Is there a way to force curves to become paths when exporting to svg?

[8R90]

It was brought up in this topic: https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/16297-any-way-to-force-everything-to-paths-when-exporting-to-svg/

 

Essentially, when I export to svg I want everything exported as <path>'s but I get some <rect>'s even though they are displayed as (Curve)'s.

 

Is there a solution for this?

[VIPStephan]

What’s the problem with rectangles instead of paths if they are essentially just rectangles anyway?

[Alfred]

If you really, really want a <path> rather than a <rect>, you can set one or more corners to a small non-zero value. If you type 0.001 into the numeric control on the Context toolbar it will be displayed as 0% but the exported SVG file will include the desired 'path' element.

[8R90]

What’s the problem with rectangles instead of paths if they are essentially just rectangles anyway?

I'm saving the path strings to a database and it would save me time not having to manually convert rects to paths.

... and I know Illustrator has that ability and I like Designer more so I thought I'd ask.  :)

[8R90]

If you really, really want a <path> rather than a <rect>, you can set one or more corners to a small non-zero value. If you type 0.001 into the numeric control on the Context toolbar it will be displayed as 0% but the exported SVG file will include the desired 'path' element.

Interesting approach. I'll go with that until there is a 'convert to curve' option somewhere.

Thanks for the help.  :)

[msageryd]

Chiming in..

I need this for the exact same reason. I'm saving polygon points to a database. I don't know what was available in 2017, but nowadays there is a "Convert to curve" function. If I convert a rect to a curve it shows up as "(curve)" in the layer browser. But AD still exports those as rect in the SVG if they are rectangular. I suppose this is a great optimization for the created SVG, but I would rather decide this myself.

Is there any way to do this in 2020 without using Alfred's hack?

[msageryd]

I just discovered another hack.

1. draw a rect

2. convert to curves

3. add another node on one of the lines (without altering the line)

When this is exported to SVG, the curve will be exported as a path and the extra node will be removed. I suppose the removal of the node is a reasonable optimization.

[Denyer]

On 5/7/2020 at 4:15 PM, msageryd said:

I just discovered another hack.

1. draw a rect

2. convert to curves

3. add another node on one of the lines (without altering the line)

When this is exported to SVG, the curve will be exported as a path and the extra node will be removed. I suppose the removal of the node is a reasonable optimization.

Having to do this to every circle and rectangle in a complex design is... unpleasant

Saving as Optimised SVG from Inkscape works, but I don't think/know if there is a way to quickly script that to handle a batch folder of 100's of images.