"The only thing faster than tablets is two-keystroke commands as available in AutoCAD. My comment about abandoning tablet menues is my biased view in the Mouse-vs-Tablet menu debate.
"Checked PowerDraft even more, it has some realy nice short cuts in Accudraw. I even found out how IGDS fanatics like me could survive there. Press M and a coordinate DL=,DX=,DI=,XY=,.. keyin dialog pops up. Press K and a line divisor KY= dialog apear. "On the negative size, I tried PowerDraft's BASIC. To me, it looks like a macro language and ... huh? Ain't this BASIC:
INPUT "X=";X"It works in most MicroSoft stuff but not in PowerDraft.
"To bring a new momentum to the debate, has anybody considered how much of a drawing you actually see through the screen? If we look at a 1024x768 display and expect a human eye to have a sight resolution 0.1mm per dot, we get a max view of 102.4 x 76.8mm for a complete drawing AND that's the main problem working with CAD. I expect this problem won't be solved before flat screen LCD tiles will become the standard display. Preferably with resolutions 10000x9000 and with pixel size of 0.1mm or even bigger!"
-- by Odd Hallstein Ystanes 100275.3524@compuserve.com
We asked Autodesk marketing for a breakdown of those figures but didn't hear back by press time. We wanted to know if the figure was at the retail level or net revenue to Autodesk. We were also interested in the split between upgrades and new sales. Autodesk has already indicated that most R13 sales are new, not upgrades.
Let's see if we can figure this out on our own. Autodesk sold 994,000 licenses of AutoCAD by end of January, 1994 -- split roughly 50/50 between R12 and R11 (or earlier) then. Assuming sales of AutoCAD are similar since then, that represents 1.2 million by end of January, 1995.
A survey released by Autodesk a year ago said that 64% of AutoCAD users stated they would upgrade to Release 13 within two months of its release. At the upgrade price of US$495 (in effect at that time), this should have resulted in sales of $223 million just for the 64% of the 703,000 R12 users upgrading (we presume that if a user didn't upgrade to R12, they won't upgrade to R13). At 11% of the expected amount, the actual $25 million in R13 sales clearly represents a disappointment to Autodesk management, shareholders, and stock analysts.
In comparison, sales of AutoCAD in the two quarters following the release of R12 were $19 million and $22 million, respectively, at a time when there were less than half as many AutoCAD licenses.
We are also interested in sales of Designer, Autodesk's primary attack on the mechanical market. About 50% of all CAD software sales are currently into the mechanical market. From conversations with some of Autodesk's largest dealers, we estimate that worldwide sales of Designer are 3,000. The low sales may be one reason Autodesk is telling disappointed R13 solids users to pay the extra US$1,500 for Designer to compensate for the R12 solids features missing in R13.
"The reason we are looking at Reflex is because it's nondiscipline-specific: it caters to mechanical, structural, electrical, and architectural CAD. As well, all our disciplines need to work with each other on the same building model.
"We are looking for other similar systems, for evaluation."
Ralph Grabowski responds:
"ART (Chief Architect), Intergraph, Bentley Systems, Computervision, and CadKey are all pursuing object-oriented CAD systems. However, the technology is young and products are either planned or immature. Thus, I feel it is worthwhile to look into the new software -- and perhaps dabble in it -- but it is too early to commit to object-oriented CAD at this time."
Basis Software of Exton PA has created an AutoLISP compiler for AutoCAD Release 12. While Vital LISP runs under Windows, the compiled LISP files also load into DOS. The package includes debugger, watch, and postmortem trace for US$595.
Issue focus: "Release 13 DWG: A Brave New World" by Matt Richards.
In Release 13, Autodesk threw a curve ball to the thriving third-party DWG-access industry -- and to itself. Autodesk isolated R13 since DWG and DXF are incompatible with all other software; the SaveAsR12 command and DxfIx translation utility do a poor job of downwards translation. Third-party developers are undaunted; the first three began shipping "read-only," "under construction" versions of R13-compatible direct-DWG access APIs.
Issue focus: "The First Access to Release 13 DWG" by Ralph Grabowski.
Cimmetry Systems was the first of third-party developers to announce and ship an API that can read R13 DWG and DXF files. EDAT -- engineering data access technology -- provides a set of functions to access DWG, DXF, and DGN drawing files in the manner of a database program.
Guest Editorial: "A Critical Look at Bentley Development" by Odd Ystanes.
Bentley Systems took the open IGDS file format and created a CAD system that has supplanted Intergraph's CAD software in less than ten years. Bentley has not been as open as Intergraph, however, and some of their developments have been so thorough as to intimidate potential users and developers.
Programming: "MDL Programming for Dummies, Part 3" by Odd Ystanes.
How to use include files and the resource manager. Includes code.
Marketing: "You Call it Network, I Call it Schmooze" by Jake Richter.
With A/E/C Systems just around the corner, find out what every schmoozer must carry to trade shows. Plus: how to schmooze with competitors.
Plus: CAD news, new Internet sites, and tips.
The monthly CAD++ Newsletter and sample back issues are available from XYZ Publishing, PO Box 3053, Sumas WA 98295-3053.
Hyperlink to the previous issue of Upfront: Upfront #2 | Upfront #3 | Upfront #4 is the next issue of Upfront.
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