I’ve had a draft of this blog post lying around since May 2007. When I first started it, it was titled “AutoCAD on alternative platforms”. It was mostly my thoughts on why it would be good for everyone involved if Autodesk decided to make AutoCAD run on systems other than Windows. Last week, with release of 2011 line-up of its products, Autodesk has deprecated that blog post.  It no longer is a question if Autodesk is going to offer their main products to customers running “alternative” platforms. Now it is just a question of when is it going to be officially announced. If you can’t wait to dump Windows and only AutoCAD/Revit are holding you back, read on and see what the future holds.

Why do you think Autodesk is working on cross-platform versions of AutoCAD and Revit?
A few reasons actually, but one of them leaves no doubt. AutoCAD and Revit 2011 ship with a few core files of the Qt framework. Qt what? I recommend you click the link and read a bit more but long story short it’s a library for building user interfaces that runs on wide range of platforms. All the major desktop ones (Windows, Mac Os X and Linux), but also a number of mobile and embedded systems.

Oh really? How can you tell ?
Go to the main application directory of your AutoCAD or Revit 2011 and see if you can find those files: QtCore4.dll, QtGui4.dll and QtXml4.dll. There you go. The core of the Qt framework inside your Autodesk product. What more evidence do you need?

Seriously? Do they use it already?
Seems like they do. Here’s an error message that was displayed when I renamed one of those files inside the Revit 2011 installation:

Revit error message - Qt library file missing

OK, but why does it mean that they *will* release those products on other platforms?

Because that is the only reason that could justify using Qt. It simply wouldn’t make sense to waste time and money to migrate away from native Windows API and not take advantage of what Qt offers. Thanks to using Qt the same code base can be used to build an application running on different platforms, which means reaching new customer base at minimal expense. Seriously, using Qt and not going cross-platforms would be like buying a plane to use it for drag racing instead of flying.

What do you mean by alternative platforms?
Qt can run on pretty much anything that runs on electricity, so possibilities are endless but I think that Autodesk will just dip their toes in cross-platform development by releasing those products on Mac OS X. It already is a reasonably sized market with a high growth rate, so in makes a lot of economic sense. Hopefully, later they’ll also decide to go to Linux as well, but I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for that to happen.

Why wasn’t it announced officially?
I don’t know, ask Autodesk. Seriously… go and ask. Call, email, send a pigeon. I guess it just the usual mixture of politics and marketing. The news that Maya 2011 is getting a Qt UI was made official long time ago. I hope that we’ll hear more news during the April 19th event but nothing is guaranteed, and even though I would be really disappointed there is a chance that nothing will happen in the 2011 product cycle. We’ll see.

What does it mean in terms of UI look and feel? Is it going to change a lot?
Certainly not in the 2011 cycle since that ship has sailed, but even later not necessarily. It is possible to mix elements of Windows toolkit with parts using Qt framework – Qt widgets can live inside traditional Windows interface and the other way around so the Windows version doesn’t have to change in a major way. I expect the Windows versions to evolve around the same concept that Autodesk was trying to get us used to for the last few versions. Fear not, the ribbon is here to stay.

It’s a different story on the Mac. Qt hasn’t got an equivalent of the ribbon in its toolbox so it will be either replaced by a bit more traditional UI or recreated as a custom widget (which I find hard to believe). With Maya 2011, Autodesk decided to use Qt only on both platforms and it makes a lot of sense if you decide to start from scratch. In case of AutoCAD and Revit both of which have just got nice new interfaces it would be a bit of waste of time and money and in my opinion a step back in terms of visual quality. Below you can see screenshots of the new UI for Maya running on Windows and Mac OS X. I’m not hugely impressed with the result, but for Maya it is probably a step in a good direction. For AutoCAD and Revit that would be a big regress. You shouldn’t also judge Qt by what you see below. It is a very flexible and a highly customizable toolkit and the quality of the interface created with it is completely up to the developer.

Maya 2011 running on Windows

Maya 2011 running on Mac OS X

Is Qt the best solution? Cross-platform vs native?
Good question. Unfortunately it is quite hard to define best. In a perfect world, without lawyers and accountants, best would mean fully native version of given application on every platform. While not very cost effective, this is the solution that guarantees the best possible integration of the application with surrounding environment. There are some good examples of this approach. Microsoft’s own Office 2011 for Mac OS X is created as a native Cocoa application. As you can see on those leaked screenshots, they have even recreated the ribbon! Mac version of Mindjet’s MindManager is also a completely native port, providing Mac users with an interface that provides experience similar to other Mac apps. That would be the best solution in a perfect world but that’s not where we are. We already know that Autodesk has gone the Qt way, so let’s just hope that their developers do a good job and get the best out of what they have to work with.

