AutoCAD text rendering

Does that make the linework exactly like the autocad drawing? autocad uses shx fonts. i don't think fme can get those fonts.

Rendering in the FME Data Inspector is different to AutoCAD, however, FME does preserve the information so when written back put to AutoCAD the text should look the same. You should use the same file as the template file when writing which should have the same .shx reference paths.

If you want to go AutoCAD to AutoCAD THE reader documentation has reccomendation for the settings that should be set ​for each parameter. https://docs.safe.com/fme/html/FME_Desktop_Documentation/FME_ReadersWriters/acad/realdwg_reader.htm

While FME doesn't have full support of the geometries it does a pretty good job.

As for getting the text as graphics the text stroker is the was to go but you will probably need to somehow map the fonts. And like you say the text is rendered differently in FME so it will look different.

While CAD is still heavily used I think labels are one of those things which are becoming more and more obsolete​ due to the difficulty to preserve the fonts when exchanging between formats. I would argue that labels are getting replaced by attribution (even in CAD systems). It makes for poorer quality maps, that's true, however with everyone now wanting to interact with data in maps the need for labels is getting reduced

(Just an opinion from someone who is biased towards GIS)

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In the project i am working on, we defined a CAD Standard which set out what fonts were acceptable and moved away from shx to true type fonts so we had more control. ​Although not perfect, once we knew the font coming from the dwg, the text stroker did a good job of converting from text to lines or polygons.