With COVID-19 impacting the ability of teachers and students to gather face to face, remote learning is the remedy. As such, Tinkercad has been found to be a valuable tool in teaching Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics. Tinkercad is our free, easy-to-use app for 3D design, electronics, and coding. It's used by teachers, children, hobbyists, and designers to imagine, design, and make anything!
In 2018, my colleague, Guillermo Melantoni, and I taught a Tinkercad class at the Alameda Boys ad Girls Club. During this time of the pandemic, one of the most frequent requests our Tinkercad team receives is for lesson plans. Well, you know what they say, "Ask and yee shall receive." The Tinkercad site has a set of free lesson plans.
Autodesk has always been an automation company. Today, more than ever, that means helping our customers automate their design and make processes. We help them embrace the future of making, where they can do more (e.g., quantity, functionality, performance, quality), with less (e.g., energy, raw materials, timeframes, waste of human potential), and realize the opportunity for better (e.g., innovation, user experience, efficiency, sustainability, return on investment). Helping teachers and students get a start on design and making is part of providing the opportunity for better.
Autodesk serves three industries:
More and more, we find that these industries are converging:
So with this in mind, I was reluctant to sort the cheat sheet of products by industry. Recall that one of our summer interns, Courtney Yu, created a cheat sheet, a sort of Cliff's Notes, of Autodesk products. Although any customer from any industry may be able to reap the benefits from any product (which is even more likely due to convergence), I thought I'd take a crack at sorting Courtney's list by primary industry.
"As an architect you are a builder. You are of course more than a builder. You need to be a militant, you have to be a poet, you have to be a visionary, you have to be an artist. But certainly you have to be a builder. Everything starts from there."
— Renzo Piano, architect
"Good design is obvious. Great design is transparent."
— Joe Sparano, designer
"Whoever controls the media — the images — controls the culture."
— Allen Ginsberg, American poet, philosopher, and writer
Autodesk has always been an automation company. Today, more than ever, that means helping our customers automate their design and make processes. We help them embrace the future of making, where they can do more (e.g., efficiency, performance, quality), with less (e.g., energy, raw materials, timeframes, waste of human potential), and realize the opportunity for better (e.g., innovation, user experience, return on investment). Our set of software products provides our customers with the opportunity for better.
Autodesk has a large array of products and services. Some were developed internally such as Fusion 360 and Inventor whereas others were acquired such as Revit. AutoCAD is the product the founders started with although their original intent was to automate the business man's desktop with electronic Rolodex, word processing, and spreadsheet software — hence the name Autodesk. There is debate as to whether or not AutoCAD was internal or by acquisition as the founders were asked to bring software prototypes to the table, and that's where AutoCAD got its start (outside of the company but by a founder). Regardless of its origin, AutoCAD has evolved over the years by being developed internally as well as by integrating technology through acquisition. Back in the day when I was a DWF Technical Evangelist, I joking referred to AutoCAD as DWF Content Creator.
Earlier this year, a visitor arrived in the lobby of our San Rafael office, looking to buy a copy of AutoCAD. Our visitor was Howard Johnson who was the CEO of Vertex — a company acquired by Softdesk back in 1987, and ultimately acquired by Autodesk when Autodesk acquired Softdesk in 1996. Howard wanted to play around with AutoCAD to experience for himself how Vertex technology had gotten integrated into Autodesk products. Howard was greeted by Amanda Kinley on our Community team who hooked Howard up with a free AutoCAD subscription and pointed him to various training materials. Thanks, Amanda.
While visiting with Amanda, Howard shared some materials.
