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CorelDRAW is a
vector graphics editor A vector graphic editor is a computer program that enables its users to create, compose and edit images with the use of mathematical and geometrical commands rather than individual pixels. This software is used in creating high-definition Vector ...
developed and marketed by
Alludo Cascade Parent Limited, trade name, doing business as Alludo ( ), is a Canadian software company headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, specializing in graphics processing. Formerly called the Corel Corporation ( ; from the abbreviation "Cowpland Rese ...
(formerly Corel Corporation). It is also the name of the Corel graphics suite, which includes the bitmap-image editor
Corel Photo-Paint Corel Photo-Paint is a raster graphics editor developed and marketed by Corel since 1992. Corel markets the software for Windows and Mac OS operating systems, previously having marketed versions for Linux (Version 9, requiring Wine). Its primary ...
as well as other graphics-related programs (see below). It can serve as a
digital painting Digital painting is either a physical painting made with the use of digital electronics and spray paint robotics within the digital art fine art context or pictorial art imagery made with pixels on a computer screen that mimics artworks from th ...
platform,
desktop publishing Desktop publishing (DTP) is the creation of documents using dedicated software on a personal ("desktop") computer. It was first used almost exclusively for print publications, but now it also assists in the creation of various forms of online co ...
suite, and is commonly used for production art in signmaking,
vinyl Vinyl may refer to: Chemistry * Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a particular vinyl polymer * Vinyl cation, a type of carbocation * Vinyl group, a broad class of organic molecules in chemistry * Vinyl polymer, a group of polymers derived from vinyl ...
and laser
cutting Cutting is the separation or opening of a physical object, into two or more portions, through the application of an acutely directed force. Implements commonly used for wikt:cut, cutting are the knife and saw, or in medicine and science the sca ...
and
engraving Engraving is the practice of incising a design on a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a Burin (engraving), burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or Glass engraving, glass ar ...
, print-on-demand and other industry processes. Reduced-feature Standard and Essentials versions are also offered.


History

In 1987, Corel engineers Mchel Bouillan and Pat Beirne undertook to develop a vector-based illustration program to bundle with their desktop publishing systems. That program, CorelDraw, was initially released in 1989. CorelDraw 1.x and 2.x ran under Windows 2.x and 3.0. CorelDraw 3.0 came into its own with Microsoft's release of Windows 3.1. The inclusion of
TrueType TrueType is an Computer font#Outline fonts, outline font standardization, standard developed by Apple Inc., Apple in the late 1980s as a competitor to Adobe Inc., Adobe's PostScript fonts#Type 1, Type 1 fonts used in PostScript. It has become the ...
in Windows 3.1 transformed CorelDraw into a serious illustration program capable of using system-installed outline fonts without requiring third-party software such as
Adobe Type Manager Adobe Type Manager (ATM) was the name of a family of computer programs created and marketed by Adobe Systems for use with their PostScript Type 1 fonts. The last release was Adobe ATM Light 4.1.2, per Adobe's FTP (at the time). Modern operati ...
; paired with a photo-editing program (Corel Photo-Paint), a font manager, Corel Capture, and several other pieces of software, it was also part of the first all-in-one graphics suite.


Features by version

:From
Windows 7 Windows 7 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was Software release life cycle#Release to manufacturing (RTM), released to manufacturing on July 22, 2009, and became generally available on October 22, ...
, 32-bit and 64-bit supported † CorelDraw 10 to X4 can open files of version 3 and later, but certain features may not be supported.
‡ The list of file formats that CorelDraw 10 to X4 can write may not be complete in this table.
* CorelDraw X7 on
Windows 10 Windows 10 is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. The successor to Windows 8.1, it was Software release cycle#Release to manufacturing (RTM), released to manufacturing on July 15, 2015, and later to retail on July 2 ...
requires Update 5.


Platform and scripting history

CorelDRAW was originally developed for Microsoft Windows 2.1, and versions existed for
Windows 3.1x Windows 3.1 is a major release of Microsoft Windows. It was released to manufacturing on April 6, 1992, as a successor to Windows 3.0. Like its predecessors, the Windows 3.1 series run as a shell on top of MS-DOS; it was the last Windows 16 ...
, CTOS,
OS/2 OS/2 is a Proprietary software, proprietary computer operating system for x86 and PowerPC based personal computers. It was created and initially developed jointly by IBM and Microsoft, under the leadership of IBM software designer Ed Iacobucci, ...
, and
Power Macintosh The Power Macintosh, later Power Mac, is a family of personal computers designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Inc., Apple Computer, Inc as the core of the Mac (computer), Macintosh brand from March 1994 until August 2006. Described by ''Mac ...
. With the release of
Corel Linux Corel Linux, also called Corel LinuxOS, was a Debian-based operating system made by Corel that began beta testing on September 21, 1999 and was released to the public on November 15, 1999. It mainly competed against Windows 98 and Windows 2000 by M ...
, CorelDRAW 9 was released with package support for Debian and Red Hat-based
Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...
. Version 11 was released for Mac
OS X macOS, previously OS X and originally Mac OS X, is a Unix, Unix-based operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 2001. It is the current operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. With ...
in 2001, but was then discontinued on both Linux and Mac. CorelDRAW was available only for Windows until the 2019 version became the first to support macOS. CorelDRAW Graphics Suite supports
Windows 10 Windows 10 is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. The successor to Windows 8.1, it was Software release cycle#Release to manufacturing (RTM), released to manufacturing on July 15, 2015, and later to retail on July 2 ...
, Windows 11, and macOS, including a new release for Apple silicon. A related web app and iPad app offers collaboration and markup online. In 2024, a new trial version was released available directly in the browser.


