www.upfrontezine.com
Inside this Issue
Notes From the Editor
After requests from readers, I have added a search engine to the
upFront.eZine Web site. I trust you'll find it easier to
hunt for material in the 190 Web pages using the Google-powered
search at http://www.upfrontezine.com/welcome.htm
Another new feature at the Web site are links to my series
of tutorials on 20 (soon to be 24) commands new to AutoCAD 2000,
2000i, and 2002. The tutorials are hosted at the Autodesk Press
Web site.
- Ralph Grabowski
Readers React: Does CAD Degrade Drawing Quality?
Leo Schlosberg, founder of Heavyware.com, last week
asked in a guest editorial if CAD software is the cause behind
the worsening quality of construction drawings. The readership
disagrees; rather, you feel that economic pressure and a software-oriented
education are the cause for the decline in drafting knowledge.
Here are just a few of the many letters I received; more next
week:
"Mr. Schlosberg's editorial asks an interesting question,
but fails to recognize that CAD is not the only thing which has
changed in the design industries over the last two decades. The
economics of design has changed dramatically in the corporate
environment; driven by billability, profitability, and the price
of the stock.
"The lack of qualified detailers and other people 'who understand
what they draw' is a direct result of neglect in the development
of these resources in favor of the next annual report. When the
current generation of design talent retires, what then will pass
for 'design'?
"Fear not, for those jobs will not disappear. They will have
moved offshore. Think how cheaply you can get the drawings done!"
- Calvin Smith
CAE Software Analyst
"While I believe the root of this trend is complex and
not easy to pin on even a handful of trends, let me highlight
two:
"First, as a longtime instructor in technical graphics, I've
seen overly -complex, user-hostile CAD software crowd out the
instruction of core technical graphics content. Instead of teaching
the language of technical graphics, many technical graphics courses
have evolved into nothing more than glorified software-training
sessions.
"Second, I'd like to point to the larger social trend of
the 'software era.' This era is represented by economic buyers
and sellers that consistently value cost-speed over quality; and
the acceptability of shipping 'beta' product in fulfillment of
economic contracts. In such an environment, it follows that it
is also acceptable to use 'beta' drawings to fulfill contracts
in the A/E/C and manufacturing industries."
- Eric Wiebe
North Carolina State University
"Let's look at three other issues that arise:
"First, CAD has increased the productivity level in the number
of drawings people can do over time, but is that the goal? I sometimes
wonder if CAD isn't plagued with the same problem as e-mail --
very quick and sometimes writing off-the-cuff without any true
thought process placed in the writing or drawing. But that is
not the fault of the software; it's the people using it.
"Second, with CAD comes other areas that designers need to
consider when drawing, ie. CAM, CIM, and DM. No longer does the
CAD person deal with just working drawings, but other areas linked
to the drawing with a holistic understanding of the entire production
process.
"Finally, from what I see in the newspapers and dealing with
professionals in industry, most CAD operators are either engineers
with limited training in engineering graphics, or someone trained
on just one specific software, and not visualization as related
to engineering/ design graphics."
- Aaron Clark
North Carolina State University
"CAD doesn't degrade the quality of drawing. On its own
CAD, does nothing without an operator -- neither does a drawing
board.
"We are devaluing the skills of tradespeople, not only within
countries but globally. Long gone are the development growth paths
that allowed good tradespeople to progress up the ladder and be
valued. Today we send our young people to college to teach them
the theory about CAD and its applications. When they graduate,
they want the earth (well, heaven and soul anyway) for their services.
"It all boils down to $$$ and how cheaply we can produce
drawings because they are seen to be a unnecessary overhead. Little
do we realize that cutting corners in the design / drafting phase
costs many hours in the manufacturing/ construction phase.
"Everyone is out to screw the best price for a project, at
the expense of quality of the whole process. I live in hope that
some will appreciate the implications, however I doubt that I
will see it in my lifetime."
- Chris Ainsworth
The CAD Centre, Australia
Show Report: Does the Planet Belong to Autodesk?
by Ricardo Montes
The Planet Autodesk Show was held June 25-27 in São Paulo,
Brazil. The general director of Autodesk in Latin America, César
Alfonzo, announced the rental of software, and a partnership with
universities. According to Mr Alfonzo, "After renting our
software, the great majority will end up buying our products."
He hopes to increase business by 10-15%.
Autodesk's partnership with universities and training centers
allows students to rent Autodesk software by the year or by the
semester, paying about 20% of the total value of the license.
By my quick estimate, the student would pay about US$760 for AutoCAD
2002. At that price, I suspect students will prefer to "borrow"
the software for an undetermined time without paying anything
-- in the same manner they always have. Autodesk's commercial
vision is, however, an option against piracy.
At the official opening, and amid the usual comments, a sentence
stuffed with modesty got my attention: "...today we safely
affirm that whatever God didn't build, Autodesk helped build...".