How Vertex Got Its Start in 1987 by Howard Johnson
I had been developing my idea for creating standard details on CAD and tying this in with manufacturers’ product details. Over lunch one day with a business acquaintance, I mentioned what I was doing. He thought it was a good idea and suggested writing a business plan and seeking investors. We agreed to give it a try. The business plan was written, and we started raising money from individual investors. We rented some office space nearby and started hiring some of the best programmers around who were also architects. These people like Mark Crosley and Spencer Jue who I had worked with in SMP were well known in this area and completely bought into and supported the concept. They developed a system, which used parametrically changeable product based icons of standard building materials such as drywall components, steel shapes, concrete footings, wood products, doors frames, window details etc., all arranged in the CSI format. These details could be inserted as icons, rotated and parametrically altered to the correct size. These icons knew what they were and automatically identified themselves with an arrowhead pointing to the product. Thus, if you created a 3-5/8" stud, it would note itself as such.
Vertex Office in 1988
Vertex Customer Testimonial
In 1990, I was contacted by the manager of the Bay Area Tapers and Painters Trust Fund, which ran a $4 billion fund, to provide a site and building analysis on an adjacent property to their present quarters in South San Francisco. They were interested in constructing a new headquarters building for the Fund. I did a code review and developed a schematic for a 12,000 sq ft building with a basement and parking. The Trust Fund decided to proceed, and I started developing a program. On completion of the program and establishing a budget of $40,000 for the construction, I proceeded into the design phase. This was an interesting project for me, and since I had no staff to supervise, this became a very personal project. Most architects (when they get to a position of being awarded substantial commercial project) are not able to sit down and do the entire project from beginning to end on their own. I thought this an admirable project to close out my practice by doing just that. I produced the working drawings in the same time frame as if I had a staff, using the Vertex system. This system worked perfectly, and my productivity was increased by 250% in using the software, totally fulfilling my expectations. The project was bid to two selected contractors, Turner Construction and Barnes Construction. The difference between the bids was only $1,000. The total change orders on the job came to 1%. I was happy with the results. During the construction, I had to attend monthly Board Meetings to be available to answer questions. It was an interesting board to watch in action. Since this was a trust fund, the Board was composed equally of union members and contractors; neither side liked the other, and it was amazing to me that they ever agreed on anything. They were a pretty violent group, one fellow apparently tried to shoot another member for some imagined slight. I decided to keep a low profile.
AutoCAD continues to grow. It has a rich set of capabilities that have evolved over time. Some of these were homegrown and others were integrated. We are grateful to contributors like Vertex over the course of AutoCAD's development. In 2010, Howard was featured in the San Francisco Chronicle in a story entitled "Architect has no designs on retirement."
Today, DWF files from AutoCAD go beyond the paper.
Though there's hype that robots will take our jobs, many like me at Autodesk believe that robots will become our assistants. We see robots moving from the factory floor to the construction site as the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction industry and Product Design and Manufacturing industry converge. According to this TED Talk, we may even develop an affection for our robot assistants:
Watching this TED video last week reminded me of a blog post that I wrote after watching Life of Pi.
May 20, 2013
"I love my computer
you make me feel alright
every waking hour
and every lonely night"
— Bad Religion
When I attended Design Night on robotics, there was a discussion as to whether or not robots would ever have emotions. The audience was split about 50-50 in terms of answering yes and no. Last night I watched the movie, Life of Pi, via Netflix. In my opinion, it contained a related conversation between a father, Sanosh, and his young son, Pi, who almost lost an arm while attempting to feed a tiger by hand:
Sanosh Patel: You think tiger is your friend. He is an animal, not a playmate.
Pi Patel: Animals have souls. I have seen it in their eyes.
Sanosh Patel: When you look into his eyes, you are seeing your own emotions reflected back at you.
And there it is — why robots will one day have emotions. Robots will mimic physical characteristics that we humans will interpret as emotions. They will make smiles or frowns with fake lips, have wide-open or droopy mechanical eyes, and perhaps even tears. In the same way Pi believed that animals have souls from what he perceived in the tiger's eyes, people will project emotions on to robots.
As was presented on Design Night, researchers discussed the following:
Panelist: How would you feel if someone took a baseball bat to your refrigerator?
Respondent: I would not like it, but not so bad.
Panelist: How would you feel if someone took a baseball bat to your robot?
Respondent: I think I would feel the same.
