Autodesk Trivia Quiz -Calling Old Timers

[Dncdesign]

My first version of AutoCAD was 2.01, prior to that I used CADAM and was on the drafting board.

But these days I use Inventor and I don't use much AutoCAD except to do Tolerance Studies, Stack-Ups and to show the mechanism in different postions.

Therefore, I selected the "Inventor Forum" to post this.

I'll post the answers after a few days.

Have fun,

Dncdesign


1. What was the name of the first product Autodesk ever sold?

2. What was the original street address on Autodesk's stationery?

3. What motto appeared on Autodesk's original letterhead?

4. When and where was AutoSketch announced, and at what price?

5. What does WIDGET stand for?

6. In what magazine did Autodesk's first full-colour ad run?

7. What was the first product launched by Autodesk after AutoCAD?

8. How much memory was required to run the IBM PC version of the first AutoCAD shipped?

9. Roughly how many lines of source code were in the original AutoCAD?

10. Who bought the first copy of AutoCAD?

11. What sample drawings were used to demo AutoCAD at COMDEX 1982?

12. Who was the first national leader to see a demonstration of AutoCAD?

13. What was E-RUN ACAD?

14. What public domain software package was AutoLisp based upon?

15. When was the first AutoCAD Expo, and where was it held?

16. Which Autodesk project bore the code name "White Album"?

17. To support which Autodesk product was the DXBIN command added to AutoCAD?

18. Which Autodesk product had a check box labeled "Show Trials"?

19. Which AutoCAD release included an audio cassette tape?

20. What programming language was the first copy of AutoCAD to ship written in?

21. Why did Autodesk decide to write AutoCAD in C rather than Pascal?

22. What were the REPEAT and ENDREP entities? In which AutoCAD release were they removed?

22. Which was the first release of AutoCAD to require a math coprocessor to run?

23. When did Autodesk first establish a forum on CompuServe?

24. What C compilers have been used to produce versions of AutoCAD for the IBM PC?

25. AutoShade was originally going to use a third-party renderer. Whose?

26. Why did AutoCAD jump from Version 2.6 to Release 9?

27. Which release of AutoCAD first required an 80386 or better processor?

28. What was Autodesk's first product for Microsoft Windows?

29. What product resulted in Autodesk's receiving its first software patent?

30. What Autodesk product was the first to sport dialog boxes and pulldown menus?

31. Why can't AutoCAD explode differentially scaled Blocks?

32. After what entertainment figure is the AutoCAD source module responsible for the ELLIPSE command named? How many arc segments are used to approximate an ellipse?

33. What was Autodesk's first animation product? What did it provide that the current products do not?

34. Has Autodesk had any shareware products? If so, what were they?

35. What version of AutoCAD was the first to include a tablet template?

36. Which magazine described Autodesk's 1985 Initial Public Offering as a “high-flyer that may not fly”?

37. Which magazine named Autodesk the “Number One Hot Growth Company in America”' in both 1986 and 1987?

38. What was the original U.S. list price of AutoCAD 1.0?

39. What did the original extra-cost AutoCAD option consist of? How much did it cost?

40. Who first designed an all-new racing car engine on a PC with AutoCAD?

 

[cadranger]

Hey, I'm an old-timer user, I first learned v.2.6 in college in 1987 and have used every version since. But I failed your test miserably. When are you posting the answers? Or did I miss that too?

 

[Dncdesign]

Hello CadRanger,

Since you asked, I'll post the answers. I didn't know but 1/8 of the answers :S. I found this on a website and was written by John Walker.

http://www.fourmilab.ch/autofile/

http://www/chapter2_112.html

1. What was the name of the first product Autodesk ever sold?
AutoScreen

2. What was the original street address on Autodesk's stationery?
16 Saint Jude Road, Mill Valley, CA 94941. This was John Walker's house. Saint Jude is the patron of lost causes.

3. What motto appeared on Autodesk's original letterhead
"Excellence in Computer Software."

4. When and where was AutoSketch announced, and at what price?
AutoCAD Expo--Chicago, 1986. $49.95. ( AutoSketch was actually shipped at a retail price of $79.95).

5. What does WIDGET stand for?
Walker's In-Line Device Guaranteeing Elimination of Theft. The original name for the hardware lock.

6. In what magazine did Autodesk's first full-colour ad run?
Scientific American, September 1984.

7. What was the first product launched by Autodesk after AutoCAD?
The AutoCAD Symbol Libraries, derived from the symbols for the AlphaMerics plotter, for which we implemented ``fractional arcs'' in shape definitions.