And only because the company is just 19 years old; imagine if
it were older!
More than a fair, the event is a demonstration of the strength
and organization of this giant Autodesk. However, whoever went
hoping to find a pavilion full of innovation was disappointed.
The only novelty was the release of AutoCAD 2002, and products
that use the new version.
Planet Autodesk accomplished its role in being the largest CAD
event in Brazil. Even so, it is clear that there is a need of
a show of greater magnitude -- generic, and more far-reaching
to offer different solutions to professionals and companies.
Ricardo Montes <montes@cadnews.com.br>
is the editor of upFront.eZine, Portuguese Edition.
Figure: Autodesk's
booth.
Letters from Readerson Other Important Topics
Re: Revit on Sony (Pen) Viao
"This is the crux of the 'revolutionary' architect-to-computer
interface paradigm that the upcoming Architectural Studio [from
Autodesk] is all about, I think. There are some aspects of this
idea that seem to me a bit sort of 'back to the future' rather
than innovative and really useful. It will be interesting to see
just what does emerge from the StudioDesk project.
"The present descriptions at http://www.studiodesk.com are
too airy-fairy to mean much. It may be as radical a New Way as
the move from the > (or $) prompt to GUI. Or it may turn out
to be hot air that's generally ignored. But that's how innovations
go, I suppose.
"Having used pens and pucks and mice and SpaceBalls and trackballs
and touchpads, I can't see any great advantage in a pen. The exception
is freehand sketching, where a pressure-sensitive pen-tablet is
the best. With auto-object-snaps in CAD, you don't have to be
very precise in pointing."
- Geoff Harrod
Australia
The editor replies: "Could Revit be talking about running on a pen computer to head off StudioDesk?"
Re: Evaluating CAD Software
"In my opinion, the new Autodesk online store does NOT adequately
represent the registered developer community. The host Autodesk
chose is Digital River; the conditions in their contract, however,
have very a high commission percentage (around 40% -- a steep
dip for simply providing a download service), and participants
can't post their own data.
"On top of it all, the contract was nearly 15 pages of 10pt
text, way too much legal verbiage than necessary for such a simple
thing. This caused us to pass on the new Autodesk store, even
though we often had top ten products on Autodesk's previous online
store, CADPlugins.com.
"On the upside, I have found DigiBuy (http://www.digibuy.com)
to work for us. Its commission is 13.9% (we would loose 3.25%
on credit card orders anyway) and we can update our files whenever
we like. Simple terms and, oddly, a Digital River subsidiary."
- [Name withheld by request]
The editor replies: "Of the 40%, I wonder how much Autodesk takes home?"
Re: Press Releases
"I don't understand why so many American companies don't
understand the difference between a press release and advertising
material. In our country, such excessive superlatives are usually
counterproductive since it hides the real news behind a curtain
of advertisement statements. If companies would understand that,
our job [as CAD journalists] would be considerably easier."
- Claes Philipson
Sweden
"We should get someone to write a macro, taking all the
words defined as modern-day marketing 'verbiage' and automatically
calculate the % of meaningless rubbish in the document. A prize
to the winner with the highest % -- a dictionary or thesaurus,
perhaps?
"It seems to me that the marketing departments of industry
players have been relying on each other's output for guidance
so long now that we now have a distinct case of 'inbred marketing'.
There's a real need to widen the marketing gene pool.
"It used to be 'e', but now there's no reward on Wall Street
for that. We have to put up with 'CPx' for 'Collaborative Product
blah blah blah' -- yet again meaning nothing, invented by a market
analyst firm so their biggest customer could be No. 1 in its own
lunchtime.
"CPx has spread like a disease. Recently, I went to a Web
site to see what the company did prior to meeting the ceo. I couldn't
work out what they did because its splash page was written in
collaborative-eze.
"I can only conclude that CAD companies must think there
are a lot of gullible people out there, folks who just nod or
make grunts of acknowledgement when the jumble of 'collaboration'
adjectives and three-letter acronyms collide to enable best-in-class,
scalable, industry-oriented sentences of no value whatsoever.
"In short, it's all roughage."
- Maryn Day
England
The editor replies: "SDRC's press releases have
recently become more legible. Complaining helps."
