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AEC Free Software directory: (https://wiki.osarch.org/index.php?title=AEC_Free_Software_directory)

1. B by bitacovir on 19 Nov 2020, edited 19 Nov 2020 #

   @Moult said:

   I think it's best to simply be aware of these but not mention them anywhere on the wiki. Mentioning them will simply promote them. If we see claims from people that they are open, we should correct them. The AEC journalist Martyn Day recently made the term "openwash", like greenwashing, but for open source. Maybe we can use that term.

   Should we change the title of the wiki page from "AEC Free Software directory" to something like "AEC Libre Software Directory", "AEC Open Source Software Directory" or "AEC FLOSS Directory"?

   Also we should add in the wikipage that "OpenBIM" solutions that use the term "Open" as reference of "Interoperability format" only, are not allowed in the list, because the meaning of "Open" for our community is "Open Source".

2. I by iosvarms on 19 Nov 2020 #

   @Moult @bitacovir What should I be looking out for in a product to be added to the Wiki? Its true that Open Design Alliance have products that are not FOSS, However, the Open IFC Viewer is "Free" to use and registration is not needed.

3. B by bitacovir on 19 Nov 2020 #

   @iosvarms said:

   @Moult @bitacovir What should I be looking out for in a product to be added to the Wiki? Its true that Open Design Alliance have products that are not FOSS, However, the Open IFC Viewer is "Free" to use and registration is not needed.

   Read the paragraphs of the wiki. We focus on Open Source software, no freeware.

4. D by duncan on 19 Nov 2020 #

   @iosvarms it's a bit tricky and can get a bit technical. Not all OpenSource licenses are suitable for Free/Libre Software. Luckily the Free Software Foundation has a list you can consult. But you're always safe if a program uses one of the licenses already on the software directory. Most projects use a small selection of licenses. If you're unsure just ask.

   The conceptual basis of free/libre software is four central freedoms outlined here: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

   A thorough read of https://wiki.osarch.org/index.php?title=Open-Source_Architecture_Community should give you the info you need. But just ask, as Moult notes, it's not always easy to tell as there is "openwashing" going on out there.

5. D by duncan on 22 Nov 2020 #

   One way of looking at this question of licenses is asking oneself "is this about the practical advantages of sharing code, or the ethical consequences of restrictive licenses?". Here are two good references for learning about the differences between the licenses:

   https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#NonFreeSoftwareLicenses

   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_free_and_open-source_software_licences#Approvals

6. D by duncan on 22 Nov 2020, edited 22 Nov 2020 # +2 votes

   https://gradslam.github.io/ for reality capture . someone want to add it, make a page, maybe linking resources about reality capture and let them know?

7. P by paullee on 22 Nov 2020 #

   Thanks, what is the difference in technology from Meshroom ?

8. B by bitacovir on 22 Nov 2020 # +1 votes

   @paullee said:

   Thanks, what is the difference in technology from Meshroom ?

   This is in the machine learning field.

9. M by Moult on 22 Nov 2020 # +1 votes

   I've added gradslam here: https://wiki.osarch.org/index.php?title=AEC_Free_Software_directory#Geometry_scanning_and_processing

   I've also authored a bit on free software, which is linked to from the homepage, which may be used to help clarify what we mean when we say "free software" from the OSArch perspective: https://wiki.osarch.org/index.php?title=Free_software

   @paullee I think it is completely different from Meshroom. From my understanding (disclaimer: I have not used either, but I have done photogrammetry before), Meshroom provides photogrammetric reconstruction using the more traditional steps of taking a whole series of unstructured and potentially non-sequential photos, doing feature matching, sparse, and then dense point cloud reconstruction, and then Poisson meshing on top. This is a highly expensive process. This uses techniques like SIFT and SfM, and is similar to apps like COLMAP and the original VSFM.

   In contrast, gradslam implements, well, SLAM (simultaneous localization and mapping). This is a highly related field to what Meshroom does, but the huge difference is that it all happens in real-time, and there is no sparse to dense cloud, it's just one cloud, and there is also no meshing at this stage. This is the stuff that self-driving cars use to sense their environment.

   I hope I got that right :)

10. P by paullee on 23 Nov 2020 #

    Thanks Bitacovir and Moult :)

11. M by Moult on 23 Nov 2020 #

    I was reading https://www.gnu.org/licenses/identify-licenses-clearly.html and I think we need to go over and re-check all GPL-based licenses to see if they are "only" or "or later". Thoughts?