8. How much memory was required to run the IBM PC version of the first AutoCAD shipped?
128K.

9. Roughly how many lines of source code were in the original AutoCAD?
12,000.

10. Who bought the first copy of AutoCAD?
Jamal Munshi, of MOMS Computing.

11. What sample drawings were used to demo AutoCAD at COMDEX 1982?
HOUSE, SHUTTLE, OFFICE, and SUBDIV.


12. Who was the first national leader to see a demonstration of AutoCAD?
Margaret Thatcher.

13. What was E-RUN ACAD?
A program to defeat the hardware lock.

14. What public domain software package was AutoLisp based upon?
XLISP.

15. When was the first AutoCAD Expo, and where was it held?
Chicago, 1986.

16. Which Autodesk project bore the code name ``White Album''?
AutoCAD Release 9.

17. To support which Autodesk product was the DXBIN command added to AutoCAD?
CAD/camera.

18. Which Autodesk product had a check box labeled ``Show trials''?
AutoShade.

19. Which AutoCAD release included an audio cassette tape?
Version 2.5.

20. What programming language was the first copy of AutoCAD to ship written in?
PL/I.

21. Why did Autodesk decide to write AutoCAD in C rather than Pascal?
Because when Greg Lutz went to see a demo of IBM Pascal at the computer store, he discovered that it took 5 disc swaps or so to compile each file. Computer Innovations C let you run with the compiler in the A drive and your source in the B drive without playing disc jockey.

22. What were the REPEAT and ENDREP entities? In which AutoCAD release were they removed?
They bracketed entities to be repeated in a rectangular array. They were replaced by the MINSERT command in Version 2.5.

22. Which was the first release of AutoCAD to require a math coprocessor to run?
Release 9.

23. When did Autodesk first establish a forum on CompuServe?
May 1986.

24. What C compilers have been used to produce versions of AutoCAD for the IBM PC?
Computer Innovations, Lattice, MetaWare, Microsoft (OS/2, Windows R11 and R12), WATCOM (Windows R12).

25. AutoShade was originally going to use a third-party renderer. Whose?
Visual Engineering.

26. Why did AutoCAD jump from Version 2.6 to Release 9?
After AutoCAD Version 2.6, a major update that some analysts said should have been called version 3.0, everybody expected that AutoCAD 3.0 would be the release with full 3D.

If the next release was called Version 2.7 it would be perceived as a minor update and few people would notice the substantial features it offered (notably the pull-down menu and dialogue box user interface).

If it were called Version 3.0 everybody would be disappointed that it didn't contain any additional 3D functionality.

27. Which release of AutoCAD first required an 80386 or better processor?
Release 12.

28. What was Autodesk's first product for Microsoft Windows?
The Autodesk Animator Player, AAWIN.

29. What product resulted in Autodesk's receiving its first software patent?
CAD/camera.

30. What Autodesk product was the first to sport dialog boxes and pulldown menus?
AutoSketch.

31. Why can't AutoCAD explode differentially scaled Blocks?
Differential scaling turns circles into ellipses, and AutoCAD, to this day, does not support true ellipse and elliptical arc entities.

32. After what entertainment figure is the AutoCAD source module responsible for the ELLIPSE command named? How many arc segments are used to approximate an ellipse?
Phineas T. Barnum. Eight.

33. What was Autodesk's first animation product? What did it provide that the current products do not?
AutoFlix. Worked on an EGA, worked with AutoShade, and had motion paths integrated with AutoCAD, allowed a musical sound track generated from the PC speaker, and permitted HyperCard-style button definitions for interactive control of animations.

34. Has Autodesk had any shareware products? If so, what were they?
AutoFlix.

35. What version of AutoCAD was the first to include a tablet template?
Version 1.0 included a blank template as a page in the manual. The plastic, ready-to-use template was introduced in Version 2.5.

36. Which magazine described Autodesk's 1985 Initial Public Offering as a “high-flyer that may not fly”?
Business Week.

37. Which magazine named Autodesk the “Number One Hot Growth Company in America”' in both 1986 and 1987?
Business Week.

38. What was the original U.S. list price of AutoCAD 1.0?
$1000.

39. What did the original extra-cost AutoCAD option consist of? How much did it cost?
Dimensioning (extremely primitive and non-associative). $500.


40. Who first designed an all-new racing car engine on a PC with AutoCAD?
Joe Shubeck of Eagle Engines.