Beyond the Paper

Autodesk 2010 Certification Now Available

Autodesk announced earlier in the week that design and engineering professionals can  become Autodesk Certified in AutoCAD 2010, Autodesk Inventor 2010, Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010, and AutoCAD Civil 3D 2010 software.

Becoming Autodesk Certified allows professionals, and companies boasting Autodesk Certified employees, to validate their industry skills and knowledge, demonstrate expertise and gain credibility. 

Customer demand has contributed to the huge growth of Autodesk Certification over the past year, increasing the number of Autodesk Certified professionals to more than 100,000. “With engineering and design fields becoming increasingly competitive, certification gives employees an edge at a time when having one is critical to career success,” said Barbara Bowen, certification program development manager, Autodesk. “Autodesk Certification allows experienced designers and engineers to validate acquired skills by receiving recognition for their knowledge of specific Autodesk software applications.”

Certification can only be achieved after passing a rigorous Autodesk certification exam, or series of exams, and companies like Parsons Brinkerhoff, a planning, engineering, program and construction management, and opera¬tions and maintenance organization, recognize the importance of certification and of having consistent quality of skills company-wide.  In 2008, Parsons Brinkerhoff partnered with Autodesk to bring certification to their designers.

“We needed a reliable way to assess the skill level of our employees, ensure they were up to industry standards and equip staff for their next project,” said Rebecca Arsham, CAD Training Manager, Parsons Brinkerhoff. “Our pilot program with AutoCAD and AutoCAD Civil 3D was extremely successful. With the Autodesk training model, our employees had an 83 percent and 71 percent pass rate on the Associate Certification and Professional Certification exams, respectively. Through this program, we have seen an increase in productivity and gained competitive advantage by marketing Autodesk Certified staff expertise on many of our projects.”

The Autodesk 2010 Certification program is available for professionals using AutoCAD, Autodesk Inventor, Autodesk Revit Architecture, and AutoCAD Civil 3D software. Professionals seeking to master their respective industries can take training courses and the Certified Associate and Certified Professional exams at all Autodesk Authorized Certification Centers across the United States and Canada. Autodesk Certification is available in more than 20 countries. 

Autodesk will also offer free certification for the second year in a row at Autodesk University, as well as a preparation lab, offering assessment and practice tests and a study room with study materials.

For more information on Autodesk Certification for 2010, please visit: www.autodesk.com/be-remarkable.

Autodesk Announces Giveaway for Cleantech Companies

Autodesk announced that it will be choosing 100 companies to receive $150,000-worth of software each under the banner of its Clean Tech Partner Program. The application process is open to any young company working on sustainable technologies, though there is a slight focus on renewable energy innovations.

Startups chosen for the program will receive five licenses for the following suite of Autodesk applications: AutoCAD Inventor Professional, Autodesk Showcase Professional, Autodesk Vault Manufacturing, Autodesk Navisworks Manage, Autodesk Revit Architecture and Autodesk Alias Design.

These programs were written to manage construction projects from start to finish, even through manufacturing.

Autodesk, which is touting the program as a new brand of seed support for early-stage enterprises, has already initiated the giveaway with a small pilot program benefiting two companies: Syncromatic and green building powerhouse Serious Materials. The former has already used the software it received to create a more efficient bus-tracking system that utilizes GPS and mobile-location technology. Essentially, the company modeled its potential assembly line and discovered an inefficiency that was subsequently eliminated to speed up the entire process.

Autodesk plans to announce its grant recipients on a rolling basis, giving the software company time to provide condensed training and to learn more about how it will be implemented to advance sustainable causes. The overarching goal is to give startups that aren’t necessarily well-funded the ability to realistically render a digital prototype, rather than having to build a series of expensive physical prototypes.

Autodesk Assistance Program Launched for Northern Europe

Following the success in North America and recognizing the impact of today's economic challenges, Autodesk is launching the Autodesk Assistance Program in EMIA. This Program will provide Autodesk customers and partners with design software tools, education and resources that will help them to enhance, maintain and develop their 3D design technology skills and remain competitive in the marketplace. The program will offer free student software term licenses, free online training and a path to certification to unemployed architects, designers and engineers in all industries.

Autodesk Assistance Program tools and resources will be made available through the online portal, where users can access to:

Free Software License: Any 13-month term student license of AutoCAD, Autodesk Revit Architecture, Autodesk Inventor Professional, AutoCAD Civil 3D or a number of other software products.

Reduced-Cost Classroom Training: Many Autodesk Authorized Training Center (ATC) partners are offering classroom training at their training facilities for free or for a significantly reduced fee.

Certification: Certification preparation and exams are available at discounted rates through Autodesk Authorized Certification Centers.

