Architosh Staff (info@architosh.com)

8 Dec 00

Autocad to Mac evidence? Screen shot of installer folder

Architosh has been siting on this information for a week. Recently a reader wrote in about Autocad on the Macintosh with a very interesting set of JPEGs.

Autocad Lite 2000 Installer CD-ROM has a Macintosh Folder

Apparently when this reader opened a demo AutocadLT 2000 CD-ROM he found a folder called Installers (quite normal to find) and inside of that two separate folders entitled WIN and MAC. This screen shot shows what that looks like. (click on it)

The reader asked, "there is nothing in the Mac folder, but why is it there?"

The presence of a Mac folder lends more evidence to the rumor that Autocad is maybe coming to the Macintosh. But then again, perhaps this folder was created by the programmers by mistake. Yet perhaps there is something planned for this folder but the programming effort is not complete yet. If that was the case why would the folder be there? Do all Windows CD's have Mac folders by default? Not to our best knowledge.

This reader received the demo CD-ROM just four months ago and the date in the Info File is Nov 15, 1999. The info file could be old and is specific to Windows only. It is unlikely that the demo CD-ROM for AutocadLT 2000 was actually produced more than a year ago, but then again it could have been.

Autocad fails to respond to our request

We recently contacted Autodesk's public relations department and asked them to comment on the Autocad on Mac rumor. Needless to say they did not reply to our request. Could this be a signal that they have something in the pipeline and need to keep it under raps? Or are they simply ignoring any news sites (particularly Mac sites) that ask such questions? You be the judge.

We will try a different approach through Autocad VAR's in the very near future, as it now appears that the chance of a port to Mac OS X is possibly unfolding. If any other users out there have Autocad or AutocadLT 2000 demo CD-ROM's it would be worth determining if they all have empty Mac install folders or if it was just this particular batch of CDs. Any help in determining this would be appreciated.