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Issue #473 : : May 9, 2006 |
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C o n t e n t s Note from the Editor Adobe Acquires TTF:
Think Clearly,
or Don't Publish
Below the Radar and other regular columns.
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Write the Editor. Donate to upFront.eZine through Paypal. Access nearly-daily CAD commentary at our blog: WorldCAD Access. |
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Note from the Editor See you in Prague next month! I'll be attending Bentley Systems' BE user conference in Prague, which takes place June 11-15. Those arriving from outside the Czech Republic need proof of:
More info at www.be.org/en-US/BEConferenceEurope/Overview.htm Readers Respond, Part I "Another thing Adobe gets with TTF is compression technology for 3D data. That should help the PDF file size when 3D is included. However, technology from Seemage, UGS (EAI), and PTC/Division are still way better for a large number of parts in a model. "What's amazing to watch is how large companies can pick
a strategy and then use might to get there. They also have the luxury
of getting it wrong and it being painful -- but not ballistically
destructive. Just a jealous rant from a little guy." The editor replies: "Another source revealed to me that it was cheaper for Adobe to buy the whole company than to pay ongoing royalties to TTF, because their cost of royalties is so steep."
"We've done a lot of work in this area [of reducing file size]. It turns out that format is a lot less important than how you pre-condition the data (a process we call 'optimizing') before you put it into the format. We have a bunch of data at www.kaon.com/kb/article.php?id=023 "U3D has problems compressing assemblies with thousands
of parts, and it has trouble with meshes that have a lot of faces.
So we pre-process the data to get it more into the sweet spot of
U3D, and the result is files that are a lot more competitive with
DWF in terms of size."
"Speaking of PDF, DWF, BIM, and SketchUp, it is interesting to note that the free PDF writer included with ArchiCAD creates CAD PDFs at a fraction of the size compared with Acrobat Distiller. This utility can be used by any program, since it installs as a virtual printer. "It's ironic what features software can contain when it
is not the industry 'standard'. A demo version of ArchiCAD and the
included PDF converter can be downloaded from our Web site at http://www.3dcadco.com/downloads
"
"The latest issue of upFront.eZine [#471] contains size comparisons of PDF vs DWF. It is an interesting test, but I suggest taking a look at a related discussion thread on the AUGI forum at forums.augi.com/showthread.php?t=30824 . "In particular notice a post regarding the default DPI [dots
per inch] setting in DWF and PDF writers. You may want to rerun
your test and make sure that it compares apples to apples. The results
may surprise you and would be of interest to your readers."
"That is precisely what we want: SMALL. I use PDF for 2D and DWF for 3D models. The only reason I don't use DWF for 2D is because the font conversion from Inventor to DWF is SO BAD it is unreadable by my fabricators. "Imagine that? Autodesk can't properly convert their own
fonts from one software to another!"
Next week: more reader reaction. Cadsoft may well be the most important CAD company you've never heard of. For more than a decade, this small Canadian company has been writing the code behind private label and consumer CAD software -- 3D Home Architect, IMSI Floor Plan 3D, IMAGINiT Builder 3D, Home Depot 3D Designer, Carey Bros Deck and Landscape, and more. You might also recognize their own CAD software: APDesign, Cadsoft Build and Concepts, and most recently Envisioneer. Founded in 1984 in Australia, the first product was APDesign, an architectural add-on for AutoCAD. They worked with Autodesk to launch the OEM program, where AutoCAD is a CAD engine for vertical software, but now develop their own CAD engine with a team of eight programmers stationed in the current head office in Canada. Australia continues to be one of the company's strongest market, only second to the US. Brad Finck is VP of Product Development, and figured it was time to lift the veil of near-secrecy surrounding his company. He began his Introducing