E-learning: participants will have access to a number of online learning resources, leveraging much of the e-learning available on the subscription portal.

The Autodesk Assistance program will be extended to other countries in EMIA over the next few months.

For more details please visit the http://www.autodesk.co.uk/assistance.

Autodesk Expands Support for Mac Users

Autodesk is now officially supporting Apple Boot Camp, a component of the Mac OSX operating system that enables customers to run Windows on their Apple Hardware, for users of AutoCAD 2010 software, 3ds Max 2010 software, 3ds Max Design 2010 software, Autodesk Inventor 2010 software, Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010 software, Autodesk Revit Structure 2010 software and Autodesk Revit MEP 2010 software. 

A growing number of Autodesk customers are working in environments with Apple hardware and have requested support from Autodesk to use our design and engineering applications on that platform.    With Autodesk support for Boot Camp, customers can now run their favorite Mac applications and Autodesk applications on the same computer.   This will also enable customers to run Autodesk applications at full speed on a Mac and leverage its native graphics capabilities. 

We know some customers have been successfully running their Autodesk software under Boot Camp for years, so we’re pleased to finally offer official support.  See www.autodesk.com/mac for more details.

Enclosed are a number of links to technical solutions appicable to this content:

Apple® Boot Camp Support for AutoCAD® 2010

Apple® Boot Camp Support for Autodesk® 3ds Max®

Apple® Boot Camp Support for Autodesk® Inventor®

Apple® Boot Camp Support for Autodesk® Revit® Products

Thank you.

Meet, Greet and Learn

Join Autodesk, the Boston Society of Architects, and Microdesk for a networking event at the Autodesk Gallery Boston on Trapelo Road.

• Date: Thursday, July 23, 2009
• Time: 6 p.m.–8 p.m.
• Location: 1560 Trapelo Rd, Waltham, MA 02451

In partnership with the Boston Society of Architects and Microdesk, Autodesk is hosting a networking event for job-seeking architects, engineers, and designers in the Boston Area.

Meet potential employers in your field, network with peers and learn more about how you can benefit from the Autodesk Assistance Program.

Please RSVP to [email protected] by Friday, July 17, 2009. Registration is limited.

Thank you.

3D Desktop Printing? You bet!

Surely, many of us know that 3D printers are rather large...not any more.

Without wanting to going into too much detail here - I thought it'd be newsworthy to share that 3D printing is now available for your desktop.

Objet have released the Alaris30 and stated that one can "Turn any 3D CAD file into a part with just a few mouse clicks.." .

We love to hear from users who operate or own this device in combination with Autodesk products.

Check out this cool video, which describes how the 3D printing process works, starting with a 3D CAD file and resulting in an actual 3D print.

Video Link

Thank you.

Harvard Survey on Use of Building Energy Models

You are invited to participate in an online survey on the use of building performance simulation during design, construction and operation. A special emphasis of the survey is to better understand who on the design team owns and gets access to the energy model of a building, what role the model currently plays during building design and construction, and how the use of the model could be extended to the overall lifetime of a building.

The survey is being carried out by the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University (GSD) in collaboration with the Harvard Office for Sustainability (OFS). The survey is funded through the Harvard Real Estate Academic Initiative.

Interested parties can access the survey here.

Thank you.

"Into Tomorrow" Broadcast Interviews

Recently, the award-winning broadcaster Dave Graveline, host of the technology talk show “Into Tomorrow with Dave Graveline,” interviewed Autodesk leaders and customers at the Autodesk Gallery at One Market.

A sampling of topics ranged from mixed reality interfaces (Brian Pene), how technology has a positive impact in the classroom (Alhambra High School), Autodesk’s response to demands in the gaming world (Mary Beth Haggerty), and Autodesk is helping to provide 9 million customers with the tools to make sustainable decisions.

 

We invite you to take a watch/listen and share any feedback or questions you may have.

Thank you.

Help Improve Autodesk Collaboration

The Autodesk Collaboration User Experience team is setting up local site visits in the San Francisco Bay Area. We’re interested in talking to our users in person and understanding the challenges they face collaborating on design projects across distributed teams. 

We are conducting 1.5 hour usability sessions the week of July 13th in order to gather user feedback. We are looking for any BIM Design application (Revit or other model-based design application such as Graphisoft, Bentley) or VCD application users who share files with other disciplines outside their firewall.
This is an opportunity to make a great impact on the user experience Autodesk products and we welcome your company’s participation.

Please complete this quick survey if you are interested.

Thank you. 

People, Planet & Profit - Video

"CNBC's Melissa Francis looks at Autodesk and how it's helping create a more sustainable world via architecture and energy use."

Video Link

Thank you.