It is Alive in the Lab

A few Autodesk facts

I saw a PowerPoint slide that one of our teammates used recently.

Click to enlarge

I thought it summed up Autodesk well. I thought I would share it.

Autodesk Design Review and Navisworks Freedom: We have ways to make you talk...

We want to hear your ideas.

Despite my earlier blog posting, Product Design Manager, Dirk Ruiz, is still looking for a few good men and women. He would like to get your thoughts regarding interoperability between Navisworks Freedom and Autodesk Design Review.

As part of this, we’re kicking off a user research effort. We’re looking to interview both Navisworks and Autodesk Design Review users in the Bay Area. In particular, if you are a Bay Area Autodesk Design Review user and can sign up for a 90-minute on-site interview, we'd be so happy. The interviews will be conducted in the first two weeks of June. We will compensate our participants for their efforts: $150 for the 90-minute session.

If you would like to participate, please contact thelabs@autodesk.com. I will forward the messages to the team. You can help shape the future of collaborating with design data. Thanks.

Still looking for volunteers for in-depth feedback is alive in the lab.

Autodesk Labs: To log in or not to log in - a follow up

In a previous blog posting, I posed the question about requiring login to be able to download technologies from Autodesk Labs. The quandary is that we want to know who downloaded what, so we can follow up with you, but we do not want to turn people away who loathe registration. Some of you thought it was a dynamite idea, one thought it was bit dicey, while still others thought it might hurt. Here's what you said:

	Having to login to download a utility would be fine; however, if you place [all of] your information behind a login, it would greatly decrease your exposure to blogs and news.
	I currently have multiple Autodesk passwords so a Labs one wouldn't bother me but it would be great if the passwords could be unified. For example it would be great if I am already logged into the subscription page not to have to re log into Labs or to the AU page or the area.
	I think sign in is a good tool for your use. I would welcome it. Updates and additional information would be to our benefit. A short explanation at the sign up screen to the "why’s and what for’s" would go a long way in providing comfort and understanding to the signee.
	Most people would be willing to login to download but not to read about a project.
	@scottsh115 - To answer your login question, you are heading in the right direction.
	It seems like there should be a middle road. If you aren’t logged in, splash up as screen saying, "Please log in for reasons A, B, and C." with a link to log in. After you log in you’re taken to the file. On the splash screen, include a "No, Thank You" button to allow you to just go to the page where you will download the file. This seems better than both alternatives.
	I don't see a huge problem in asking people to log on to download stuff. It will introduce a barrier and reduce participation, but how much is anybody's guess.
	Including a required log in puts up a barrier that some people just won’t want to deal with. I mean, yet another username and password to deal with . I’ve made so many duplicate user accounts on so many sites that have required logins.
	It is often easier to just fill out junk info on a throwaway email account (then it is only slightly more annoying than the repeated form filling out like you have now). This goes doubly when there is a security question you have to remember as well.
	The Autodesk Single Sign-on login involves logging in again, and again, and again, and again... Very annoying, and a definite disincentive to using any site infected with it.

Thank you fro providing this feedback. We will consider this as we move forward.

Platinum LEED Certification for our One Market facility

Our Scottsdale home is for sale so we can relocate to the Bay Area. I will be trading my home office for a spot in our One Market office in San Francisco. The Autodesk Gallery at One Market and newly renovated office space in the historic Landmark Building at One Market have received Platinum certification in the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED for Commercial Interiors (LEED-CI) rating system. The Autodesk offices are one of only four Platinum-certified projects in San Francisco, and second in the state of California under the commercial interiors rating. I am proud that I will be working at this facility.

If you would like to see for yourself, the Autodesk Gallery at One Market is open to the public on the first Wednesday of each month from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m.

Bragging just a little bit is alive in the lab.

How large of an image can I get using Project Freewheel?