Cadsoft tour with by visiting the offices of upFront.eZine -- criss-crossing Canada in a single day. Envisioneer 3 is a heck of an impressive product for US$800. It's what AutoSketch should have become. (I encouraged Mr Finck to increase the price.) If you've ever tried a demo of 3D Home Architect, then you've had a feel for this product, but Envisioneer is a "pro" version that contains a lot more. Try this on: real-time lighting: as you place a lamp in a room, and move it around, its emitted light moves along, in realtime. That lets you fine-tune the location of room lighting without the move-lamp-render- move-lamp-again cycle. Envisioneer also includes a photo-realistic renderer supporting radiosity and raytracing thanks to technology developed by a university professor in British Columbia, Canada. The limits of radiosity, however, are shown as you move outside the house; the lighting effects are just not as nice. Another feature: the BOM data can become excruciatingly detailed, down to cut lists, where the software tells you which lengths to cut from which pieces of wood -- to minimize wastage. The software has many links to outside number-crunching software, but no IFCs. "The IAI moves too slowly," laments Mr Finck. Roofing design blows away Revit. OTOH, this software is limited to multi-floor residential and light commercial designs; it's no Freedom Tower designer. Envisioneer’s building model is not parametric, although its 2D/3D elements that define the model are. Instead, it uses a relational connectivity graph to connect all drawing elements, along with a hierarchy that users can manually overrule. For example, walls are connected to roofs; as the roof is raised, the wall extends. But the wall can be disconnected from the roof. Similarly, fencing can follow the 3D terrain -- or ignore it. Link: www.cadsoft.com Think Clearly, or Don't Publish Wil Schroter this morning ships a press release on himself: "Wil Schroter's new book 'Go BIG or Go HOME' details how aspiring entrepreneurs can build the next generation of hyper growth companies like Google, MySpace or NetFlix that grow from 'zero to a billion dollars' practically overnight." One way to go big, of course, is to write a book. Those who sell shovels make more money than do gold miners. Let's look at the flaws in his some of his arguments: "Go BIG or Go HOME" -- there is no need to go home (quit the business) if you don't go big. Proof? CAD companies are now targeting SMBs [small and medium-size businesses], because there are far more SMBs than large corporations. After all, the Fortune 500 is limited to just 500 of the largest corporations, and that number is tiny compared to the number of SMBs. CAD vendors themselves are proof that Mr Schroter's philosophy is flawed. Most are small enough to be called "niche vendors": they serve a group of a 100-300 thousand customers and thrive happily on maintenance, upgrade, and service revenues. "It would be easy to write off the success of these companies as a 'fluke' except for the fact that it's happening more and more often" -- and soon the world will consist only of millions of giant companies. Because everyone will have bought and read Schroter's book, who himself became a giant corporation. Later that day, cows began jumping over the moon. Meanwhile, Google is being sued for providing access to child pornography, Yahoo stands accused of aiding the Chinese government in arresting those who think independently, and MySpace has become the new synonym for teenage perversion. Not having read his book, I don't know whether Schroter covers those points as enthusiastically. Should you buy his book? That's your decision. But it does smack of luring readers (a.k.a. contributors to Mr Schroter's personal fortune) who also buy lottery tickets. "Maybe THIS TIME I'll hit the formula that makes me rich!" As an alternative, try hard work, market awareness, critical thinking, and leveraging the Internet. Oops! Did I just spoil the plot? Should you be unhappy being a niche player? No. I like my niche and I don't want the headaches of being the head of a giant corporation. Find contentment in your nicheness. Profit is more important than growth.
In Related News PTC announced a 16% yearly growth in the reseller channel resulting from adoption of PTC software by small and medium-sized businesses.
