September
21, 2004
Issue
#399
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- - - C
O N T E N T S From
the Editor IntelliCAD
Worldwide Conference 'Alibre
Design 8 Press Tour Below
the Radar Write - - - Donate - - - Look for additional,
nearly-daily CAD commentary at our Weblog: (ADVERTISMENT) Updated and Expanded for AutoCAD 2005! Tailoring AutoCAD 2005 is the new e-book for AutoCAD 2005. Download as a 260-page e-book in PDF format (US$26.95) or on CD ($31.95). 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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From the Editor We have a few copies of the following new books available for a US$25 donation to this e-newsletter:
If mailing a cheque, please send an email first to reserve your copy. Conact info at end of this newsletter. Thx! IntelliCAD Worldwide Conference Last week was the IntelliCAD Technical Consortium's first "user" conference -- meant for members and non-members. <www.intellicad.org> (IntelliCAD is a CAD package run by committee. The ITC has members who pay $20,000 a year. That employs programmers to update the mostly-compatible-with-AutoCAD software. In exchange, members get the code and sell it as they wish: as a straight CAD package, as part of a vertical application, or used in-house.) IntelliCAD v5, 5.x, and v6 The big announcement was IntelliCAD v5. And v5.5. And v6. Version 5 will ship in the coming weeks. In addition to the seven enhancements listed in ITC's press release, there are these:
The ITC confirmed rumors that they purchased code from BricsCAD. The main reason is speed. BricsCAD had already written the code and released it in their variant of IntelliCAD last June. Numerous display functions, like hatch patterns, TrueType font display, and linetypes, are 7-20x faster after BricsCAD programmers examined the code for bottlenecks. The BricsCAD code will be added to IntelliCAD v5.x, codenamed "Fusion" -- fusing together IntelliCAD and Bricscad. It will be released in 1Q05 with these features:
ITC is also working on ICAD v6, but no details on that. A slide gave one hint: PostScript output. And a presenter strongly hinted he would like to see ObjectARx added. Not Compatible with AutoCAD With all those AutoCAD features added to IntelliCAD, you might guess the ITC is attempting to close the gap on AutoCAD. Not at all, says ITC president Arnold van der Weide. "I'm not interested in being 100% compatible with AutoCAD, because then we only ever follow Autodesk." Instead, the plan to stablize IntelliCAD as a platform (more speed, fewer bugs, basic commands), and then take IntelliCAD where the ITC members want it to go. Each member gets one vote. This makes for democratic development, which, Mr van der Weide admits, makes for slow development. (And explains why BricsCAD went ahead with their optimization without the ITC.) Other thoughts from Mr van der Weide: Third-party applications tend not to cost more than 20% of AutoCAD's price, because AutoCAD is so expensive at US$3,750. Developers look at IntelliCAD with its base price of $249, and think, I can't live on 20% of $249. On the contrary, says Mr van der Weide: you can charge far more for your software, because the total cost is less. "Who sets the standard for DWG -- Autodesk or us [non-Autodesk software developers]?" With many non-Autodesk CAD vendors using DWG, maybe "we" should take over, mused Mr van der Weide. This sentiment was expressed by other attendees; one joked that perhaps one day in the future we'll see error messages that report, "Warning: This drawing was saved by AutoCAD." LT is outselling AutoCAD, according to several speakers at this conference [I doubt it]. LT with no API and a price tag of US$800 -- members of ITC see that a golden opportunity for IntelliCAD to provide a replacement product. There are, apparently, now over one million users of IntelliCAD. Why Software S*cks For the second day, the ITC invited several outsiders to present members with a non-members point-of-view on IntelliCAD -- Evan Yares of the Open Design Alliance, Nick Ballard of Cambashi, and myself. Evan Yares began the day with the unappatizing seminar title of "Why Software S*cks." [I am guessing this newsletter will be blocked by many automatic spam filters.] He explained why software is NOT doing what users want, some of which includes:
His list of four deadly sins of software: 1. Inadequate performance (largest DWG file seen by a member of the audience was 180MB and it took four hours to load into AutoCAD. Mr Yares reported on a MicroStation DGN file that was nearly 1GB, including all reference files.) 2. Poor usability. 3. Unreliable (crashing, and not doing what the user expects). 4. Lack of extensibility (users trying to make the software do things that its designers never thought of). The only products that are well conceived and implemented are database engines, compilers and Google. No CAD products. IntelliCAD has the advantage, he noted, that it doesn't have the problem of overwhelming success that locks it to its market. An Outsider's View My presentation was on "an outsider's view into IntelliCAD." I went over the history of IntelliCAD: Q: Who is the grandfather of IntelliCAD? A: David C Arnold, founder of DCA Engineering, later SoftDesk. Q: Where did the name come from? A: A software company called IntelliCAD in San Diego of the early 1990s. Q: What was IntelliCAD's other name? A: Phoenix. Q: Why is IntelliCAD so cheap (starting at $249)? A: Visio first sold it for 10% of the price of AutoCAD ($349), and eventually gave it away free in the early days of the ITC. I reminded members to keep March, 2007 in mind: that's the date when the FTC's consent order expires, and Autodesk is no longer restrained from attempting to acquire IntelliCAD. I asked the audience who their competitors are. The instant answer was "AutoCAD LT." I found it interesting that they had no