Through the Interface

Autodesk SoCap

I’m excited to announce the newest member of the Autodesk product portfolio, Autodesk SoCap. The term “SoCap” stands for “Software Capture”, in much the same way as ReCap stands for “Reality Capture”. SoCap is a tool that helps you capture existing software behaviour as code, just as ReCap helps you capture a 3D scene as a point cloud. For SoCap to do its thing, you point it at the piece of software whose behaviour you want to capture – whether desktop software on Windows/Linux/OS X, mobile software targeting iOS/Android* or the URL of a cloud-based app – and SoCap... Read more →

AutoCAD 2014 for Mac

Yesterday the first AutoCAD 2014 for Mac customers pealed the virtual shrinkwrap off their shiny digital copies. Here’s some info on this release from my friend Micah, the AutoCAD for Mac Product Manager: There's been quite a lot of press on the 2014 release already, both from Autodesk and beyond (here are but a few examples of the coverage to date). The release schedule for our Mac version has now been synced with Apple’s annual announcements, allowing us to take advantage of the latest & greatest OS X capabilities but also to be part of the launch event (however... Read more →

Using AutoCAD’s Bindable Object Layer to change the current view using .NET

After looking at how the Bindable Object Layer (BOL) in AutoCAD might be used to get information about the current drawing, in today’s post we’re going to see how it can also be used to manipulate that data (in a fairly limited, albeit useful, way). But first, let’s talk a bit about the origins of the BOL. It was first introduced as an architectural feature of AutoCAD when we were looking at delivering AutoCAD for Mac. It’s common, these days, for programming frameworks to provide some kind of data-binding facility to simplify the creation of UIs: both WPF and... Read more →

Creating a 3D viewer for our Apollonian service using iOS – Part 1

Last week, it was all about Android. This week, I’ve started taking the plunge into the world of iOS. I’ve been using a Mac for some time – mainly to wean myself away from being so Windows-centric, but also with a view to working more with AutoCAD for Mac from a development perspective – but this was the first time I’d actually forced myself to write anything for either OS X or iOS. It all came as a bit of a shock, initially, even though I was generally aware of the strangeness of Objective-C with respect to its message-passing... Read more →

ADN DevCast Episode 5 – AutoCAD for Mac development

After a longer-than-anticipated break, Stephen and Fenton are back with an all-new ADN DevCast. This one focuses on developing applications to work with AutoCAD for Mac. They’ve managed to keep the timing of the DevCast down to 20 minutes, so we’re trying just posting this online (rather than having a separate download for offline viewing). Do post a comment if that doesn’t work well for you. Read more →

Mac Attack

Well, I’ve finally taken the plunge and ordered a MacBook Pro. I have very little experience with Apple products – other than owning an aging iPod Photo and having bought an iPod Touch for my wife – so this is quite a departure for me. I’m far from being ready to call myself “a Mac” rather than “a PC”, but if I’m to talk intelligently about working with AutoCAD for Mac then it was bound to happen, sooner or later. I ordered the 15” model with a screen and processor upgrade. I’m very curious to see how it performs.... Read more →

AutoCAD for Mac

Well, it’s finally been announced. After months (probably ev en more) of intense speculation, Autodesk has just announced that after a break of several (perhaps 15, depending on how you count them) releases, we’re planning to deliver a version of AutoCAD that once again works natively on Mac machines. [For some history regarding the original Mac port of AutoCAD, see the first part of my interview with John Walker – you’ll need to scroll way down or just search for “Macintosh”.] To clarify something about this release, it is not AutoCAD LT – it has full 3D editing capabilities... Read more →