12. B by bitacovir on 23 Nov 2020, edited 23 Nov 2020 #

    @Moult said:

    I was reading https://www.gnu.org/licenses/identify-licenses-clearly.html and I think we need to go over and re-check all GPL-based licenses to see if they are "only" or "or later". Thoughts?

    Some projects are not clear about their license : https://inkscape.org/about/license/

    If there is conflict with the quality of the information in the wiki page of software Directory, we could hide the last column (license) of the list.

13. C by Cyril on 24 Nov 2020, edited 24 Nov 2020 #

    @bitacovir said:

    we could hide the last column (license) of the list.

    Please, no. It is still very useful even if 100% accurate. It is a wiki let’s fix it over time.

14. S by stephen_l on 24 Nov 2020 #

    from linked inkscape page :

    GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE

    Version 2,

15. D by duncan on 24 Nov 2020, edited 24 Nov 2020 # +3 votes

    @Moult said:

    I was reading https://www.gnu.org/licenses/identify-licenses-clearly.html and I think we need to go over and re-check all GPL-based licenses to see if they are "only" or "or later". Thoughts?

    Just read that article. Good point. Makes sense to do a cleanup. The first step would be adding a question mark after all GPL-based licenses. That can then be replaced by the relevant "-only" or "-or-later". What a pain.

16. B by bitacovir on 5 Dec 2020 # +1 votes

    Linux Drawing Viewer (lx-viewer)

    http://lx-viewer.sourceforge.net/

    A DXF file viewer. It is very old but it works. For Linux and Windows. Also you can view DWG files using OpenDWG libraries but you need to download them separately, and these libraries have a different license.

    lx-viewer GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE Version 2

    http://lx-viewer.sourceforge.net/LICENSE

17. D by duncan on 5 Dec 2020, edited 5 Dec 2020 #

    @bitacovir said:

    Linux Drawing Viewer (lx-viewer)

    The author recently talked on the LibreDWG email list about getting DWG support that way. Hope it works out.

    OpenDWG is an old name for Teigha from ODA. Doesn't exist anymore and cannot be accessed for free.

18. D by duncan on 23 Jan 2021 #

    How do you suggest we solve the problem of some packages fitting into several categories - no matter what those categories are?

19. A by agron on 23 Dec 2020 #

    Hi,

    while I was searchign for FM apps, I found out openMAINT. It says on their website that it is opensource, but for a full package they charge you.

    I have tested the trial version, and it seemed quite powerful for facility managemnet tasks. It can also integrated IFC Files, which I sadly could not test...

20. R by rakela on 23 Dec 2020 #

    finally I got the confirmation email ! thank you Bitacovir for the invite...

    going thru this list i didnt see any MOVIE EDITOR; A must app to have IMHO... my vote is for BLENDER and SHOTCUT

21. M by Moult on 23 Dec 2020 # +1 votes

    @agron did you try download the source and self-host? Is that what you mean by trial?

    @rakela I'm a little hesitant - movie editing is a bit of a fringe activity, not really domain specific. Maybe a better solution is to write it on this page? https://wiki.osarch.org/index.php?title=Open_source_software_beginners (which I think need a big of work done on it)

22. B by bitacovir on 24 Dec 2020 # +2 votes

    Mesh Align Plus (Blender Addon)

    Mesh Align Plus helps you move things around, precisely: arrange objects in your scene, align mesh parts to each other while you're modeling, and create complex custom transformations using measurements from your models.

    https://github.com/egtwobits/mesh_mesh_align_plus

23. D by duncan on 24 Dec 2020 # +1 votes

    Another project with analysis of point cloud data: https://towardsdatascience.com/torch-points3d-a-unifying-framework-for-deep-learning-on-point-clouds-94115c0be4fb

    Do we need a section for reality capture? There's a lot going on.

24. M by Moult on 26 Dec 2020 # +1 votes

    @duncan reality capture stuff should go under "geometry scanning and processing".

    https://wiki.osarch.org/index.php?title=AEC_Free_Software_directory#Geometry_scanning_and_processing

25. R by rakela on 27 Dec 2020 # +1 votes

    @Moult Thank you much for that link ! first time in there and all good, dont ask me how i got to a very

    complete list of movie editors which included Blender, Shotcut, etc. good deal, thx

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