive on macOS falls back to a plain fsync when the share refuses a full flush (#1625, part of #1620; not confirmed on a real share), and a save still succeeds when a folder refuses the temporary file, the rename over the document or copying permissions: the content is written elsewhere first and copied in, and a failed copy keeps the temporary file and names it (#1649, part of #1620); A document opened by a relative path finds its relatively linked images, and `vectorcraft-cli convert` lists what reading the input left out as `importWarnings` (#1606, fixes #1604); A zero-length subpath draws its round cap as a dot and its projecting cap as a square, so dots in imported `.ai` and SVG files show (#1619, fixes #1613); scores unchanged (estimated) |
| 2026-10-13 | minor | PDF.R1: editable PDF import uses the shared pinned reader; layer and overprint scans preserve state across content windows and reject known incomplete input. Synthetic streaming, decoder-limit and dependency-source regressions added; scores and hours unchanged. |
| 2026-10-13 | minor | PDF.W1: PDF export and print composition use the shared guarded writer; drawing, colour policy and editable import stay app-owned. Metadata regression coverage and immutable dependency checks added; scores and hours unchanged. |
| 2026-10-13 | minor | Native documents with a lot of path data (traced or generated art, in layers, symbols or patterns) are saved as compact JSON, about a fifth of the size; small documents stay pretty-printed (#1492); Paste takes a PDF or EPS another app copied as editable vector art: from the macOS pasteboard (with SVG), EPS on Windows beside PDF, and `.eps` files copied in a file manager, with the new command `clipboard.importEps` (#1538, fixes #1499); Opening or placing a file with an image too large to decode says so, and the Links panel shows it on the row (#1540, part of #1479); a multi-artboard `.ai` with notes beside its artboards opens from its editing data, a page's art past its artboard no longer lying over the page before it (#1528); a `.ai` gradient whose stops are listed upwards keeps each midpoint on the stop that starts its part of the ramp (#1530); SVG text on a path follows basic shapes (circle, ellipse, rect, line, polyline, polygon) as their SVG 2 equivalent paths (#1531, fixes #1527); PDFs whose alpha soft masks are drawn as images import with the mask instead of empty art (#1551); EPS and PostScript type set in Type 42 (TrueType) fonts imports at its size instead of 1000 times too large (#1553); PDF and EPS import keep a clipping path whose bounding box covers the page but whose shape doesn't (#1544, fixes #1542) (the `.ai` row for #1528 was written by that PR); scores unchanged (estimated) |
| 2026-10-13 | minor | `.ai` read as its PDF part: a page whose art reaches past its artboard to the left (notes beside a design) moves right in the row until that art clears the page before it, so it is no longer taken for that page's art; a multi-artboard `.ai` with such notes opened as its PDF part ("the art on them differs from the page's"), without the art outside its artboards, and now opens from its editing data |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | Legacy `.ai` of version 7 (Save As › `ai` › Version: Legacy (version 7), #868): written from the published specification, keeping layers, groups, compound paths, clipping groups, gradients and images, one artboard per file chosen in an artboard picker; type as editable text objects (point, area and on a path, fonts by PostScript name, Windows-1252), or outlines (Text: Outlines); hidden objects, which the format can't hide, in a hidden layer of their own, omitted or made visible (Hidden Objects); images with see-through pixels flattened with the art under them or omitted (Transparent Images). The `.ai` reader reads legacy type (`To` … `TO`) and `Ar`. `vectorcraft-cli convert` takes `--ai-version 7`, `--hidden-objects` and `--transparent-images`; scores unchanged (estimated) |
| 2026-10-13 | minor | TIFF: grayscale files with an alpha channel or other extra channels place, relink and open, read as CMYK files with alpha already were (8 and 16 bits, either polarity; #1489, part of #1466); the rows for #1434 (strokes kept apart from a faded or masked fill, a `.ai`'s RGB numbers) and #1435 (SVG knockout groups without masks, `--decimals`) were written by those PRs; scores unchanged (estimated) |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | TIFF is available in Export for Screens and Asset Export with shared format settings; scores and hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | Affinity import: a text frame too short for its first line (a 64 pt title in a 54 pt frame) is made taller from its top, with a warning in the open result, instead of showing