March 30, 2004
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#379
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- - - C
O N T E N T S Does
Better Analysis Make Products Better? - - - Below
the Radar Write - - - Donate - - - Look for additional,
nearly-daily CAD commentary at our Weblog: (ADVERTISMENT) Updated and Expanded for AutoCAD 2004! Tailoring AutoCAD 2004 is the first book for AutoCAD 2004. Download as a 204-page e-book in PDF format (US$24.95) or on CD ($29.95). Covers all areas of customization, from changing the user interface to writing toolbar macros and LISP routines. Click here to sample preview pages and place your order.
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Does Better Analysis Make Products Worse? I have no answer to the question posed above; I'm not terribly familiar with analysis software used by the CAD industry. But Peter Coffee raises the problem on the 25th anniversary of the spreadsheet. (The spreadsheet is credited with mainstreaming the personal computer; before then, they were the sport of hobbyists. The original spreadsheet, VisiCalc <www.bricklin.com/visicalc.htm>, was released first for the Apple II computer. Twenty-five years later, the basic design remains in Excel XP.) The original reason for creating the spreadsheet was to quickly try out many what-if scenarios. You plug in a range of numbers, and the software does the drudge work of repeated recalculations. But spreadsheets create a false sense of accuracy. You are probably familiar with flaws of spreadsheets: enter the wrong formula or include the incorrect range, and you get results that look right are are false; the "formulae hidden from view" design of the spreadsheet prevents you from realizing errors easily. Mr Coffee reports on the work of Stan Kelly-Bootle and Jeffrey Kottemann to expose psychological problems with using analysis software. - - - Mr Kelly-Bootle says people tend to slide their assumptions toward the optimistic limits, "inching good numbers up and bad numbers down until we get the result we want -— failing to admit that the result is based on multiplying a series of less-than-even chances." Instead of entering single values for unknown quantities, we should be entering a probabilistic range of values. But Excel (produced by We-Are-Innovative Microsoft) doesn't support that without third-party plug-ins. Mr Kottemann has written on 'Performance, Beliefs, and the Illusion of Control.' He describes tests where some people use software that allows alternative scenarios. These users "believed they were doing a better job —- even though statistical measures of their results showed no improvement in the actual quality of the forecasts." Worse, these users took longer to arrive at an answer. Summing up: Software is idiot savant, and people fool themselves. Application to CAD I believe we need to take serious the warnings of Mr Kelly-Bootle and Mr Kottemann. We want to hear good news, and our bosses are happy with us when we deliver good news. We input good news into software, and then are pleasured by the software reflecting back to us the good news. When we use spreadsheets and other analysis software, we need to ask ourselves: Am I inputting only good news? What is the most-likely scenario? In his article, Mr Coffee make reference to several software packages that take the broader view of analysis story.news.yahoo.com/news . Are the same principles being applied to CAD analysis software? Enter "cad" into Google, and it returns this curious ranking of CAD vendors -- some of whom I've never heard of. Here are the first 15:
1. JW CAD (Japanese) www.jwcad.net 2. Altium P-CAD (PCB design) www.acceltech.com 3. Rccad (model airplane design) www.rccad.com 4. Delta CAD ("world's easiest" CAD program) www.dcad.com 5. Bentley Systems (MicroStation) www.bentley.com
6. BRL-CAD (3D modeler) ftp.arl.mil/brlcad 7. CadStd (general purpose CAD) www.cadstd.com 8. Delcam (automotive CADCAM) www.delcam.com 9. IMSI (TurboCAD) www.imsisoft.com 10. Autodesk (AutoCAD) www.autodesk.com
11. CYCAS (2d/3D architecture CAD) www.cycas.de 12. QCad (simple 2D CAD) www.ribbonsoft.com/qcad.html 13. Surfware (SURFCAM CAD/CAM) www.surfware.com 14. TekSoft (ProCAM) www.teksoft.com 15. Fashion CAD (pattern making) www.fashioncad.net
A half-hour later, I entered "cad" again into Google, and got a different ranking. Who can fathom how Google operates? Below the Radar A summary of CAD industry news you may not have read elsewhere, or that we found interesting: - - - Tailor Made Software announces AcroXchange ($3,995 per server) for converting PDF and Illustrator files to CAD, technical illustration, and raster formats. www.tailormade.com Expect VIZ 2005 in a couple of months. Announcement to be made later this week. VariCAD is updated to v9.0-2.1. Thirty-day trial version for Windows or Linux available from www.varicad.com SAMTECH pre-releases BOSS quattro V5 for parameterized analyses, stochastic analyses, design of experiments, optimization and updating of numerical models with experimental data for CATIA V5. www.samcef.com