Panelist: Then explain this. We had people play with a robot dog. After a short while, we gave them a bat and asked them to destroy the dog. They could not do it.
They say communication is defined by the receiver, not the sender. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I guess it's the same with emotion. People will see physical characteristics that they associate with human emotions and believe that the sender has these emotions when in fact it is they who are projecting the emotions on to the sender. Whoa! In the Design Night example, people believed the mechanical dog had feelings because it acted like a dog even though it was the equivalent of a blender or toaster.
Let me guess. He's angry?
source: fxguide.com
At the start of the Design Night, Adviser to the CEO/CTO, Jonathan Knowles, introduced the panelists and also recognized Dr. Don Greenberg who was in the audience. Dr. Greenberg is a professor at Cornell University and pioneer in computer graphics. Back in the early days had anyone asked him, or anyone else for that matter, if we'd ever see computer graphics that were so good that one could not distinguish them from a photograph, the answers would not have been split 50-50, but 100% no. But just look at visually striking movies, such as Life of Pi, today. No tiger was harmed in the making of the movie because the tiger was computer-generated. Robots are indeed in their infancy, but just give them time. One day we'll say "They're Gr-r-reat!" One day we might not be able to distinguish them from people — much like computer renderings and photographs.
Getting emotional is alive in the lab.
Autodesk has always been an automation company, and today more than ever that means helping people make more things, better things, with less; more and better in terms of increasing efficiency, performance, quality, and innovation; less in terms of time, resources, and negative impacts (e.g., social, environmental). Robots are just one part of that automation that allows customers to do more and better with less.
The Autodesk Galery experience includes
Though there's hype that robots will take our jobs, many like me at Autodesk believe that robots will become our assistants. We see robots moving from the factory floor to the construction site as the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction industry and Product Design and Manufacturing industry converge. According to this TED Talk, we may even develop an affection for our robot assistants:
Watching this TED video last week reminded me of a blog post that I wrote after watching Life of Pi.
May 20, 2013
"I love my computer
you make me feel alright
every waking hour
and every lonely night"
— Bad Religion
When I attended Design Night on robotics, there was a discussion as to whether or not robots would ever have emotions. The audience was split about 50-50 in terms of answering yes and no. Last night I watched the movie, Life of Pi, via Netflix. In my opinion, it contained a related conversation between a father, Sanosh, and his young son, Pi, who almost lost an arm while attempting to feed a tiger by hand:
Sanosh Patel: You think tiger is your friend. He is an animal, not a playmate.
Pi Patel: Animals have souls. I have seen it in their eyes.
Sanosh Patel: When you look into his eyes, you are seeing your own emotions reflected back at you.
And there it is — why robots will one day have emotions. Robots will mimic physical characteristics that we humans will interpret as emotions. They will make smiles or frowns with fake lips, have wide-open or droopy mechanical eyes, and perhaps even tears. In the same way Pi believed that animals have souls from what he perceived in the tiger's eyes, people will project emotions on to robots.
As was presented on Design Night, researchers discussed the following:
Panelist: How would you feel if someone took a baseball bat to your refrigerator?
Respondent: I would not like it, but not so bad.
Panelist: How would you feel if someone took a baseball bat to your robot?
Respondent: I think I would feel the same.
Panelist: Then explain this. We had people play with a robot dog. After a short while, we gave them a bat and asked them to destroy the dog. They could not do it.
They say communication is defined by the receiver, not the sender. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I guess it's the same with emotion. People will see physical characteristics that they associate with human emotions and believe that the sender has these emotions when in fact it is they who are projecting the emotions on to the sender. Whoa! In the Design Night example, people believed the mechanical dog had feelings because it acted like a dog even though it was the equivalent of a blender or toaster.
