They have a very cool website.
http://www.cyberstein.co.uk/

I've had good success on the PC with both Camtasia Studio (multiple output formats) and Instant-Demo (flash output only).

Todd

Yes - but they are only minor differences which would be recognised on install surely. Steinberg sells more programs than sketchup, I'm sure they've considered this.

Hi all.

Once again, thanks for the insight.

I fully respect the amount of time and money any company or individual puts into their IP, and it is only right that they should protect that. 5 years research - wow! This is why I always use genuine software (which is often swimming against the tide).

I've been on a seminar arranged by the UK patent office for small business advisors, so I'm pretty clued up in the main, but it's not always the same over the pond. The Formica example is interesting but it doesn't apply IMO. They let the word become associated with something not their product. SU is SU and no-one's trying to label "sketchy" software in general as "sketchup".

Looks like the way forward is to build up the site so that G can see what I'm doing and if it's a competitor or a benefit to them. I think it'll be a benefit which is why I was surprised at their stance. Kris may have hit the nail on the head with his comment:

"and of course if you ask Google what they think, they are always 100% of the time going to say no, and protect their trademark or copyright."

In the meantime I'll keep the URL parked.

Eric, you need to take the free gullibility test 😄

Thanks for the reply marne and welcome to the forum!!!

I think I would want John Williams to write a personal score for me. Something very variable to cover all manner of social and emotional situeations. Or maybe whoever it was who wrote the score for Star Trek the Next Generation. I love that score. At any rate I would want something heroic and epic. Maybe it would transform me accordingly.

@unknownuser said:

I'm a little worried about their progress. Unless their idea becomes an official part of a Rhino release, I don't think there's much chance of this becoming a professional-grade tool.

It's a sepparate company that develops the plugin so you will be worried forever. In the mean time Ive tried the alpha demo. Looks realy promissing. If they arent greedy when they release, this may be the one for me.

ha ha! LOL kris! my sentiments exactly! architects tend to be egoists.. atleast most of them.. its kinda becoz of the schools they get trained at i suppose....
anyways i tend to show my ego only at the site!!! 😉

Todd. Small world..I know the Rio Rancho store very well...Thats where I live..

I don't know if 'blinded' is the correct word. The oral traditions of storytelling and songs certainly must go right back to the earliest days of humanity and i believe those traditions continue through to this day.

Part of being human is to communicate with stories. Some of the stories we all know may have had their germination many thousands of years ago. For instance, many people believe that traditional biblical stories evolved to incorporate enough of older pagan stories that the 'new' stories had a timeless familiarity to them. That would help to communicate the message of the new story and make it more believable and memorable. Broad themes like love, betrayal, pride, anger, hope and fear must have been talked about as long as there have been people. It makes sense that the really good stories developed over time are still with us in some form today even if hard to recognize. If we could go back and visit the caveman days I think we might be surprised by the familiarity of many of their campfire stories. They might understand some of our stories too.

Regards, Ross

Here's some more Canadian inventions:

17-alpha-ethynyl-17-hydroxy-5(10)-estren-3-one: today known simply as "The Pill"
Air-Conditioned Railway Coach: Henry Ruttan, 1858
Abdominizer: (infomercial exercise device) Dennis Colonello, 1984
A/C Radio Tube: Edward Samuels Rogers, 1925
Automatic Foghorn: Robert Foulis, 1859
Automatic Machinery Lubricator: Elijah McCoy
Automatic Postal Sorter: (200,000 letters an hour) Maurice Levy, 1957
Basketball: James Naismith, 1891
Bone Marrow Compatibility Test: Barbara Bain, 1960
Chocolate Bar: Arthur Ganong, 1910
Computerized Braille: Roland Galarneau, 1972
Creed Telegraph System: (Morse Code to text) Fredrick Creed, 1900
Electric Cooking Range: Thomas Ahearn, 1882
Electric Light Bulb: Henry Woodward invented the electric light bulb in 1874 then sold the patent to Thomas Edison
Electron Microscope: Eli Franklin Burton, Cecil Hall, James Hillier, Albert Prebus, 1937
Electric Organ: Morse Robb, 1928
Electric Streetcar: John Joseph Wright, 1883
Fathometer: (early sonar) Reginald A. Fessenden, 1919
Film Colourization: Wilson Markle, 1983
Goalie Mask: Jaques Plante, 1960
Gramophone: Alexander Graham Bell & Emile Berliner, 1889
Green Ink Currency ink: Thomas Sterry Hunt, 1862
Half-tone Engraving: Georges Edouard Desbarats & William Augustus Leggo, 1869
Heart Pacemaker: Dr.John A. Hopps, 1950
Hydrofoil Boat: Alexander Graham Bell & Casey Baldwin, 1908
Instant Mashed Potatos: Edward A. Asselbergs, 1962
JAVA: (programming language) James Gosling, 1994
Jetliner: The first commercial jetliner to fly in North America was designed by James Floyd in 1949.
Jolly Jumper (Baby bungee jumping): Olivia Poole, 1959
Music Synthesizer: Hugh Le Caine, 1945
Newsprint: Charles Fenerty, 1838
Odometer (mechanical): Samuel McKeen, 1854
Paint Roller: Norman Breakey, 1940
Plexiglas: William Chalmers, 1931
Pumpable liquid hand soap system: Harold Humphrey, 1972
Portable Film Developing System: Arthur Williams McCurdy, 1890 (McCurdy foolishly sold the patent to George Eastman in 1903)
Process to Extract Helium from NG: Sir John Cunningham McLennan, 1915
Quartz Clock: Warren Marrison
R-Theta Navigation System: J.E.G. Wright, 1958
Radio-Transmitted Voice: Reginald A. Fessenden, 1904
Railway Car Brake: George B. Dorey, 1913
Railway Sleeper Car: Samuel Sharp, 1857
Plastic bottle Machine (Rotary Blow Molding): Gustave Côté, 1966
Safety Paint: Neil Harpham, 1974
Silicon Chip Blood Analyzer: Imants Lauks, 1986
Standard Time: Sir Sanford Fleming, 1878
Stereo-orthography Map Making: T.J. Blachut & Stanley Collins, 1965
Superphosphate Fertilizer: Thomas L. Wilson, 1896
Synthetic Sucrose: Dr. Raymond Lemieux, 1953
Television System: Reginald A. Fessenden, 1927
Television Camera: F. C. P. Henroteau, 1934
Telephone Handset: Cyril Duquet, 1878
Tuck-Away-Handle Beer Carton: Steve Pasjac, 1957
Undersea Telegraph Cable: Fredrick Newton Gisborne, 1857
UV-degradable Plastics: Dr. James Guillet, 1971
Wirephoto (fax concept): Edward Samuels Rogers, 1925
Pablum (baby food): Drs. A. Brown, F. Tisdall, & T. Drake, 1930s
Superman: Joe Shuster & Jerome Siegel, 1938
Panoramic Camera: John Connon, 1887
Electric Wheelchair: George J. Klein
Silicon Steel Alloy: Reginald A. Fessenden, 1892
Alkaline Batteries & Lithium batteries: Lewis Frederick Urry, 1959
Two-way transatlantic radio transmission: Reginald Fessenden, 1906
Instant Replay (for televised sports): George Retzlaff, 1955

