Design File Locking and Snake Oil Security

Sat, 06 Dec 2008 14:52:00 +0000

The increased sharing of electronic CAD data (ala BIM) holds a lot of promise, but it also exposes companies and individuals to additional liability and risk. This additional risk is coming into focus more and more as actual cases of costly legal battles confront engineers and architects.

The June 2008 AUGI wishlist results contain “Design File Locking” as the top wish by a substantial margin, and Shaan Hurley lists it as number 3 in the AU 2008 AutoCAD wish list. Clearly, interest in file and IP security has been growing steadily.

As demand for IP security grows, there are sure to be snake oil security vendors trying to cash in on it. I received a spam email a few days ago from SafeNet, Inc. promising “a cost-effective and easy to integrate solution that provides reliable and effective security through the use of digital signatures.” Whenever I see such statements with a long string of buzzwords, my snake oil alarm goes on alert. Digital signatures are for authentication and establishing trust – they cannot and do not provide “reliable and effective security”, although I suppose they could be used by a system that does.

In the last year or two, a number of companies have claimed to market software that “secures” AutoCAD DWG files. When I see such a claim, it invariably refers to software that creates an anonymous unequally scaled MINSERT entity. These can be created or “exploded” with a few lines of AutoLISP code. Frequently these companies claim to “encrypt” the drawing, which may sound sexy, but is an outright lie. If this is a level of “security” that meets your needs, at least use one of the many free versions posted throughout the internet (DETER.VLX from DotSoft is one I know of).

There are solutions, but they always require changes in the workflow process that involve difficult tradeoffs and careful evaluation of what is technically feasible and practical versus the costs of implementing the changes. There is no such thing as installing a single piece of software to instantly solve the problem. If you are looking for ways to protect intellectual property in your drawing files, don’t be fooled by snake oil security vendors.

Disclaimer: One of my hats is the president of CADLock, Inc., makers of CADVault for AutoCAD.

Debugging ObjectARX: Break on Exception

Mon, 12 May 2008 11:11:00 +0000

I have presented a class entitled High Octane ObjectARX at Autodesk University the past two years. In 2006 the focus was on project organization, and last year I focused more on techniques for supporting multiple versions of AutoCAD with a single Visual Studio solution, touching briefly on testing and profiling. For 2008 I plan to focus on debugging.

AU 2008 on ManuSoft

Design File Locking and Snake Oil Security

Debugging ObjectARX: Break on Exception