Let me guess. He's angry?
source: fxguide.com
At the start of the Design Night, Adviser to the CEO/CTO, Jonathan Knowles, introduced the panelists and also recognized Dr. Don Greenberg who was in the audience. Dr. Greenberg is a professor at Cornell University and pioneer in computer graphics. Back in the early days had anyone asked him, or anyone else for that matter, if we'd ever see computer graphics that were so good that one could not distinguish them from a photograph, the answers would not have been split 50-50, but 100% no. But just look at visually striking movies, such as Life of Pi, today. No tiger was harmed in the making of the movie because the tiger was computer-generated. Robots are indeed in their infancy, but just give them time. One day we'll say "They're Gr-r-reat!" One day we might not be able to distinguish them from people — much like computer renderings and photographs.
Getting emotional is alive in the lab.
Autodesk has always been an automation company, and today more than ever that means helping people make more things, better things, with less; more and better in terms of increasing efficiency, performance, quality, and innovation; less in terms of time, resources, and negative impacts (e.g., social, environmental). Robots are just one part of that automation that allows customers to do more and better with less.
Our automation efforts go beyond the paper.
Today's blog post story comes to us from the Forge team. Forge is our application program interface (API) platform and supporting materials (sample code, manuals) as well as a community of developers who uses those APIs. Although Forge is intended for our customers and 3rd party developers to be able to use our web services, we use Forge for our development of the cloud-based services that we offer.
VueOps helps customers maximize facility uptime by integrating their building information through via a platform that optimizes facilities and the teams that support them. VueOps improves the workflow of managed equipment to save valuable time looking for information and planning the work. The time savings helps customers increase resource allocation to preventative maintenance, higher equipment reliability, and profitability. The VueOps visual platform uses intelligent, 3D models to enhance how even the most complex buildings operate.
Owners came to VueOps looking for practical ways to take advantage of Building Information Modeling (BIM) in operations and maintenance. The 3D models used to construct the buildings contained a wealth of information, but they were difficult to link to operational data and enterprise systems. Plus, people without design experience had difficulty navigating the massive files. The VueOps team decided to develop a solution that provided model viewing, data management, and integration with enterprise solutions (such as work-order management systems). So it's no surprise that VueOps adopted the Forge platform to connect cloud-based facilities management with 3D models, equipment data, and enterprise systems.
Forge is defined by 7 groups of APIs:
VueOps developers are making use of 4 of them:
Authentication
Authentication for Forge is based on the industry standard OAuth, specifically OAuth2, that provides for token-based authentication and authorization. The basic flow for using OAuth is:
Since Forge authentication is based on industry standards, the VueOps developers were able to implement security for their solution in a straightforward way.
Data Management API
The Data Management API gives VueOps a unified and consistent way to access their data across BIM 360 Team, Fusion Team, BIM 360 Docs, A360 Personal, and its own Object Storage Service. The Object Storage Service allows an application to download and upload raw files (such as PDF, XLS, DWG, or RVT). Using the Forge Data Management API, VueOps manages data within the model.
Model Derivative API
The Model Derivative API lets VueOps represent and share your designs in different formats, as well as to extract valuable metadata into various object hierarchies. 60 different file input formats are supported. With this API, VueOps can translate your design into different formats, such as STL and OBJ, but the key one is that they can have it translate their designs into SVF for extracting data and for rendering files in the Viewer. The Forge Model Derivative API provides a way for the VueOps team to separate model construction data from operational data — accelerating end users' implementation process. How much time has Forge saved? Leaders at VueOps estimate that Forge has saved as much as 2 years of development time.
Viewer
The Viewer is a WebGL-based, JavaScript library that VueOps uses in 3D and 2D model rendering. The Viewer communicates natively with the Model Derivative API to fetch model data, complying with its authorization and security requirements. The Viewer requires a WebGL-canvas compatible browser:
The Forge Viewer API makes building models in a variety of file formats viewable as lightweight, 3D visualizations. This is a hassle-free way for the VueOps team to share data without having to deal with all of the peculiarities of the various browsers.
VueOps has used the time savings gained with Forge to do more than just go to market sooner. The VueOps team has been able to devote more time to high-value functionality, such as search-driven model viewing — a plus that lets users navigate large models very quickly. And with less time spent on basic development, VueOps can apply more resources to customizing the solution to meet customer needs.