Links: uk.us.biz.yahoo.com/prnews/060508/clm005.html?.v=44
A summary of CAD industry news you may not have read elsewhere, or that I found interesting:
Free rendering software from nVidia: Gelato 2.0 can be downloaded from www.nvidia.com/page/gelato_download.html -- after registration, and if your computer has one of the supported nVidia graphics boards and runs Linux or Windows XP. IntelliCAD v6.2 supports true color, color books, snap to midpoint, faster loading and display, attach WAV files to drawings, and more. The software is distributed by members of the IntelliCAD Technology Consortium. www.intellicad.org UGS has an add-on for Solid Edge that allows it to do wire harness design. It also imports net-lists from Vesys, Mentor Graphics, Promis-e, LTX, and Cim-Team. www.solidedge.com/overview/v18_wireharness.htm UGS also ships Femap v9.2 for finite element modeling. New features include automatic surface contact detection and support for glued surface connections. www.ugs.com/femap Alibre reports that its free Design Xpress software has been downloaded 207,000 times in nine months. www.alibre.com Cyco Software says its engineering data management software now supports AutoCAD 2007. www.cyco.com LMS adds to its noise and vibration software: SCADAS Mobile is for mobile data acquisition, and Test.Xpress is a sound and vibration analyzer. www.lmsintl.com VX CAD/CAM now imports digital images to generate 3D models. www.vx.com - - - These news items were posted during the last week at the WorldCAD Access blog <worldcadaccess.typepad.com>:
And at the Gizmos Grabowski <worldcadaccess.typepad.com/gizmos/> Weblog:
Hardware News Contex has a new line of energy-efficient large-format scanners, certified Energy Star Compliant. [I've never thought of scanners as being energy hogs.] The press release fails to mention the energy savings. www.contex.com
Seminars & Conferences Rapid.Tech 2006 takes palces May 16-17 in Thuringia Germany. www.rapidtech.de Third annual Engineering Green Buildings Conference and Expo is Sept 18-19 in Austin TX USA. www.egbregistration.com
People/Companies on the Move Silicon Graphics is seeking protection from creditors by filing for bankruptcy. The hardware company hopes to reorganize in six months and keep runing. Creative Products takes over sales, marketing, and product development of the Metrolosys inspection software. www.metrolosys.com
Market News IGE+XAO Group reports a net profit of e883,940 for the first half of its fiscal year, up 13% from a year ago. Adobe Systems warns its Q2 profit and revenue might fall due to weak sales in Europe and North America. The share price fell 7%. Letters to the Editor Re: upFront.eZine's 11th Anniversary "Happy 11th birthday! I've been enjoying your upFront.eZine for a fair while, although not quite that long. So it's time to finally acknowledge the value of the information you send winging my way with a few bucks [dollars]. "My CAD experience goes way back to AutoCAD 2 with ADE-1.
For a presentation to convince mangement that we should start using
CAD, I brought in my Apple ][ from home, and ran a little program
I had written to demonstrate moving furniture symbols around a floor
plan with cursor keys. Primitive, but it worked!" - - - Re: School Politics "Found you article in #471, about the prof at VA Tech requiring a tablet PC purchase, to be very interesting. I can remember that as a faculty member I couldn't require my own book for my classes because of the royalty situation. From your commentary, this smells of payback in some form when everyone is required to purchase from one vendor. "I wonder if the prof is as concerned about the basic understanding,
rationale, and soundness of content and intent of documents and
such produced by his students as he is about their apparatus! The
tablet PC does so much for them, I wonder how well they just think!
OK, I'm an old guy, but I still maintain there is value for example,
in performing manual drafting prior to utilizing CAD -- you gain
so much more insight into your product and what it takes to produce
it." The editor replies: "I began manual with drafting, but there was no CAD back then. I recall that on the first day the instructor had us practice lettering. That drove the class size down to 3. I wonder if he did that on purpose!" Mr Liebing responds: "I also had to do many series of lines, in varying weights with the same 2H pencil (wood!), twisting/rolling the point as we drew the lines [to maintain even line width]. From that beginning, I got into architectural drawing and a 42-year career as an architect with a lot of detailing and other contract drawings. I wouldn't change a thing; I'm just saddened by what the kids today don't know or experience." - - - "Thanks for providing us with the upFront.eZine. This is
valuable information newsletter that, I think, brings a lot of market
feedback."
"Thanks for your dedication and skills. It is enjoyable
and beneficial"
"Thank you for your magazine. It's been very readable and
useful."
Spin Doctor of the Moment "Unauthorized recording or downloading of this [Webcast]
event is not permitted."
Notable Quotable "We hear of developers who keep a Linux instance open on
Windows, or vice-versa, either for the sake of cross-platform productivity
or to strike a blow for religious freedom."
Copyright 2006 by upFront.eZine Publishing, Ltd. All rights reserved worldwide Article reprint fee US$250.00.
All trademarks belong to their respective holders. "upFront.eZine,"
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