Project Scorch retires from Autodesk Labs

Project Scorch was our free technology preview that let you play with fire.

Actually, it helped you perform fire simulations within a structure. Project Scorch used the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS) to understand fire behavior within a building, such as smoke development and propagation, sprinkler behavior, and more. Project Scorch was intended as a more efficient and easier-to-use front-end for FDS from simulation setup and results exploration. The technology preview has ended.

When a Labs technology preview ends, one of three things can happen:

• Graduation

  A technology graduates from Labs when it is available somewhere else (e.g., App Center, feature in a new product offering, new cloud-based service).

• Retirement

  A technology retires from Labs when the preview ends, and users can't get it anywhere. It may come back as another technology preview sometime later. It may show up in a future product offering. The technology is not necessarily dead, but in the meantime, customers can't get it.

• Extension

  Sometimes teams decide they need more feedback, so they conduct another technology preview.

In this case, Project Scorch has retired. Thanks to everyone who participated in the project and provided feedback. Most Project Scorch participants identified themselves as engineers who work on design projects but do not use energy analysis. (No, they did not identify themselves as pyromaniacs.)

Though the technology has been retired, it may come back at a later date, in the same form, or perhaps a different form? Users who wish to continue to work with the technology can work with NIST FDS directly.

Visit NIST.

Smothering fire is alive in the lab.