DOSCH 3D:ROADS collects 390 textured 3D models of road elements, such as highways (US and European), rural roads, and road construction sites. www.doschdesign.com/products/3d/Roads.html VX QuickShapes consists of primitive 3D shape commands that eliminate the need to define base sketches in VX 9. www.vx.com ALGOR V14.3 features new analysis capabilities for Mechanical Event Simulation, electrostatics and heat transfer. www.algor.com And ProSoft has a new Web-based training service for online MicroStation training. online-training.prosoftnet.com Seminars and Conferences Alan Woolridge starting a CADVANCE UK Users Group. www.cadalot.co.uk/cadvance/cadvance.htm People/Companies on the Move Axiom celebrates its 20th anniversary. The company began writing software utilities for Intergraph CAD running on VAX mini-computers; today, Axiom calls itself "the world's largest independent provider of general-purpose MicroStation utilities." www.axiomint.com/20th-anniversary.htm Bentley Systems joins TransXML, a proposed standard for exchanging transportation data: surveying and road design, highway and bridge structures, construction and materials, and transportation system safety. TransXML is an initiative of the US National Cooperative Highway Research Program. Paul Wilkinson heads up Delcam's new Professional Services Group. Mr Wilkinson is the former software development director with PTC. Proficiency notes that John Helm joins the company as vp of worldwide sales. Mr Helm is the former vp of sales for NuGenesis Technologies. Oce named Joe Marciano to head up Oce Business Services, and Patrick Chapuis to lead the North American division of Oce Wide Format Printing. Last February's AEC Systems show, under its new ownership, was attended by just under 2,000 visitors -- significantly fewer than the 20,000+ visitors in the 1980s and 1990s. WorthWhile Web www.bricklin.com/history/othersites.htm History of early software, along with downloadable copies of VisiCalc v1, Turbo Pascal v1, and others. Letters to the Editor Re: Plagiarism "Thanks again for the ongoing helpful
information. I thought it was very appropriate to point out the
plagiarizing issues you have run into." - - - Re: High cost of LT "I don't think LT (US$899) costs more than it should. Isn't anybody else using this program in the business world? Continued support and development, as well as advertising and shareholder profits, cost money. "When I first started using AutoCAD in 1985, it cost $1,250 -- if I remember correctly. Based on cost inflation alone, AutoCAD should cost $2,250, if it did the same things as it did then. As it is, I would estimate it is 25-50 times as powerful. It is still in the same basic price range, and in fact cheaper than some of its primary competitors, MicroStation, ArchiCAD, Nemetschek, et al. "If you need less power by cheaper, less
functional software. No I don't work for Autodesk, I just want to
see them successful, so I don't have to completely retool my software
investment." The editor replies: "The CAD vendors you mention consider the price of AutoCAD when deciding on the price of their products. A rising tide lifts all boats."
"Perhaps Mr. Bau should have a go at Intergraph's SmartSketch, and see what modern 2D CADD really is, rather than profess his content with, and coalescence with Autodesk's decision to keep AutoCAD users technologically oppressed and in the dark ages, and using AutoCAD as a means of force-feeding them other Autodesk products. "What does parametric, constraint- and dimension-driven 2D drafting have to do with 3D modeling? The fact of the matter is that Autodesk is intentionally hobbling the 2D drafting features of AutoCAD very specifically for the purpose of trying to herd customers to other product offerings in order to get advanced 2D functionality. "I have, and will continue to use SmartSketch
for my 2D drafting needs (I'm an AutoCAD developer by profession,
not a drafter), because SmartSketch allows me to be 3-5X more productive
at 2D drawing, compared to AutoCAD."
"If I was in the position where I needed to purchase CAD software (and assuming it had to be AutoCAD-compatible), I would much rather pay $1,000 than $4,000. (The math works quite well.) "Not really connected: I entered my name
in a Google search the other day and found letters I had written
to upFront.eZine -- including ones translated to Spanish and Japanese.
It was quite a treat." - - - "I have been reading your newsletter
for several years now. I continue to look forward to reading your
newsletter each week. It makes for a very interesting reading. Thanks
and keep up the great work!"
"I do enjoy reading your ezine each week,
as well as the reactions/comments from the various readers!" Spin Doctor of the Moment "Nobody knows the magnitude of the problem,
or if it exists at all." Notable Quotable "The average European cow receives $2.50 in daily agricultural subsidies, more money than at least three billion of the world's humans have to live on." - Anne Applebaum, 'The New Radical Chic'
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