Between the Lines

Photos from Yesterdays 35th Birthday of Autodesk

Yesterday Autodesk celebrated its 35th birthday and employees, partners, and customers joined in to mark the occasion. From Portland, San Francisco, Manchester, Boston, Toronto, Moscow, Neuchâtel, and many other locations and remote offices there were employees in old Autodesk memorabilia and cakes. It was a lot of fun seeing all the nostalgia and stories in Twitter, Facebook, and other social media as well as in person. In the Lake Oswego Oregon office which is in a suburb of Portland, we... Read more →

Retro Autodesk Logo

On this 35th birthday of Autodesk, it seems appropriate to fly the old calipers logo. Here is a DWG file for the logo. http://autodesk.blogs.com/files/old-adsk-logo.dwg Read more about the early days of Autodesk at founder John Walker’s website Fourmilab. Read more →

Happy Birthday Gift to BTL Readers

I received a nice email from a longtime Autodesk product trainer and friend Matt Murphy. He and his company are offering a little something special to Between the Lines readers today to celebrate the 35th birthday of Autodesk. It is some free Autodesk product training. How wicked cool is that? Thank you Matt! 35 Years already, Autodesk? Wow, how the time flies when you’ve been busy teaching, constructing, manufacturing, animating, designing, and, of course, having a whole lot of fun!... Read more →

Happy 35th Birthday Autodesk!

On this day 35 years ago in Mill Valley California, Autodesk was founded. Our customers and partners around the world (technically outer space as well) have done so many amazing things over the past 35 years, and so many amazing things yet to come. Today, many are wearing Autodesk old memorabilia such as old shirts and sharing old stories. I am wearing my “AutoCAD R14 Faster, Smarter, Better” tee shirt. I have an office full of my old Autodesk shirts... Read more →

Autodesk Feedback Community Planned Outage January 28th, 2017

The Autodesk Feedback Community is where most of the Autodesk Betas take place. From time to time we need to upgrade hardware and do some database upgrades. We never take an outage lightly on this large user community, but there are times when it needs to be done and this is one of them but thankfully a short planned outage. Planned Maintenance: Saturday January 28th 6pm PST until approximately 7pm PST. The Feedback Community will be offline for approximately 1... Read more →

Autodesk 35th Next Monday – Wear Your Oldest Autodesk Shirt

So next Monday Autodesk officially turns 35 years old. I am not sure if that requires a cake, beer, pizza, or just a thoughtful acknowledgement of all the years and amazing customers that made this possible. I think 35 years in tech and the design industry is a big milestone as there are not many in than club, not even Adobe is 35 yet. I hope some Autodesk offices and colleagues will stop next Monday and reflect on what an... Read more →

It’s the Beginning of the 2017

At the beginning of the year it is a great opportunity to start fresh along with... Read more →

Learn to Machine Like a Boss

So you are interested in cutting some steel and making something, we have some great software and there is great training to help you master CAM (Computer Aided Manufacturing) and CNC (Computer Numeric Control). So maybe you are using Autodesk Inventor with HSM for your CAD/CAM power duo or using Autodesk Fusion 360 with its awesome built in CAM features and just need to get your machining skills up to par. Back in November at Autodesk University 2016 we had... Read more →

FIRST Robotics FRC STEAMWORKS 2017

Details of FIRST STEAMWORKS 2017 Robotics Game Revealed And they were off as of just over a week ago on January 7th reading the game rules, discussing strategies, and then talking about design of their robot to best compete this year. This is my second year participating with Team 1540 Flaming Chickens. Last year among the thousands of teams they made it to the World Finals. Team 1540 already has their design all designed in one week and sourcing parts... Read more →

Seriously Mother Nature

I am not sure what is going on up here in Portland Oregon, but we have another weather impacted day that has shuttered schools. It used to be that we could expect a day of snow and it melted fast and a couple freezing rain events due to the Columbia Gorge, but that has not been the case the past two winters. We seem to have had storm after storm and this past week a storm dumped 14 inches of... Read more →

35 Years of Autodesk and AutoCAD Memories

In response to my post about AutoCAD turning 35, my email inbox and twitter feed is full and I am so grateful for the response. It is so amazing to read about when you started using AutoCAD and the stories about Autodesk and also the photos. A little known fact is AutoCAD 1.0 wasn’t shipped to customers so the first release was actually AutoCAD version 1.1. Here is quote from a customer that started on the very first shipping AutoCAD... Read more →

Another Snow Day in Portland

We typically do not get snow or big snowstorms here in Portland, but this year…SnowMG. This is the third big storm. I spent 4.5 hours on the freeway in a traffic jam due to an accident that then turned into snowed in vehicles becoming stuck in a parking lot from hell. We closed the Autodesk office today out of concern for the safety of our employees and also due to the weather and closed roads. At home the electricity and... Read more →

The Best of Lynn Allen’s AutoCAD Tips & Tricks

For both AutoCAD and AutoCAD LT For over 10 years, AutoCAD expert Lynn Allen has produced an annual collection of her top tips and tricks for AutoCAD and AutoCAD LT. This year, using feedback from AutoCAD users around the globe, she put together an exclusive collection of her – and your – favorite and most requested tips and tricks. All for free. http://autode.sk/2igoPrH Read more →

Generative Designed Elbo Chair One of 2016’s Most Innovative Objects

Wired has just ranked the Autodesk Elbo Chair third on its list of “The Most Innovative Objects of 2016”. Last summer, my teammate Arthur Harsuvanakit and Autodesk intern Brittany Presten set out to use a chair as a design space for Project Dreamcatcher, working with the software to generate solutions that were feasible and sensible to fabricate using wood as the material and a CNC router for fabrication. This is what we do in the Office of the CTO “OCTO”. Read more →

New Year

I'm back after just returning from my extended annual week of rest vacation. I spent my vacation snowshoeing a weekend in the snow up on Mount Hood then escaping away from the computer in sunny warm Mexico SCUBA diving with friends and seeing maker space\s and beaches. It was an amazing experience and a tradition to spend New Year Eve there I may do every year now. More details on the trip later as I need to go chip my... Read more →