Autodesk has always been an automation company, and today more than ever that means helping people make more things, better things, with less; more and better in terms of increasing efficiency, performance, quality, and innovation; less in terms of time, resources, and negative impacts (e.g., social, environmental). Autodesk Forge is an integral part of our automation plans.
Facilities Management via Forge is done beyond the paper.
Let's say you've been an Autodesk customer for a long time. You've got decades of your intellectual property captured in AutoCAD drawings. If you'd like to leverage that data to showcase your work to your customers, then Autodesk Forge is for you.
Forge is our application program interface (API) platform and supporting materials (sample code, manuals) as well as a community of developers who uses those APIs. Although Forge is intended for our customers and 3rd party developers to be able to use our web services, we use Forge for our development of the cloud-based services that we offer. You can leverage Forge in the same ways that we do.
Forge is defined by 7 groups of APIs:
Authentication
Authentication for Forge is based on the industry standard OAuth, specifically OAuth2, that provides for token-based authentication and authorization. The basic flow for using OAuth is:
Design Automation API
The Design Automation API gives you the ability to run scripts on your design files, taking advantage of the scale of the Forge Platform to automate repetitive tasks. The API currently works with DWG files, but private beta testing is underway for Inventor and Revit files. This is a handy way to publish thousands of drawings to DWF or PDF. "Ordinarily, you would have to download all the files, run a script on them in the AutoCAD desktop software, and then potentially upload them all back to the cloud. Your efficiency would be bottlenecked by the processing power of your computer and your network bandwidth, and you would have to instrument logging and retry logic in your code to ensure that the entire job completed. With the Design Automation API, you can offload all that processing to the Forge Platform, which can process those scripts at a much greater scale and efficiency." [Forge]
Reality Capture API
"The Reality Capture API gives you the ability to use our latest desktop and cloud solution built for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and drone processes, ReCap Photo. You can add geo-based metadata by setting Ground Control Points (GCPs), selecting specific geographic coordinate systems, and tagging images with GPS information. The integration of this geo data results in accurate textured meshes, point clouds, and orthophotos. A reconstruction (Quality) report details the level of accuracy." [Forge]
Data Management API
The Data Management API gives you a unified and consistent way to access your data across BIM 360 Team, Fusion Team, BIM 360 Docs, A360 Personal, and its own Object Storage Service. The Object Storage Service allows your application to download and upload raw files (such as PDF, XLS, DWG, or RVT). Coupling this API with the Model Derivative API, you can accomplish a number of workflows, including accessing a Fusion model in Fusion Team and getting an ordered structure of items, IDs, and properties for generating a bill of materials in a 3rd-party process. Or, you might want to superimpose a Fusion model and a building model to use in the Viewer. [Forge]
Model Derivative API
The Model Derivative API lets you represent and share your designs in different formats, as well as to extract valuable metadata into various object hierarchies. 60 different file input formats are supported. With this API, you can translate your design into different formats, such as DWF, STL, or OBJ, but the key one is that you can have it translate your designs into SVF for extracting data and for rendering files in the Viewer.
Viewer
The Viewer is a WebGL-based, JavaScript library for your use in 3D and 2D model rendering. The Viewer communicates natively with the Model Derivative API to fetch model data, complying with its authorization and security requirements. The Viewer requires a WebGL-canvas compatible browser:
This is a hassle-free way to share your company's data to your customers without having to deal with all of the peculiarities of these various browsers.
Webhooks API
The Webhooks API is currently undergoing beta testing internally and by Autodesk partners. A webhook sends data to endpoints (URLs) when a certain event occurs. It is triggered by events occurring in web applications. It then sends real-time data to applications listening to it. Since the data is sent immediately, using a webhook is more efficient that frequently polling for updates. The Forge Webhooks API allows your application to listen to Forge Data Management events and receive notifications when they occur. When an event is triggered, the Forge Webhooks API sends a notification to a callback URL you have defined. You can customize the types of events and resources to receive notifications for. For example, you can set up a webhook to send notifications when files are modified or deleted in a specified hub or project. The basic workflow is:
Autodesk has always been an automation company, and today more than ever that means helping people make more things, better things, with less; more and better in terms of increasing efficiency, performance, quality, and innovation; less in terms of time, resources, and negative impacts (e.g., social, environmental). Autodesk Forge is an integral part of our automation plans.
