Exporters
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Cheers.
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Hmmm, well after reading the EULA icant see anything that would stop you from doing this.
Has anyone with a bit more legal know-how got any more info on this?
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PROPRIETARY RIGHTS
You acknowledge that (a) the Software contains proprietary and confidential information that is protected by applicable intellectual property and other laws, and (b) Google owns all right, title and interest in and to the Software and software provided through or in conjunction with the Software, including without limitation all Intellectual Property Rights therein and thereto. "Intellectual Property Rights" means any and all rights existing from time to time under patent law, copyright law, trade secret law, trademark law, unfair competition law, and any and all other proprietary rights, and any and all applications, renewals, extensions and restorations thereof, now or hereafter in force and effect worldwide. You agree that you will not, and will not allow any third party to, (i) copy, sell, license, distribute, transfer, modify, adapt, translate, prepare derivative works from, decompile, reverse engineer, disassemble or otherwise attempt to derive source code from the Software, unless otherwise permitted, (ii) take any action to circumvent or defeat the security or content usage rules provided, deployed or enforced by any functionality (including without limitation digital rights management functionality) contained in the Software, (iii) use the Software to access, copy, transfer, transcode or retransmit content in violation of any law or third party rights, or (iv) remove, obscure, or alter Google's copyright notices, trademarks, or other proprietary rights notices affixed to or contained within or accessed in conjunction with or through the Software.
I would say that pretty well covers it. The part about modifying and reverse engineering is where I think they would get someone.
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For my understanding there is nothing in 3. PROPRIETARY RIGHTS that can stop you to write a exporter. Ruby is a feature of SU, using it is no modifying or reverse engineering. Besides, in meny countries, like Finland, it is allowed to modify or what ever you want to to, unless you try to break DRM or copy protection, so program works like you want. Also usually a agreement that is not available to see at the time of purchase is considered invalid.
Just keep in mind that some formats like .max are undocumented, but for example .obj is well documented. Only catch can be in a license of the format on what you try to create a converter, if you use they own resource kit.
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Scott, as notareal says, i cant see anything in that to stop you writing your own exporters in ruby, as anything you write is your own creation, and as such isnt reverse engineering/modifying any of the code in SU.
As for the second point you highlighted, i dont see anything that says your only allowed to use exporters if youve brought the pro version, so you wouldnt be breaching anything there.
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Scott, I have to agree with Notareal and Remus...
What you've highlighted is not saying that you're not allowed to write exporters...
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After reading, I think you guys are right. I think there could be some resistance from google seeing as how not having export capabilities is one of the bigger things that separate Sketchup free from Pro. Making a exporter for the free version itself would not be the problem I think it would be the distribution of it seeing as how it would then (for the most part) make free into pro. I could be wrong but that would be my look at things if I were google. Although they might be willing to turn a blind eye as it just opens up capabilities to people debating about using sketchup but did not due to not having export capabilities.
Sorry for jumping the gun though as now that I have read what I posted it is not directly related to exporters.
Scott
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If such a thing was to happen id imagine youd be treading dodgy ground reagardless of wether theres anything in the EULA, good job it's all hypothetical.
Any word from the almighty google representative? (craigd
) Id be interested to see what the official stance is on this is. -
Aren't there already quite a few file exporters written in Ruby? Indigo, Kerkythea, STL spring to mind. And I rememeber someone making a half workable OBJ importer too. All text-based formats with a documented structure, like DXF, should at least be possible.
Anssi
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Anssi, I think the question is regarding exporters available in SU Pro and not SU Free. Emulating existing SU functionality that would normally only be available in the Pro version and making it available for Free users. There have been a few functions emulated for Free that is normally only available in Pro, another (apart from those already mentioned) is the ability to set location and set the North angle.
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