other competitors on their mind. After some prodding, I helped them create three lists: a. Other products that use DWG as their native file format: AutoCAD LT, AutoCAD, PowerCAD, VDraft, and MicroStation. b. Other products in the price range: TurboCAD, DesignCAD, and so on. c. Other products that use similar APIs and CAD engines: OpenDWG, CADsoft, ObjectDBx, AutoCAD OEM, and so on. I asked the ITC to think through their marketing strategy, details of which I won't reveal here. After lunch, the sessions were closed to non-members, such as myself. And so I cannot share Mr Ballard's comments. ArchT for IntelliCAD Autodsys <www.autodsys.com> released ArchT 2004 architectural software for IntelliCAD. Originally developed by Ketiv Technologies, ArchT provides 2D production drafting utilities, style-based design, and customizable records and reports to underlying CAD packages -- IntelliCAD and AutoCAD. It also provides dynamic block and layer control and 3D modeling tools. During lunch at the conference, Autodsys president Ron Prepchuk showed how he used extended entity data to convert polylines into true complex linetypes, with features not found in AutoCAD or IntelliCAD -- such as filled shapes and start-with-symbols. The Georgetown Loop Mr Ballard and I had all-day Saturday before our planes left (his to England, mine to Canada), so we rented a car and drove west on I-70 to the Georgetown Loop railway <http://www.georgetownloop.com>. The train is pulled by a 1916 Class C 60-3 Shay steam locomotive on a narrow gauge (3') track at an elevation of 9,100 feet. A selection of photos here: worldcadaccess.typepad.com/photos/georgetown/ - - - Summing up: After several years of near-invisibility, IntelliCAD is again showing life. I think that the business experience of the ITC's new president, Arnold van der Weide, and the new programming team will have a positive impact on IntelliCAD's future. Alibre Design 8 Press Tour Alibre ceo Greg Milliken started the Design V8 press tour the same day I arrived in Denver, Colorado for the IntelliCAD conference. To show off the software's multi-user capability, he had a demo jock back in Texas demonstrate the software manipulating Mr Milliken's copy in the hotel room. Alibre doesn't do surface modeling (Rhino is recommended), so for now it imports surface models, and then converts them to solid models. More details on V8 at www.alibre.com But the demo was not as important as the message that Alibre, the company, is here to stay, and will grow at the expense of the $5,000 MCAD packages. He is pleased that his company has a 1% market share -- small, but easier to grow than competitors with larger market shares. As much as 95% of his customers have five or fewer seats of Alibre, so larger shops is one of several growth areas. The privately-held company is making US$4 million a year, and has a subscription renewal rate of 50%. It is profitable, because of its lean cost structure, using the Internet as much as possible for support and direct sales. In addition, the company is working on incorporating Alibre Design into other software, such as finite element analysis and other verticals. Expect the next release in 1Q05. Is Alibre going to get a version of IntelliCAD, as has SolidWorks? Mr Milliken says there is little demand at this point. Below the Radar A summary of CAD industry news you may not have read elsewhere, or that we found interesting: - - - IBM is running a two-page ad in 'Fortune' magazine: "IBM and Gehry Technologies are helping architects precisely and efficiently translate radical designs into remarkable buildings." No mention of CATIA or Dassault Systemes, maker of the CAD software marketed by IBM and used by Gehry Tech. www.ibm.com/ondemand LD Assistant is software that helps lighting designers set up effects for stages. New v4.1 now available from www.ldassistant.com/new.html InfoWorld editor Ed Foster is comparing software licenses between Adobe and Autodesk. Perhaps of greatest interest is section 9.5 of the AutoCAD 2005 license, which allows Autodesk (or its agents) to give reasonable notice, and then enter your home to search for non-compliant copies of its software. www.gripe2ed.com/scoop/section/Eula Noesis Solutions releases OPTIMUS 5.0, which predicts and reduces the impact of parameter variability on designs -- among other things. www.noesissolutions.com NIST has a report that says lack of interoperability in construction costs the industry $15.8 billion per year in the US. [I take these reports and their numbers with large doses of salt.] Still, incompatibility has a cost. You can get an electronic copy of NIST GCR 04-867 from www.bfrl.nist.gov/oae/oae.html Ellen Finkelstein adds a new RSS newsfeed for her monthly AutoCAD Tips Newsletter at www.ellenfinkelstein.com/rss.html Notes3D from QuadriSpace lets you view and share 3D models, and create 3D documents. Documentation features include create steps and document procedures; automatically generate explode sequences; and publish web pages and CDs. www.quadrispace.com Delcam's free viewer handles drawings created by CATIA v4/5, Pro/Engineer 2001 and Wildfire, SDRC, Unigraphics, SolidWorks, Solid Edge, Parasolid XT, IGES, VDA and STEP. www.delcam.com Redo The author of last issue's excellent Guest Editorial on drawing representation was written by a former employee of a CAD software company. It was not written, as mis-guessed by seveal readers, by Evan Yares of the Open Design Alliance. WorthWhile Web www.sepp.org/controv/ehrlich.html
Spin Doctor of the Moment "You couldn't have a starker contrast
between the multiple layers of check and balances [at '60 Minutes'],
and a guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas writing." Notable Quotable "The Internet has detected the mainstream
media as a form of censorship and simply routed around them." |
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