The raster support comes from an open source library used by 90 products. The Android support is an API in member-only beta testing.

The latest release of the Open Design Alliance (ODA) Teigha software development platform adds support for a popular raster image software library and offers software developers its first support for the Android mobile OS platform.

Teigha version 3.5 is primarily a bug-fix release for ODA members, who use the platform to create CAD products with independently created compatibility for the .DWG drawing standard popularized by Autodesk. This update also adds support for entity selection and drawing order in .DGN files (popularized by Bentley Systems MicroStation).

The FreeImage raster library is currently used by almost 90 products for the import, manipulation, and export of raster images, with more than 20 commercial products on the list. The popular commercial 3D painting and rendering product Modo 501 uses the FreeImage library. FreeImage is known as a fast, multithreading-safe, and cross-platform (32- and 64-bit versions of Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X) raster editor.

ODA also announced two new beta programs for its members:

• Teigha.NET for .dgn Files is ODA’s first .NET API for .DGN files;
• Teigha on Android is ODA’s first API for Android OS devices. The initial release is limited to database operations; rendering support will be provided in due time.

Teigha 3.5 is the first release built and tested daily using the ODA’s new automated build system, which provides improved regression test coverage for all major components. “Our goal is to build and test-run new code each time it is checked in to our source control system,” says ODA Chief Technology Officer Neil Peterson.

A wide variety of CAD vendors use the ODA libraries; the Alliance has worked in recent years to move from being only a provider of compatibility for DWG files to creating a complete software development platform for engineering software. One of is users is Graebert GmbH, the developer behind several new CAD products including Graebert ARES, Dassault Systemes DraftSight, and CorelCAD. CTO Robert Graebert says, “Over the last year, ODA has improved leaps and bounds in their quality assurance and testing efforts. As a heavy user of ODA technology, we have already noticed the effect on the quality of the product, and we are actively working on porting our applications to Teigha 3.5, our smoothest upgrade to date.”

Teigha version 3.5 is available now at www.opendesign.com for download by ODA members.