How can I mashup thee? Let me count the ways...

It was about a year ago that I blogged about the importance of mashups: It's all about the pipes... A frequently asked question is How do I add Project Draw or Project Freewheel to my Wiki? Autodesk Labs Software Architect, Ben Cochran, recently outlined the mashup capabilities of Autodesk Labs offerings.

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Project Freewheel and Project Draw have several different ways to be mashed up into other site.

1. Using an iFrame is one way the Project Freewheel interactive viewer can be added to a 3rd party site. In this case, the other site can also pass in CSS and JS to change the look and functionality of Project Freewheel. Some examples of this are:

   • http://www.actionair.co.uk/drawing.html
   • http://gis.co.weber.ut.us/gis/pop_up_plats_freewheel.php
   • http://www.timberdesign.com/contemporary/northmoor/northmoorframe.htm

   Using an iFrame has been very popular.

2. A 3rd party can also use the Project Freewheel services directly. Project Freewheel is actually 3 things: a JavaScript based web interactive viewer, a DWF rendering service, and a real-time collaboration service. The Project Freewheel interactive viewer is actually a sample application demonstrating how someone could use the two other services. These 3rd parties could use Project Freewheel just to render DWF files.

   As an example, we have CADoogle (http://www.cadoogle.com/). My favorite is the bookmarklet. Go to http://freewheel.labs.autodesk.com/gallery.aspx and add the bookmarklet to your bookmarks. Then do a Google search for filetype:dwf robot. The search will return DWF files of robots. When you click on the bookmarklet, all of the DWF links will be changed into calls to the Project Freewheel rendering service. The hyperlinks are replaced by thumbnail images.

3. We have also been working with OAN (Open Architecture Network) http://www.openarchitecturenetwork.org/. In this case we built an ObjectARX app that uploads design data directly from AutoCAD to OAN. OAN uses Project Freewheel to render and collaborate about the designs.

4. In addition to being an interactive content creation tool. Project Draw can also serve up an image. After creating a diagram, Project Draw can provide a snippet of HTML that can be added to a Wiki (or any site). The HTML uses Project Draw to serve up an image of the diagram. The image is also a hyperlink that when clicked, takes you to Project Draw to edit the diagram. In this way, it adds diagramming to a Wiki.

5. An API that allows 3rd parties to retrieve diagrams on Project Draw was recently added. This API lets 3rd parties save data locally. 3rd parties get an API key by contacting us at [email protected].

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Thanks Ben.