STL binary formats!

From: André Dolenc (Helsinki University of Technology)
To: RP-ML
Date: Friday, September 16, 1994
Subject: STL binary formats!
Elaine Persall writes:
 > I consider the binary format of the STL file property of 3D Systems.  It
     No, it is not "property" of 3D Systems. They published it long ago. The document describing the format is available to whoever wants to see it. You can most probably obtain it from your local representative.
     At some point in the future we will have it described in our WWW document on RPT.

 > and dissected by the various computer science methods.  Since I consider
 > this a violation
 > of their software and we(universities) are often accused of reinventing
     Nah, no need to reverse engineer; just look at the specification.

 > We can pass around information that is considered confidential but is this
 > the solution?
 > I think not.
     If it is confidential, I think not either. But the STL specs are not confidential. On the other hand, their *slice* format is...

Regards,
Andre'