plus the Dental Mirror, Tracer Bullets, Radio Compass, portable baby highchair, Yachtzee game, Trivial Pursuit game, Pictionary game, Balderdash game, Nursing Mother Breast Pads, helium as a substitute for hydrogen in airships, the first cardiac intensive care unit, and Margerine,

And close to my heart...
the yummy McIntosh Apple: developed by John McIntosh, 1796

Congratulations!

Good article Solo.

I use dreamlinux on my old laptop, it was easy to install and cost me nothing. It installed with Blender, Gimpshop, Inkscape and a few other design apps. I've added Cycas for cad work and would have to say it's a very nice lean system. Open Office is excellent too. I've had no problems transfering files to windows or commercial programs.

There seems to be plenty more 3d/cad apps in development for linux at the moment:

http://archimedes.incubadora.fapesp.br/portal/project/archimedes-project/
http://avocado-cad.sourceforge.net/
http://www.octree.de/

This is a controversial article about a design lecturer who switched all his design students from OSX to Ubuntu and replaced all the courses proprietry software with open source alternatives. It makes for a good read, and the following comments raise some good arguments for and against.

http://www.linux.com/articles/52758?&depth=5&order=1&sortby=3&render=flat

The sound of the bird nearly drove my dog bonkers 😄

@sorgesu said:

So how do they stop?

Susan, You ask really funny questions at times! Did you not notice the parachute on their back? They just pull the rip cord when they get down to a certain level and have
a gentle landing if they are lucky.

These guys are nuts! Just one good gust of wind and they would find themselves splattered all over those cliffs ..... ouch!

Mike

Something we affectionately call "ugly days"

No work, house work or otherwise. Jammies all day (brushing teeth is not required, but requested) No cooking, only ordered food, preferrably pizza. Snuggling, watching movies all day. Maybe a nap here and there. Optimal for disposable plates and utensils to be used, but if not dishes can wait until tomorrow.

I long for an "ugly day"........

OK, this is how Football is played in Australia.....

Youtube Video

Enjoy!!
A

After playing around with several movie converters and reinstalling quicktime the problem went away. Thanks everyone for your help!

I was looking up the base camp earlier this week while I was thinking about how to get some sort of meeting going.

Here is what I read: http://aecnews.com/news/2006/08/16/1958.aspx

Has anyone heard any news about a base camp in the future

@unknownuser said:

SketchUp 3D Base Camp Drops Off the Radar for 2006

Posted on Wednesday, August 16, 2006 2:25 PM

The 2005 SketchUp 3D Base Camp won’t be returning for an encore in 2006.

In a letter today to Base Camp attendees, The Google SketchUp team said “It's not that we don't want to; we just don't have the resources to do it properly.” Given that SketchUp is now owned by a company that harvests money with almost as many zeros as its name suggests, one has to wonder what resources are lacking.

The apology continues:

BaseCamp was such a great experience last year that we were all looking forward to doing it again this fall. Getting the chance to meet everyone, and to have everyone meet each other, was our favorite part of the event. This doesn't mean that there won't be one next year—that's still very much a possibility.

The letter tries to explain what’s keeping the SketchUp team so busy it can’t throw another big party:

Currently, we're working on SketchUp 6 and Grizzly, which some of you might have seen previewed at AIA in Los Angeles in June. We're also trying our hardest to have both platforms available at the same time. Then there are the French, Spanish, Italian, German and Japanese versions of SketchUp 6 that we've got to have ready... Needless to say, we don't have much time to use the pool table in the break room anymore.

If you need a SketchUp 3D Base Camp fix, here’s a list of articles from our coverage last year:

@robmoors said:

I believe something like a conference already exists:

The Sketchup Basecamp