So regardless of the number of gigabytes of data you have in your design files, you can use these APIs to extract data, surface it, and allow your customers to view and interact with it on your own website. To forge is to make or shape a metal object by heating it in a fire or furnace or beating and hammering it. In terms of customer showcasing, your data is the metal, and our APIs are the heat.
With help from Forge, DWF goes beyond the paper.
Editor's Note: With the addition of the Reality Capture APIs, this is an update of a previous blog post.
Let's say you've been an Autodesk customer for a long time. You've got decades of your intellectual property captured in AutoCAD drawings or DWF files. If you'd like to leverage that data to showcase your work to your customers, then Autodesk Forge is for you.
Forge is our application program interface (API) platform and supporting materials (sample code, manuals) as well as a community of developers who uses those APIs. Although Forge is intended for our customers and 3rd party developers to be able to use our web services, we use Forge for our development of the cloud-based services that we offer. You can leverage Forge in the same ways that we do.
Forge is defined by 5 groups of APIs:
Design Automation API
The Design Automation API gives you the ability to run scripts on your design files, taking advantage of the scale of the Forge Platform to automate repetitive tasks. The API currently works with DWG files, but private beta testing is underway for Inventor and Revit files. This is a handy way to publish thousands of drawings to DWF or PDF. "Ordinarily, you would have to download all the files, run a script on them in the AutoCAD desktop software, and then potentially upload them all back to the cloud. Your efficiency would be bottlenecked by the processing power of your computer and your network bandwidth, and you would have to instrument logging and retry logic in your code to ensure that the entire job completed. With the Design Automation API, you can offload all that processing to the Forge Platform, which can process those scripts at a much greater scale and efficiency." [Forge]
The pieces of this part of the Forge API include:
Reality Capture API
"The Reality Capture API gives you the ability to use our latest desktop and cloud solution built for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and drone processes, ReCap Photo. You can add geo-based metadata by setting Ground Control Points (GCPs), selecting specific geographic coordinate systems, and tagging images with GPS information. The integration of this geo data results in accurate textured meshes, point clouds, and orthophotos." [Forge]
The API for the Photogrammetry engine can process up to 1000 geo-tagged images captured by a UAV or drone with a (rectilinear lens) camera. Ground Control Points (GCPs) can be specified to mark precise coordinates of known points in the scene to generate highly accurate 3D models. The geo-located input as well as output data can be specified in any geo-referenced coordinate system.
The output data from the Photogrammetry Converter includes:
The API can also be used to request that the Reporter generate a Quality report that details the level of accuracy.
For a Reconstruction created from non-aerial images, the API can process up to 300 images of objects, statues, building facades, and interiors. It generates high resolution, photo realistic textured mesh models that can be viewed and edited in Autodesk ReCap Photo to create various digital assets.
The output data includes:
Data Management API
The Data Management API gives you a unified and consistent way to access your data across BIM 360 Team, Fusion Team, BIM 360 Docs, A360 Personal, and its own Object Storage Service. The Object Storage Service allows your application to download and upload raw files (such as PDF, XLS, DWG, or RVT). Coupling this API with the Model Derivative API, you can accomplish a number of workflows, including accessing a Fusion model in Fusion Team and getting an ordered structure of items, IDs, and properties for generating a bill of materials in a 3rd-party process. Or, you might want to superimpose a Fusion model and a building model to use in the Viewer. [Forge]
The pieces of this part of the Forge API include:
As mentioned, these pieces allow you to interact with several Autodesk hubs:
BIM 360 Docs — keeps teams on-track with the latest construction drawings, documents, and models. Teams can share construction drawings across the entire team and perform constructability reviews, manage issues, and RFIs. BIM 360 Docs reduces rework risks through versioning and permissions. Users can manage contracts and maintain document control. When construction project teams have the right information at the right time, work happens faster. BIM 360 Docs lets teams publish, manage, review and approve all construction drawings, documents, and models — anytime, anywhere.