Project Freewheel is our software as a service approach to viewing and collaboration using just a web browser. Think of it as Autodesk Design Review without the install. Or think of it as a way to view designs on the Macintosh, Linux, or cell phones. In addition to being an interactive viewer (pan, zoom, 3D orbit, etc.), Project Freewheel can be used to generate static images. The static images are just like GIFs or JPEGs that are traditionally used in conjunction with HTML. The advantage of using Project Freewheel to generate them is that when the design is updated, the image is regenerated. This allows companies to include designs on their company web sites and only need to update the designs but not touch their web sites for web site visitors to see the latest and greatest designs.

A Mr. Richard Feder from Fort Lee, New Jersey writes in:

How large of an image can I generate with Project Freewheel?

Software Architect, Ben Cochran noted:

The Project Freewheel API that returns an image has an upper limit to the size of the image that it will compute. Since the number of pixels goes up by the square of the resolution, allowing people to increase the requested image width or height to large sizes can make the number of pixels Project Freewheel has to compute grow exponentially. When this happens, the Project Freewheel server requires very large amounts of RAM. To prevent malicious users from intentionally crashing Project Freewheel, we limit the amount of RAM any one image request can make. For Project Freewheel this value is 7,480,000 pixels. When exceeding this value on Project Freewheel, the caller of theAPI gets an “Error rendering DWF File” message.

Autodesk Labs VP, Brian Mathews, chimed in with an HTML page that provided some sample code. I have posted it to my blog:

Using Project Freewheel's parametric API to make tiled maps

Keep those questions coming in to labs.freewheel@autodesk.com. Helping clarify how design data can be viewed using just a web browser is alive in the lab.

Memorial Day Tribute to those in uniform

To help put the memorial back in Memorial Day, my wife, Sheryl, and I attended a memorial service at the National Memorial Cemetery of Arizona. The service featured a fly over of actual 1940 WWII antique fighter planes:

Arizona Governor, Jan Brewer, was on hand to read a proclamation specifically for the day:

United States Senator, John McCain, offered inspirational words to the families of the fallen:

To honor all 6 branches of military service: Air Force, Army, Coast Guard, Marine Corps, Merchant Marines, and Navy, the service concluded with the releasing of white doves - symbols of peace:

America regards itself as the land of the free and the home of the brave, but Martha Alderman, Service Officer, Arizona Department of Veteran's Services, summed it up best when she closed with "remember that we are free because of the brave."

Happy Memorial Day

Today United States employees for Autodesk have the day off to honor those who have fallen in the name of the freedoms we enjoy.

Comcast Town: a Project Dragonfly wannabe?

Software Engineer and Technical Lead, Gyorgy Ordody has worked on Project Freewheel for design visualization and Project Showroom for photorealistic rendering. He noted that it seems like building likenesses of one’s real and/or hoped-for living quarters is the thing to do these days...

This one is an ad campaign by Comcast:

• http://www.comcasttown.com
• http://www.comcasttown.com/faq.html

What is Comcast Town?
Comcast Town is a website that was created as part of the launch of Comcast's new advertising campaign. It allows people to watch the latest commercials from Comcast, download wallpapers and ringtones, and move into Comcast Town by designing a virtual apartment.

This appears to be right up Project Dragonfly's alley.

Technology:

• http://www.unit9.com/archives/comcast-town/
• http://www.nexusproductions.com

Facebook:

• href="http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=57541501427&ref=ts">
• http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=57541501427&ref=ts

And blog articles about it:

• http://ariwriter.com/2009/03/r-o-t-f-l-o-ling-at-comcast-town/
• http://www.inhabitat.com/2009/04/23/test-out-a-virtual-home-renovation-in-comcast-town/
• http://www.adverblog.com/archives/003790.htm
• http://www.itsartmag.com/features/nexuscomcast

Sharing information about other forms of immersive experiences in the cloud is alive in the lab.

I broke it, so I fixed it.

I fixed it. I updated new images for EMAIL, FORUM, BLOG, and SOCIAL media. I have wired them in.

You will no longer see broken images.

I broke it. I'll fix it.

When you look at the Autodesk Labs site right now, you will see some missing images:

In a fit of spring cleaning, I removed the old Inventor LT page. This removed the supporting files. Alas the other site pages were linked to the image files associated with Inventor LT. I will fix this. The hyperlinks still work though.