[freearchitecture] Re: Welcome to the freearchitecture list

[digitect at mindspring.com]

on 2/6/2003 7:14 AM Chris Croome said the following:
> 
> This list has been set up following a couple of posts on slashdot:
> 
>   digitect has posted a comment in reply to your comment.
>     Re:It's about apps, not the OS/distribution
>     http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=52882&cid=5231696
> 
>    Replied to:
>     Re:It's about apps, not the OS/distribution
>     http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=52882&cid=5231480
> 
> I think the next thing to do next is to post all the ideas we have
> and then work out what can be done about them :-)

I can imagine we'll have have quite a few! 

Maybe it would help if I offered a brief introduction about myself, it
may give you an insights to my goals.

I currently work as an Architectural Intern for a largish
architectural firm in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina.
(www.obrienatkins.com, had absolutely nothing to do with the design!)
I'm degreed in architecture and in the process of completing my exams
to become licensed.

I've used both DataCAD and AutoCAD extensively, and have been involved
with considerable customization of both. My current shop uses AutoCAD
and a colleague here and I have written a customization suite we call
DodoCAD, which is a settings/block/utilities system written in both
AutoLISP and VBA. It's licensed under the GPL and we're itching to
share it with others and get a community together that could help us
develop it further.

The biggest frustration with DodoCAD is that it is based around
AutoCAD, which is both proprietary and available only on proprietary
operating systems. My long term goal is to be on a team developing a
GPL CAD for Linux, so DodoCAD is seen only as a stop-gap measure at
this point. I'm concerned that efforts directed at this might
comprimise efforts for a Free CAD app, a la typical RMS arguments.

I'm also interested in CAD Standards. Here in America we have two
major systems in place, the AEC CADD Standard
(http://tsc.wes.army.mil/products/standards/aec/intro.asp) and the
National CAD Standard (http://www.nationalcadstandard.org/). Both are
similar (supposedly the first is a subset of the second), and have
been derived out of the considerable CAD standard wranglings among the
various agencies and departments of the US government, the
Architecture and Engineering professions and many other parties with
vested interests in organizing CAD data.

Finally, having been a DataCAD user, I am interested in Free standards
of CAD file formats. OpenDWG (http://www.opendwg.org/) collected
numerous CAD applications together to agreement on a common version of
the proprietary AutoCAD DWG file. Unfortunately, their open standard
appears neither open or standard, but it's a start toward file format
ubiquity. Hopefully, a GPL CAD application could use XML/GZ or
similar as a truly Free file format.

Oh, well, a bit rambly, but then I never was very good at
introductions.


Steve Hall  [ {digitect}AT{mindspring}DOT{com} ]