Fusion Team — lets teams share files securely across departments and supply chains. Users can view models instantly and review designs in real time. Teams communicate better and host real-time design review sessions to make decisions together. Fusion Team centralizes file version history, comments, and mark-ups from distributed teams. Teams can include their supply chains in the design process. Models are safeguarded from download and user access is managed by project administrators. Users can view, share, review, and markup more than 50 2D and 3D design file formats in the browser including STEP, SKP, Inventor (IAM, IPT), Filmbox (FBX), IGS and more. Teams can access critical project details from anywhere on a web browser or mobile device.
BIM 360 Team — provides a cloud based project management workspace for team members, helping them communicate and stay organized at all times. It allows teams to hold real-time design review sessions with all project stakeholders, no matter where they are. Clients, team members, and stakeholders markup and comment directly on designs. Online project collaboration allows user roles and permissions to be managed and controlled by project administrators. Users can view, share, review, and markup more than 50 2D and 3D design file formats in the browser including AutoCAD (DWG, CAD), DXF, Revit (RVT), IFC, and Navisworks (NWD, NWF). Cloud-based project collaboration makes files accessible on mobile or desktop via the BIM 360 Team mobile app.
A360 Personal — allows individuals to view and share files — including 2D and 3D designs — on the go, on any device. A360 store data where users can find it and find it when they need it. Right in the browser — without any software, users interact directly with 3D models: Zoom in, walk through, create a section analysis, and orbit, all in real time. Files are accessed by a secure link that an individual sends via email or chat, or embeds into a site. Users navigate through models, capture feedback, and make decisions together. A360 automatically saves edits and comments. Users can search text in documents, metadata on items or components within designs and models, and comments or posts by team members. The data is stored securely in the cloud. It's backed up and recoverable. Users control who can view their files and for how long.
Model Derivative API
The Model Derivative API lets you represent and share your designs in different formats, as well as to extract valuable metadata into various object hierarchies. 60 different file input formats are supported. With this API, you can translate your design into different formats, such as STL and OBJ, but the key one is that you can have it translate your designs into SVF for extracting data and for rendering files in the Viewer.
The pieces of this part of the Forge API include:
With this API, you can translate your design into different formats, such as STL and OBJ, but the key one is that you can have it translate your designs into SVF for extracting data and for rendering files in the Viewer.
Viewer
The Viewer is a WebGL-based, JavaScript library for your use in 3D and 2D model rendering. The Viewer communicates natively with the Model Derivative API to fetch model data, complying with its authorization and security requirements. The Viewer requires a WebGL-canvas compatible browser:
The Model Derivative API provides a URN to the SVF file. A URN (Uniform Resource Name) is an internet resource with a name that, unlike a Uniform Resource Locator (URL), has persistent significance — that is, the owner of the URN can expect that another program will always be able to find the resource. A frequent problem in using the cloud is that web content is moved to a new site or a new page on the same site. Since hyperlinks reply on URLs, they no longer work when content is moved. URNs do not have this problem. The Viewer converts the SVF (Simple Vector Format) into WebGL that the browser can display natively without an additional plug-in.
Allowing Forge to render your files in the Viewer is a hassle-free way to share your company's data to your customers without having to deal with all of the peculiarities of these various browsers.
So regardless of the number of gigabytes of data you have in your design files, you can use these APIs to extract data, surface it, and allow your customers to view and interact with it on your own website. To forge is to make or shape a metal object by heating it in a fire or furnace or beating and hammering it. In terms of customer showcasing, your data is the metal, and our APIs are the heat.