Scripting

With version 6, Corel introduced task automation using a proprietary scripting language, Corel SCRIPT. Support for VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) macros was added in version 9, and Corel SCRIPT was eventually deprecated. Support for VSTA (Visual Studio Tools for Applications, Microsoft Visual Studio Tools for Applications) has been integrated in Windows versions since X5, and currently requires Microsoft Visual Studio, Visual Studio 2017. Version 2019 added Javascript as an option for cross-platform scripting with MacOS support; however, the built-in IDE does not support it as of 2020.


File format


Structure

In its first versions, the CDR file format was a completely proprietary format, proprietary file format primarily used for vector graphic drawings, recognizable by the first two bytes of the file being "WL". Starting with CorelDraw 3, the file format changed to a Resource Interchange File Format (RIFF) envelope, recognizable by the first four bytes of the file being "RIFF", and a "CDR*vrsn" in bytes 9 to 15, with the asterisk "*" being just a blank in early versions. Beginning with CorelDraw 4 it included the version number of the writing program in hexadecimal ("4" meaning version 4, "D" meaning version 13). The actual data chunk of the RIFF remains a Corel proprietary format. From version X4 (14) on, the CDR file is a ZIP-compressed directory of several files, among them XML files and the RIFF-structured ''riffdata.cdr'' with the familiar version signature in versions X4 (CDREvrsn) and X5 (CDRFvrsn), and a ''root.dat'' with CorelDraw X6, where the bytes 9 to 15 look slightly different – "CDRGfver" in a file created with X6. "F" was the last valid hex digit, and the "fver" now indicates that the letter before no longer represents a hex digit. There is no publicly available CDR file format specification. Other CorelDraw file formats include CorelDraw Compressed (CDX), CorelDraw Template (CDT) and Corel Presentation Exchange (CMX).


Use of CDR files in other programs

In December 2006, the sK1 (program), sK1 open-source software, open-source project team started to reverse-engineer the CDR format. The results and the first working snapshot of the CDR importer were presented at the Libre Graphics Meeting 2007 conference taking place in May 2007 in Montreal (Canada). Later on the team parsed the structure of other Corel formats with the help of the open source CDR Explorer. As of 2008, the sK1 project claims to have the best import support for CorelDraw file formats among open source software programs. The sK1 project also developed the UniConvertor, a command line open source tool which supports conversion from CorelDraw ver.7-X4 formats (CDR/CDT/CCX/CDRX/CMX) to other formats. UniConvertor is also used in the Inkscape and Scribus open source projects as an external tool for importing CorelDraw files. In 2007, Microsoft blocked CDR file format in Microsoft Office 2003 with the release of Service Pack 3 for Office 2003. Microsoft later apologized for inaccurately blaming the CDR file format and other formats for security problems in Microsoft Office and released some tools for solving this problem. In 2012, the joint LibreOffice/re-lab team implemented , a library for reading CDR files from version 7 to X3 and CMX files. The library has extensive support for shapes and their properties, including support for color management and spot colors, and has a basic support for text. The library provides a built-in converter to SVG, and a converter to OpenDocument is provided by package. The library is used in LibreOffice starting from version 3.6, and thanks to public API it can be freely used by other applications.


Other applications supporting CDR files

CDR file format import is partially or fully supported in following applications: * Adobe Illustrator – CorelDraw 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 * CorelCAD * Corel PaintShop Pro * Corel WordPerfect, WordPerfect Office * Inkscape - CorelDRAW versions 7 through X4 * LibreOffice using * Adobe FreeHand – CorelDraw 7, 8 * Microsoft Visio 2002 – CorelDraw! drawing file versions 3.0, 4.0, 5.0, 6.0 and 7.0 (.cdr), Corel Clipart (.cmx) * sK1 (program), sK1 – partial support * Xara Designer Pro and Xara Photo & Graphic Designer – early versions of CorelDraw CDR and CMX


See also

* Comparison of desktop publishing software * List of desktop publishing software * Comparison of vector graphics editors * Comparison of raster-to-vector conversion software * List of 2D graphics software


Notes and references


External links

*
Official CorelDRAW Community

Corelclub.org The CorelDRAW users community in Spanish
{{Authority control 1989 software Corel software, DRAW Vector graphics editors Raster to vector conversion software Proprietary cross-platform software Font editors