Below the Radar
A summary of CAD industry news you may not have read
elsewhere:
The 'Extranet News' e-newsletter reports 200 extranet-related companies in its latest survey. http://www.extranetnews.com
PlanetCAD has "temporarily" suspended its 3Dshare.com translation service. In the meantime, it is providing online CAD translation via cadverter.com from UK-based Theorem Solutions. PlanetCAD and Theorem will collaborate on future developments. PlanetCAD will license Theorem Solutions' STEP and PDES translators for new products. http://www.planetcad.com and http://www.theorem.co.uk
Autodesk has made Streamline available in the United States and Canada [so much for the Web being WorldWide - Ed.]. Autodesk Streamline is a Web-based service for sharing design data from AutoCAD and Autodesk's mechanical software. Price is US$970 per user per year, with a free seven-day trial at http://www.autodesk.com/streamline
Code Zebra is offering a conversion service to convert AutoCAD DWG drawings into "intelligent" Visio (VSD) or Actrix (AXD) diagrams [I'd guess there'd be a bigger market converting AXD to DWG. - Ed]. The fee is based on the complexity and configuration of the source files. http://www.codezebra.com/conversionservice.html
Cigraph has two plug-ins (US$119 each) for Graphisoft's ArchiCAD: ArchiRuler is a toolbar with over 50 2D tools; ArchiFacade straightens out a perspective-distorted image, such as an angled photograph. Download from http://www.viaweb.com/intcad/utilities.html
New
Software Releases
Parasolid v13.0 features automated detail removal, and is now
available in 64-bit versions for Hewlett-Packard and Sun hardware.
http://www.parasolid.com
DotSoft has added 100 new functions to its ToolPac's 500 functions, along with improvements to its Symbol Manager and Table Tools. The software works with AutoCAD R14, 2000, 2000i, and 2002. Details at http://www.dotsoft.com
GlobalCAD 2002 stores and retrieves AutoCAD blocks and design details from a database. The software features password-protection, network support, and works with AutoCAD 14, 2000, 2002, and AutoCAD LT. http://www.globalcad.com
RealityWave's VizStream platform now supports all major 3D creation programs, including 3DS, PRJ, SLDPRT, SLDASM, STL, VRML, WRL, and PkZIP'ed versions of the formats. http://www.realitywave.com/technology-applications.asp
Version 2.006 of the AutoCAD 2000-compatible OpenDWG Toolkit/Viewkit supports Mac OS X, the new Unix-based operating system for Macintosh computers. http://www.opendwg.org/News/news.htm
Advances
in Hardware
If you have problems with clean prints from inkjet printers, try
a better-quality USB cable [such as one rated for 12 megabits/sec].
-- George Maidstone in 'Digital Photo Newsletter'
Toshiba's 1.8" PC Card hard drive will be available as a 5GB drive by the end of July (US$499). http://www.harddrives.toshiba.com
IBM's new 22" flat panel display (US$22,000) features "extreme high resolution," but the press release nor related Web site don't state the resolution spec, other than 200dpi.
People/Companies
on the Move
Steven Weisberg reports, "I have written my last CAD article,
and I plan to take a long vacation in Europe. I'm switching my
career to commercial real estate, and Cisco router operations.
Ciao!"
SofTech president and ceo, Mark Sweetland resigned form the company, rather than relocate with the company to Tewksbury MA USA. SofTech makes Cadra, DesignGateway, Prospector, ToolDesigner, ExpertCAD, and ExpertCAM.
Altris Software appointed Bill Weber as ceo, replacing Roger Erickson. Mr Weber was previously with Cisco Systems.
Smart Solutions, a subsidiary of Dassault Systemes changed its company name SmarTeam Corporation. http://www.smarteam.com
Computer
News Summaries
Samsung and Lexmark have the first sub-US$200 monochrome laser
printers. The vendors are selling the 600dpi printers at a loss,
hoping to make up the difference with the US$80 toner cartridges.
As MSN Messenger outage continues into its second week, affecting
10 million customers, analysts are questioning the viability of
Microsoft's newly-announced Web services that rely on instant
messaging, such as .Net and HailStorm. (Under HailStorm, you would
pay Microsoft a monthly or yearly fee to access your own personal
data.) If nothing else, Microsoft's failure to provide five-9s
uptime (as it has been boasting in recent ads) shows the importance
of multiple service providers.
In other news, Microsoft has dropped the SmartTags "feature"
from the next release of its operating system and Web browser.
SmartTags offer links to related Web sites operated by Microsoft.
- With reports from CNET and PC World
Market
News
PTC expects 3Q revenue to be US$228-$230 million, below the US$235
million low-end of its previous projection. The company is blaming
it on the slowdown in manufacturing being more pronounced this
quarter than last.
Graphisoft reported that 2Q01 sales were approximately e8.4 million,
slightly above last year's figure.
Bricsnet and Constructeo announced a conditional letter of intent
under which all shares of Constructeo will be exchanged for new
Bricsnet shares. Paris-based Constructeo is a provider of project
management and e-commerce tools for the construction industry.
The
WorthWhile Web
http://ojr.usc.edu/content/print.cfm?print=599
Online Journalism Review
Liberal bias targets the Internet.
Notable
Quotable
"There's no publicity so good as an attack from Microsoft."
- Bruce Perens, http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/zd/20010614/tc/beware_of_wolves_in_agnostic_s_clothing_1.html
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