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Autodesk Suing to Keep Format Closed
An anonymous reader writes "AutoCAD is by far the industry standard CAD tool for engineering drawings. When I was an engineering student it was on every computer in the college of engineering. Autodesk, the makers of the AutoCAD software, are attempting to quash an effort to reverse-engineer the proprietary binary format used by AutoCAD. Looking at the court order, their whole argument revolves around something called TrustedDWG that basically looks like a digital signature that verifies the file was created by an Autodesk product."
This behavior is consistent with monopolistic thinking: we own the market, so let's raise the barrier to entry and/or companion-software diversity by making our product harder to use.
The thing is, you'd best be sure your monopoly is rock solid before attempting such a move, lest it bite you in the ass when your users find their workflow has a new kink in it.
Interoperability is cool. All the happening kids are doing it. Software mongers who fail to understand this are doomed to wither and die, or rule us with a taste of rising bile in our throats (I'm looking at you, MS Office). Grudging and bitter acceptance is not equal to brand loyalty.
We've been phasing AutoCAD out of our shop here because it won't play nice with others. I doubt we're the only ones.
These stories are free but worth money.
I've been using CAD since the Mid 80s (paper before), and AutoDesk got the jump just because they were the only early serious 2D CAD player when Microsoft hit the street with that, what was it, CP/M derivative OS, called DOS or something.
This is a new millenium and 2D is not gone, but it is dying fast. Somehow they, Autodesk, missed the point that we live and think in a 3D world.
SolidWorks.com has about 500,000 users of their mid-range software and has trounced AutoDesk's various offerings, so AD is just trying to protect what little it has left in 2D. What a pity.
By all rights, AD should have been a leader in low-mid 3D CAD, but they squandered their efforts, not the least of which involve cumbersome user interfaces. I think they needed someone like Andy Hertzfeld and others from Apple's early days to make their CAD interfaces far easier to learn and use.
Good bye AD. I use us no more.
Now History. Part of the lore.
For those who have never done CAD:
:)
AutoCAD is a 2D drawing tool with functions optimized for the production of scale drawings. It is an extension of the old T-Square And Pencil technique into the computer; a sort of Adobe Illustrator tuned to drafting.
It is very, very good at this, and I found it (given that I had a little old skool drafting experience) fairly easy to adapt to.
But at its core, you're still projecting 3D objects into 2D or psudo 3D (orthometric projections) using the draftsman's brain as the projection device.
Enter Solidworks.
Solidworks is a parametric 3D modeling package. You create the object in 3D, and then the software generates your 2D drawings from it. No more construction lines. No more mismatched views.
There have been 3D modelers before (VariCAD for Linux isn't bad) but Solidworks takes it a step farther - it remembers every step in the construction of an object, and every step is tunable. Where past 3D modelers used Boolean operations to construct their shapes - but then the shape was fixed - Solidworks allows you to change the parameters of every operation at any time. Punch a hole through an object, but then discover it is the wrong size? No problem - just select the hole in the object's construction tree, and change its size.
And that's just the tip of the iceberg.
It has revolutionized mechanical drawing, to the point where it is inconceivable that I'd ever use AutoCAD ever again. Solidworks is one of the few software packages I've ever used that just left me dumbfounded in amazement at how powerful, easy, and intuitive it is.
And no, I don't work for them.
DG
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
The Lanham Act is the federal trademark code. What Autodesk is trying to argue is that anyone 'faking' their 'TrustedDWG' technology is violating their trademark. The best analogy I can think of is GM saying you can only put 'genuine GM' parts in their cars. Of course, it is a lot more complex than that here, and judges aren't known for their technological savvy. The keystone of trademark law, though, is how likely something is to confuse the consumer. In other words, for Autodesk to win they will have to show that consumers are likely to confuse this imitation 'TrustedDWG' for the real thing; i.e., that since it's a .dwg file, it must have been made/come from Autodesk.
Not sure what I think of their chances. On the one hand, AutoCAD is so ubiquitous that anyone that has any need for CAD probably automatically associates .dwg files with AutoCAD. On the other hand, well . . . who gives a shit? It'd be like MS claiming trademark in .doc files -- sure, everyone knows .doc files = Word, but it's something that's below the radar. It's not like you go into a store to buy a .doc or .dwg file, and might be confused about it's source.
It's been a while since I've looked at the Lanham Act, but I think Autodesk would have to prove some sort of damage, even if they were able to show likelihood of confusion.
The bigotry of the nonbeliever is for me nearly as funny as the bigotry of the believer. - Albert Einstein
There was a recent discussion about this case, and the central point was NOT that the open source group was reverse engineering documents. It was about the open software's representation of itself as a "genuine" file using the AutoCAD name. The equivalent to a ODT file containing the terminology "Genuine Microsoft Word file, guaranteed to work". I have my issues with Autodesk, but they aren't necessarily the evil ones here.
Right, and that combined with their products only working with signed drawings means they're using this watermark as a ruse to try to monopolize their corner of the industry. This is basically what HP and Lexmark have tried to do, in which they've put code in their printers to check the manufacturer of the printhead. There's no reason for it technologically, it's only there for anticompetitive purposes. Same here, and the DMCA, as bad as it is, does say that using copyright as a ruse to prevent interoperability won't fly.
Most of the posts here seem to be stating that AutoCAD isn't the "standard" because
it isn't the leader in the arena of 3D design.
AutoCAD is _not_ the standard for 3D design. I'm not sure it ever was...
Autodesk competes in that arena with their Inventor product - but I don't think
that they are anywhere near the market leader. It's a pretty fragmented market.
However, I believe the AutoCAD _is_ the standard for 2D architectural drawing.
This is the arena where architects (or, rather, the draftsman working for an architect)
draw the 2D drawings. Buildings, landscapes, etc.
I'm not sure either, and IANAL, but if I wanted to contest this I would probably cite Sega v. Accolade (Scroll down, copied text appears here:
Most of us know how that turned out - Accolade eventually won the right to continue to distribute their game cartridges. Sega went on to do the same kind of crap on the Dreamcast, but they weren't able to prevent clever programmers from putting a notice on the same screen that came up saying "licensed by sega" that says "no, it isn't, but this message has to be here".
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"On the other hand, well . . . who gives a shit?"
.dwg file that is not "trusted" into AutoCAD and a dialog pops up with warnings that say the file format is not "trusted, unsafe, etc".
Well, for one, the end users do, when they bring in a
Extending your GM analogy, say you install a non GM part in your GM car and get a blinking light on the dash to the effect of "Car may crash violently or explode through use on non-GM part." What are the results of that? The consumer is scared back into going to GM and GM only to buy the part.
Also, for more analysis of the case, go here:
http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com/blog/
The best analogy I can think of is GM saying you can only put 'genuine GM' parts in their cars.
Actually, a better analogy is GM making their oil filters in the shape of the GM logo. If you make an oil filter that fits in a GM, you have to make it in the shape of their logo, thereby violating their trademark.