Adsk vs ODA: Law Suit Runs Out of Purpose

Autodesk objects to how the Open Design Alliance implemented TrustedDWG. ODA removes code.

ODA objects to how Autodesk handles and describes TrustedDWG. Autodesk changes description*. With AutoCAD 2008 due to ship in two months, its handling of TrustedDWG code may well be changed.

Are we running out of reasons to have a law suit?

(*) Autodesk's wording is partly misleading**: "The TrustedDWG notification may be easily disabled by checking the box identified for that purpose." That's true for just one of three notifications. "Checking the box" only turns off the dialog box; the warning statement at the command line and the ! icon on the status bar remain. Send your Webmaster back to the editing desk.

(**) Autodesk's Web page on TrustedDWG has new wording, which shows malleability, a drawback to the Internet. Still, the original wording is cast in stone, because Autodesk included it as an exhibit in their original court filing. Oops: can the ODA use this change in wording as part of their countersuit?

Comments

[Mike]

The core merits or purpose of the issue is support.

I think it still goes back to an article that Martyn (?) wrote quoting Carl B. about support issues with customers who get DWG clone files and ask Adesk/channel to help fix them.

The comment stuck out to me because it was the first time I had heard anyone from Adesk state anything about the ODA libraries that caused them grief other than their existance.

[R. Paul Waddington]

'The core merits or purpose of the issue is support.'

I don't think so. Autodesk deliberately used DWGCHECK in a new form to achieve what they have done and are using support as an excuse to back their argument. At the same time they are knowingly and deliberately wasting their customers' time and money hoping it will 'rally support' for their cause. Win, loose or draw; What's in it for Autodesk's customers? Nothing except more expense.

DWGCHECK can simply be returned to its earlier form. The wording is, and was, appropriate and for those of us that chose to it can be TURNED OFF.

That is, OFF, not glowing in the dark!

[Deelip Menezes]

"Are we running out of reasons to have a law suit?"

I don't think so. Quoting from the Autodesk motion for Preliminary Injunction "the ODA has not represented to the court that it will permanently refrain from reinstituting the simulated TrustedDWG technology in its future libraries".