Once again, just as DWF lets you go beyond the paper, Forge lets you go beyond the application.
The purpose of DWF files is to go beyond the paper. DWF files can be shared with stakeholders who do not have design authoring software. They are integral to the electronic review process in that they can be marked up and measured. If you have decades of your intellectual property captured in DWF files and would like to leverage that data to showcase your work to your customers, then Autodesk Forge is for you.
Forge is our application program interface (API) platform and supporting materials (sample code, manuals) as well as a community of developers who uses those APIs. Although Forge is intended for our customers and 3rd party developers to be able to extend our web services, we use Forge for our development of the cloud-based services that we offer. You can leverage Forge in the same ways that we do.
In terms of what you can do with Forge and DWF files. Forge is defined by 4 groups of APIs:
Design Automation API
The Design Automation API gives you the ability to run scripts on your design files, leveraging the scale of the Forge Platform to automate repetitive tasks. The API currently works with DWG files, but we have plans to expand to file types generated by other design software. For example, this is a handy way to publish thousands of drawings to DWF or PDF. "Ordinarily, you would have to download all the files, run a script on them in the AutoCAD desktop software, and then potentially upload them all back to the cloud. Your efficiency would be bottlenecked by the processing power of your computer and your network bandwidth, and you would have to instrument logging and retry logic in your code to ensure that the entire job completed. With the Design Automation API, you can offload all that processing to the Forge Platform, which can process those scripts at a much greater scale and efficiency." [Forge]
The pieces of this part of the Forge API include:
Data Management API
The Data Management API gives you a unified and consistent way for you to access your data across BIM 360 Team, Fusion Team, BIM 360 Docs, A360 Personal, and the Object Storage Service. The Object Storage Service allows your application to download and upload raw files (such as DWG oor DWF). [Forge]
The pieces of this part of the Forge API include:
Model Derivative API
The Model Derivative API lets you represent and share your designs in different formats, as well as to extract valuable metadata into various object hierarchies. 60 different file input formats are supported.
The pieces of this part of the Forge API include:
With this API, you can translate your design into different formats, such as DWF , but the key one is that you can have it translate your designs into SVF for extracting data and for rendering files in the Viewer.
Viewer
The Viewer is a WebGL-based, JavaScript library for your use in 3D and 2D model rendering. The Viewer communicates natively with the Model Derivative API to fetch model data, complying with its authorization and security requirements. The Viewer requires a WebGL-canvas compatible browser:
The Model Derivative API provides a URN to the SVF file. A URN (Uniform Resource Name) is an internet resource with a name that, unlike a Uniform Resource Locator (URL), has persistent significance — that is, the owner of the URN can expect that another program will always be able to find the resource. A frequent problem in using the cloud is that web content is moved to a new site or a new page on the same site. Since hyperlinks reply on URLs, they no longer work when content is moved. URNs do not have this problem. The Viewer converts the SVF (Simple Vector Format) into WebGL that the browser can display natively without an additional plug-in.
Allowing Forge to render your files in the Viewer is a hassle-free way to share your company's data to your customers without having to deal with all of the peculiarities of these various browsers.
The Autodesk technology that was once known as the "Large Model Viewer" (because it handles 3D models larger than Autodesk Design Review) is the same viewing technology that is now called the Autodesk Forge Viewer. In addition, leveraging webGL offers the advantage that the browser user does not have to download and install any additional plug-ins. Throughout the years, we've heard from customers that downloading and installing Autodesk Design Review can be a challenge as some users do not have administrative rights on their machines. In addition, Autodesk Design Review is Microsoft Windows-only. The Autodesk Forge Viewer supports browsers that can consume WebGL independent of operating system.
Just as DWF lets you go beyond the paper, Forge lets you go beyond the application.
The It's Alive in the Lab blog mentioned that there's a new version of Autodesk Design Review available:
DWF continues to go beyond the paper.
Here is the latest software for processing PDF and DWF files to paper.
To go beyond the paper, DWF has to be able to get to paper first.
— Scott Sheppard