OK. What else?
Have a look here. It’s a web page that lists all the LGPL libraries that Autodesk is using. Since they chose to use the open source version of Qt they are legally obliged to redistribute the libraries that they use. That page alone wouldn’t mean much, since Maya 2011 also has a Qt UI, but we’ve already established that AutoCAD and Revit 2011 actually include those files in the default installation. It will be interesting to keep an eye on this page and see what other open source software Autodesk is going to use.

Final words
Back in 2007 when I researched the topic of AutoCAD running on Linux and Mac, I was hugely surprised with how aggressively current AutoCAD/Revit users were opposed to the idea of Autodesk bringing those products to other platforms. A lot of CAD “pundits” have been displaying an incredibly hostile attitude claiming that by investing in alternative versions of its products Autodesk would lose focus and the quality and the pace of development would suffer from that. This was a very strange thing to see since it pretty much meant that there is a lot of people that are not really happy with the quality/feature set of Autodesk products but they still use them for some reason while waiting for Autodesk to magically fix them. Some of those opinions sounded so demanding that it was obvious that their authors thought that by buying a product they gain shareholder-like powers and rights. I’m happy that Autodesk seems to have ignored those lunatics.

I really hope that Mac OS X versions of AutoCAD and Revit will be announced soon. I’m pretty sure that majority of Autodesk customers will appreciate the freedom of choice of the system in which they have to work every day. A lot of users that have been running Autodesk products in virtualized environments will be relieved that they don’t have to compromise on speed and system integration. For me it means that I’ll be one step close to the dream of coming to work and not booting into Windows.

How much confidence do I have in what I have written here? Well, if I had some loose cash lying around I would certainly buy some Autodesk stock. Implications of going cross-platform will certainly sound very optimistic to investors and once it is all officially announced I’m sure the price of Autodesk shares will go up, probably quite a bit.

Oh, one more thing. If you actually know that anything I have written here is wrong, let me know. I’ll be happy to either correct it or admit that my predictions have been wrong.

Update: I have just confirmed that the same set of Qt files can be found inside Inventor 2011 as well. Looks like Autodesk is planning to go cross-platform with the whole product line. I love it. The sooner the better.

Links:

Qt framework website: http://qt.nokia.com

Examples of Qt application: http://qt.nokia.com/qt-in-use/target/desktop

MS Office 2011 for Mac gallery: http://www.boygeniusreport.com/gallery/?gallery=23&pid=295

Open source libraries used by Autodesk: http://www.autodesk.com/lgplsource

Disclaimer:
All information included in this post comes from publicly available sources and in best case can be considered as bold speculation. I have no privileged or inside information. All opinions expressed here are my own and not those of my employer or Autodesk Inc.

Why would it be so beautiful?

Just a few of my personal reasons why I would love to see that happening:

• Big blow to Microsoft’s dominance
  I have nothing against Microsoft as a software maker. I just hate that I have no choice and when I’m not happy with their product I can’t simply switch to something different. For me, just like for millions of engineers, designers, detailers, draftsmen and other technical professionals there is no choice – we run whatever AutoCAD and other Autodesk products run on.
• I would get to work on a Mac
  Don’t get me wrong – I’m not an Apple fan boy. My system of choice would probably be Linux, but since I am stuck on an evil proprietary platform I’d rather be stuck on something as good as Mac OS (security, performance, stability, usability) additionally running on beautifully designed hardware.
• No funny looks at work
  Our industry (CAD/CAM/CAE) is so Windows centric that when I tell my colleagues at work that I am sometimes using a Mac at home they look at me as if I was trying to be original. A snob with a girly notebook (my gf’s MacBook).
• Just for the fun of it
  It would be really exciting to watch, just like a big storm on the sea. Not a lot of people would probably see that one coming and implications of such a move by Apple would be huge to the whole industry.

What could make you think it is possible?

During the last couple of months a few things have happened that could be seen as signals of something significant going on. No hard evidence but still enough for a hungry mind…

• This job posting.
  Autodesk is looking at hiring a BDM for AutoCAD and Apple is mentioned as one of vendors who would be selling and marketing it. Here’s an excerpt in case the original expires:

Business Development Manager: AutoCAD	Posted 02-Nov-2007
Location: 3950 Civic, SRF
Are you ready to travel the world, develop partnerships with major technology players, and grow a half billion dollar business as the Business Development Manager for AutoCAD? You must be a highly-motivated business person ready to develop a product strategy for selling and marketing AutoCAD with vendors such as hp, Dell, APPLE, Lenovo, Amazon, CDW, and many others.