nothing (#1423), as `.ai` area type is (#1392); the spacing Affinity itself fits the line with isn't read; scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | `.ai` editing data: a compound path takes the paint, opacity, blend mode and fill rule of its last path (the last painted one when that has none), so gradient-filled compound paths no longer come in black, and paths grouped inside a compound path stay its paths (#1426, fixes #1410); hand-written editing data test; scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | `editingData: "always"` (`convert --editing-data`) opens a `.ai` from its editing data even where it draws differently from its page, which can be older, with a note |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | `.ai` editing data: an art style of one fill and one stroke (variable widths too) with an Outer Glow or Drop Shadow comes in as the object's own appearance; a clipping path's own fill paints under what it clips; a compound path holding its drawn look paints that look's paths apart; a group's own state keeps the current transparency |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | `.ai` editing data: gradients take their matrix (`Xm`, radials and skew too), focal point and the order of stops sharing a ramp point; gradient meshes come in as mesh objects; artboards keep their names |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | SVG export: knockout groups of opaque art are written plainly, without masks, so shapes meeting edge to edge leave no seam; translucent, blended, masked or brushed art still knocks out through masks |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | `.ai` read as its PDF part keeps the RGB numbers of its `ICCBased` spaces (`uncalibrated_rgb`, on for `.ai`, off for PDFs): a user-visible colour change for `.ai` files tagged with a non-sRGB RGB profile |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | PDF import: a fill that took its opacity or soft mask from a transparency group no longer absorbs the same-outline stroke drawn after the group, so the stroke keeps neither |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | A `.ai` whose PDF part draws only text opens from that part when its editing data can't be read, instead of being refused as saved without PDF compatibility: a page that states an art, trim or bleed box is art, not the placeholder (#1387); scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | PDF and `.ai` import, and placed PDFs, keep overprint: the graphics state's `/OP` and `/op` (ISO 32000-1 §8.6.7) become the overprint of fills, strokes and type, so a spot colour set to overprint still does after export; `/OPM 0` is reported in a note (#1388); scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | `.ai` editing data: a gradient with middle stops runs its whole ramp (#1390); type of objects with an appearance, of hidden layers and on later artboards goes to its own text object (#1391); area type in a frame too short for the fallback font shows its first line (#1392); scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | `.ai` editing data: placed (linked) files come in as linked images showing the preview the file keeps, so a file with them opens through its layers, with its guides (#1264); scores unchanged |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | PDF and `.ai` import: a shape painted with a gradient opens as one path with the gradient (#1304). PDF and `.ai` export: the constant alpha soft mask of a CMYK page with transparency is white (#1286, in part) |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | DXF reads control-point SPLINE closure (#1299 follow-up after #1320); open curves stay open and curves retained; rational/non-rational import and export versions regression-tested; scores/hours unchanged |
| 2026-10-12 | minor | A `.ai` opens on its trim boxes with its bleed boxes as the document's bleed; a PDF opened on its trim boxes too (#1266); a PDF saved with its editing data opens as the `.ai` does |
| 2026-10-11 | minor | An EPS keeps its own page and its stacked text strokes through its layers (#1102) |
| 2026-10-11 | minor | A `.ai` read as its PDF part keeps its artboard layout from the editing data (#1068) |
| 2026-10-11 | minor | Spot colours defined in Lab keep their Lab values, from the editing data and from a PDF part whose ink alternate is an ICC Lab profile (#1032) |
| 2026-10-11 | minor | `.ai` in PostScript form opens through its layers, also without its prolog (#1027) |
| 2026-10-11 | minor | `.ai` editing data: global process colours and pattern fills read, so they no longer drop sublayers (#1025) |
| 2026-10-10 | major | First checklist; moved the `.ai` editing-data scope from the ROADMAP's "Out of scope" here; added the user-reported `.ai` failures |