Techno Babble

Autodesk has recently introduced Autodesk Labs a web-site that provides free, early access to prototypes, experimental and beta applications and technologies.

The intial offerings include:

• Feature Recognition for Inventor 11, User Guide for converting neutral 3D CAD data models (STEP, SAT or IGES) into fully featured Inventor 11 models.
• Autodesk Vault Mirror Beta which provides the ability to create a read-opnly mirror of the files and directory structure in a Vault.
• DGNV8 Translator allows a user to share AutoCAD DWG and Bentley Microstation 2D V8 DGN files.
• Google Earth Extension Beta provides the ability to publish 3D models from AutoCAD 2007 based products directly into Google Earth. (User Guide is available HERE Adesk Google Users Guide.pdf )
• Project Freewheel http://dwfit.com/ both a web-site where you can enter a DWF url for interactive viewing and a web-service that allows you to embed an interactive DWF viewer in your own HTML page.

The software is not intended for mission-critical projects, nor is it supported.

Quoted from a recent article at Yahoo News,

…Since going live about two months ago, Autodesk Labs has received more than 190,000 hits and over 49,000 unique visitors from 150 countries. There have been more than 10,000 downloads of the beta products available on the site, and hundreds of positive emails about the offerings and the overall experience, including suggestions for new products.

Autodesk has released Autodesk Design Review 2007, the product formerly known as Autodesk DWF Composer, at a cost of $199 (same as before). Other tools freely available are the DWF Viewer, and the DWF Writer.

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/index?siteID=123112&id=6101753

An addin is provided for SW2005 and SW2006 that enables a user to create a DWF variant of his model directly from within SolidWorks. Plugins are also provided for other CAD systems including CATIA, Pro/ENGINEER, Solid Edge, and NX.

The DWF writer includes the ability to capture 3D geometry from any application which uses opengl for drawing - similar to the capability offered by Adobe.

Another interesting feature is the ability to move (move/rotate) components of the assembly but this functionality is VERY limited (at the moment), and has no collision detection etc.

AECbytes has a review of AutoCAD 2007. Actually, this one makes quite good reading, although it is biased towards Architectural - it does after all come from a site dedicated to the Analysis, Research and Reviews of AEC Technology. Of further interest is the glimpse of how mental ray has been integrated into the AutoCAD environment.

Read the article at

http://www.aecbytes.com/review/2006/AutoCAD2007.html

Start Slide Show with PicLens Lite

In a recent interview with Heather Clancy Editor of CRN, Autodesk COO Carl Bass says (amongst other things)

The kind of acquisitions we normally do, Alias would be more of an anomaly. What we do a lot of is technology acquisitions to fill in gaps. What we’re doing in analysis and simulation. We’re moving to this world in which we’ve gone from a 2-D, line-drawing representation of what it is you’re going to build to a digital, 3-D model. What comes with that 3-D model is the ability to analyze it, simulate it, avoid making prototypes of it. And with each of those are specialized software. So, there are gaps in our ability to visualize, analyze, simulate some of those things. You’ll continue, probably, to see us do small technology acquisitions. These bigger acquisitions are much more opportunistic.

The full article is available at

http://www.crn.com/…articleId=183702289&pgno=1

It looks as though Autodesk have re-branded Alias products following the recent completion of the acquisition.

Trying http://www.alias.com now re-directs to Autodesk.

ImageStudio is now known as AutoDesk ImageStudio and they also offer Autodesk DirectConnect to enable data exchange between leading CAD products, such as SolidWorks, and ImageStudio.

There are various demos available which are worth a look. It is interesting to see the approaches used in this product.

Autodesk reports record revenues of $417 million for its fourth fiscal quarter ended January 31, 2006.

Autodesk’s performance was driven by strong growth in new seats and subscriptions, increasing penetration of its vertical and 3D products and continued strong profitability. In addition, during the quarter the company completed the acquisition of Alias for $197 million.

Read the full press release at

http://usa.autodesk.com/…ID=1977925

There’s an “exclusive” write up of Inventor 11 available to read at MCAD Online

http://www.mcadonline.com/index.php?…Itemid=73

Topics covered include:

This version of Inventor, currently in Beta, is still a couple of months away from release which is expected in March/April.

Autodesk, Inc. (NASDAQ: ADSK) today announced that Carl Bass, the company’s chief operating officer, has been named president and chief executive officer, effective May 1, 2006. Bass also has been appointed to the company’s expanded Board of Directors, effective immediately.

Carol Bartz, who has served as CEO since April 1992, will become the company’s first Executive Chairman of the Board

Read the full press release at

http://usa.autodesk.com/…linkID=1977925