• Windows application compatibility in Mac OS
  A few weeks ago someone has noticed something that was interpreted as a chance for Windows compatibility coming to Leopard in future versions.
• Autodesk buying out its own shares
  I won’t pretend I know what and why they are doing but maybe they want to accumulate some stock to actually have something to offer to Apple?
  (Edit 1:10 pm, 20 Dec 2007)
• They both like nice new toys
  Multitouch namely. We all know the beautiful and intuitive multitouch interface of iPhone and iPod touch, but if you read Scott Sheppard’s blog you have probably seen this and earlier posts on the subject. Multitouch interfaces seem to be perfect for CAD software and Apple definitely knows a lot about them.

Why I don’t believe it will happen?

I would be happy to eat my gym shorts if I’m not right but I simply think that Apple buying Autodesk is not possible. No matter how strong you wish for something to happen it won’t happen JUST BECAUSE you wish, unfortunately…

• Autodesk and Microsoft are too close
  Autodesk is all buddy-buddy with Microsoft. The next version of AutoCAD looks as if it was an Office 2007 application (ribbon control). They have created their DWFx file format as an implementation of Microsoft’s XPS and it is natively viewable in Vista. I wouldn’t be surprised if the next generation omnipotent file format called DWGx (if rumors turn out to be true) would be somehow based on the OOXML format.
• Too much work to port products to Mac OS
  I can’t even imagine how much time and resources would it take to port, even just the most important Autodesk products, to Mac OS. Maybe temporary use of some kind of Windows compatibility (as mentioned above) would be a good temporary solution but I find it hardly believable that anyone would like to use critical applications in non-native environment.
• Too much resistance from Windows users
  A lot of computer users don’t cope with a change very well. Especially if they use their computers as tools at work and they only care about getting their job done. For them a change of platform would be just an unnecessary disruption.

Why would it make sense for Apple?

Obviously it’s all about the number of users and revenue that they bring to the company. Think about over 8 million of seats of AutoCAD (only legal) and multiply that by the price of a single Leopard license. That alone would give a number close to $1 billion and although it is the biggest, AutoCAD is not the only Autodesk product that people would like to use on a Mac.

• Access to a huge community of technical clients
  Apple hardware and Mac OS would become an instant standard in a number of different engineering industries. They are already pretty strong (or even dominant) amongst professional photographers and graphic designers. There is also a decent number of architects using ArchiCAD on Macs but bringing Autodesk products to the table would introduce Mac OS platform to all sort of engineers and big corporate customers.
• Halo effect or platform synergy bringing new customers
  Huge number of people use Windows at home just because they use it at work. Either because they simply don’t know Mac OS or they don’t want to use two different environments. Bringing AutoCAD (Inventor, Revit, etc.) to Mac OS would introduce it to a lot of people that would simple prefer it over Windows or again use it at home just because they use it at work (or school). This way the number of new Mac OS licenses would probably be much bigger then the number of Autodesk product licenses.
• Media & Entertainment products
  Over the last couple of years Autodesk has acquired a few companies that that are widely used in TV and movie production. Disney and Pixar are probably amongst significant users of those systems. Can you smell the connection already? Huge render farms running on Mac OS on XServ must sound appealing.
• Leverage in product politics
  Apple never knows when Microsoft decides to kill off Office for Mac. If they decided to keep Autodesk products running on both platforms they would have something to keep Microsoft playing nice. Of course before iWork becomes a full blown Office replacement. It would also give a lot of ISVs a reason to treat Mac OS on the same conditions as Windows.

Why would it make sense for Autodesk?

Well, I don’t believe it would unless they make it run on both platforms, but that’s not really the point here. If Apple buys Autodesk it is supposed to be good for Apple, but looking at the graph below I know in whose boat I would like to sit. Apple is still worth half of Microsoft but its value is growing quickly and consistently. They have overtaken IBM already and probably have enough cash in the pocket to buy Autodesk as a Christmas gift to all the people patiently waiting for AutoCAD on a Mac all those years.

Click the image for 6 year value growth history.

Update (10:40 am, 20 Dec 2007):
We all know how impossible that story is, but if you have something that would back it up I would love you to see your comment. That could develop into a nice bogus gossip. :-)

We are sorry…

We could not process your order because of geographical restrictions on the product which you were attempting to purchase. Please refer to the terms of use for this product to determine the geographical restrictions.We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.

I understand that Amazon and music labels treat that project as an experiment and after it proves to work it will be (hopefully) extended to other countries as well, but without a given time line when that could happen, it’s really hard to accept iTunes conditions. Beside it, it doesn’t really take a lot of special powers to predict that a globally accessible MP3 shop offering what Amazon currently does, would beat iTunes hands down and could easily become a standard in music distribution. Come on Apple, Amazon – you can’t overcharge like that or make clients jump through hoops when illegal sources are so easily reachable.

So, guess what?! Nobody got my money and I’ll leave it to you to guess to what I’m listening right now. Oh, and of course I’ll buy that album as soon as Amazon or any other shop offers me the same deal the US residents get.