Comment 2 for bug 167768

Originator: NO

This is a known issue. The desktop cutting plotter dxf output extension
requires all objects that are not currently inkscape path objects to be
converted to paths. This is required for text. This is required for
rectangles (which inkscape represents as an svg <rect /> element). And it
is also required for inkscape's ellipse objects. Even though the svg
representation of the ellipse objects is a <path /> it uses the ArcTo path
operator which exactly represents elliptical arcs and the extension is not
able to convert this to a NURB for dxf representation.

There are at least two possible fixes.
1) alter simplepath.py to optionally approximate ArcTo operators with
CurveTo operators. (This will allow processing of many more path/@d
attribute elements, though inexactly.)
2) add special cases in the dxf output extension to output rectangles and
ellipses without converting them to pure <path />s

Note to bug tracker maintainers:
I'd like to change the summary of this but to something like
"simplepath.py doesn't handle ArcTo operators" but I've resisted for the
moment because the poster did not use a sf.net account or leave an email.
Perhaps leaving the summary field will help them to find this answer in the
rare case that they check back in to see the bug status. Perhaps the
summary could be changed after a month to help us better manage the bug and
more easily attract fixes.