u p F r o n t . e Z i n e
celebrating 15 years of reporting on the business of cad
Issue #655 | July 27, 2010 | English Edition
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In This Issue
Guest Editorial by Dave Angelotti
by Jon Sommers
Sent From My iPad
Guest Editorial by Dave Angelotti
I've had my iPad for a month now, and can see a lot of potential for it fitting into the digital CAD world. I hardly ever use my workstation at home, because for most of what I did I can now do on the iPad.
I have been downloading various apps that pertain to my work as an engineer, but these are limited. There is a project scheduling app, another that lets me work with spreadsheets and Word docs. I have some basic vector-based sketching programs, and even a concrete design program.
I can download various apps that give me remote desktop capabilities. So I can be somewhere and access my work network and workstation. For ROAD warriors, this sure beats lugging the laptop.
Taken separately, this doesn't amount to much. I think, however, that the real power of the iPad (as compared to the tablet computers of the past) is the integration with WiFi and 3G. I can be as connected as I want to be -- it's basically a Blackberry on crack, and much better than the iPhone. As well, it is much faster at starting up than any laptop.
But I ramble.
I see the real potential in using this device in the field. With the ability to view docs, annotate them, record notes, and so on, iPads make great field notebooks. I think that they would also make great tools for construction support personnel. I've worked as a field manager for a construction management company and would have loved this for doing my daily reports. As it was, I had to walk around, take notes, and then type them into ConstructWare later.
I could download copies of many building codes and keep them in my library. This would give me simple access to most of my documentation.
There are limitations. As of right now, the iPad doesn't include a camera or a video camera; if it did, it would be great for showing someone something in the field.
The key in my mind is allowing people to see how the iPad functions differently than a typical computer. Until that is understood, it is hard to see the real potential. For me, I'm still learning. I wish I had more computer coding background, for I can imagine many great apps.
[Mr Angelotti has spent more than 20 years working as a structural engineer, construction manager, and project manager for the industrial and commercial built-environments. He also worked many years with the enabling of engineering work processes with technology tools. He is presently Engineering Manager for the Midland, MI USA office of CDI Engineering Solutions - Process & Industrial.]
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[654/5]
All About Blueprints
by Jon Sommers
Blue-prints, blue-lines, white bond paper prints, and the nostalgic odor of ammonia fumes.
The blue-line repro process, sometimes called "Diazo," results in blue lines on a white (or sometimes blue stippled) paper. The light-sensitive paper is contact exposed with ultra-violet light from tracings and then is developed in ammonia fumes. This leaves a slight ammonia smell coming from the prints for a few minutes.
Even today, some repro [reproduction] companies in Southern California produce these blue-line prints. As an architect for over 25 years, I can assure you, contractors really don't care what kind of paper/colors the prints are. For in-house use, small Diazo machines can still be purchased from drafting supply houses for around $1,500 along with paper and ammonia
“Blue-prints” are white lines on blue background paper. This is created through a wet development process using light sensitive chemicals (containing potassium and ammonia) that are applied to paper. When exposed to light, the chemicals turn blue and become insoluble. The unexposed contract printed lines are than washed away, leaving white lines on a blue background. There is a time lag while the developed blue-prints are run through a dryer. To my knowledge there are no "blue-pints" made in Southern California now.
Until about ten years ago, a local Long Beach, repro company did produce blue-prints, often used as movie props, because directors and prop masters thought they were more authentic to the movie audiences than blue-lines prints.
In a recent film, "It's Complicated," architect character Steve Martin unrolls his prints for Meryl Streep, the homeowner character, showing his designs for her remodel. His drawings are white bond prints [black lines on white bond paper]. The white bond method has pretty much taken over from blue-line/blue-print methods due to aggressive selling of the machines from big copy machine manufactures. Generally the through-put on a white bond machine is a bit faster than other methods and of course can read digital files. These machines are really an ultra-size Xerox machine, are made by Xerox, IBM, Ricoh, Cannon, Oce, and others, but cost a lot.
In my area, a 24x36" white bond print ordered from Kinkos/FedEx costs a little over $6 each. Using my own tracing, a blue-line print from the local repro house costs about $2 each. If I make the print on my in-house Diazo blueline machine, that I’ve owned for over 15 years, a single print will cost me about 25 cents.
For in-house use, the white bond machines are very expensive, none costing less than $20,000 (new, turn-key, retail price). They require a lot of costly manufacturer-provided maintenance and extras such as RIPs [raster image processor] to process images from files and scanners, also sold separately.
White bond is "revolution in printing" but, I’m not sure that they are truly cost-effective, speedy, or a progressive method to get hardcopy prints to clients.
When the gallon bottle of ammonia in my Diazo machine loses its potency, I take home the bottle, add the weakened ammonia solution to my garden sprayer, and apply it to the lawn. It makes a great fertilizer, and I bet the white-bond printer people can't equal that kind of re-cycling.
[Jon Sommers is an AIA architect working in California.]
And In Other News
Now that Hexagon is going to own Intergraph, the Swedish company now gets greater awareness. Hexagon Metrology ships some new hardware, its Endeavor 3 CMM [coordinate measuring machine], vertical coordinate measuring machines with new sizes, improved sensors , and boosted accuracy. http://www.HexagonMetrology.us
Oleg Shilovitsky has a new blog, "Beyond PLM," because he's expanding from PLM-only to writing about engineering and manufacturing software. Welcome home, Oleg! (Readers may recall that his first blog was named "Daily PLM Think Tank.") Point your RSS reader to http://beyondplm.com
VSG [visualization sciences group] is claiming their new Open Inventor 3D graphics toolkit is nearly as fast as graphics hardware. Works with C++ and .NET on Linux and Windows, 32- and 64-bit. http://www.vsg3d.com
TransMagic's EXPERT XL-64 handles CAD data in excess of two gigabytes on 64-bit computers: "...with a single click, shrink several days of work down to minutes." Yowser! Also improved: optimized Fast Bounding Box and upgraded Auto Repair Wizard.
With delayed updates dogging TTF (ex-Adobe, now TechSoft 3D0 translator, TransMagic is pretty happy to boast support for the latest, as in CATIA V5 R20, NX 7, Pro/E 5.0, JT 9.3, and SolidWorks 2010. http://www.transmagic.com/products/R8SP4/feedback
Holistic City makes me think of the New Jerusalem, but this one's the name of a software company rooted in the concrete reality of urban design. They've just released version 2 of CityCAD, their conceptual urban planning application for CAD. A perpetual license is 4,000 British pounds. http://www.holisticcity.co.uk
Robert Shear of Autodesk spent a few minutes last week chatting me up about Autodesk Plant Design Suite 2011. He's the senior industry manager for Autodesk’s Plant Solutions group, and he agrees that Intergraph and AVEVA are the best for new designs, but figures his software is better for revamps and compliance.
Plant Suit is one license (well, two) that works out cheaper for customers, should they want AutoCAD + P&ID + Plant3D + Navisworks Simulate for $9,500, whereas Plant3D alone is $9,000. Should you want Navisworks Manage instead for its multi-model clash detection, then the suit is $11,500. http://www.autodesk.com/plant3d
IntegrityWare's new SubD-NURBS converts sub-division surfaces (used in conceptual modeling) to NURBS-based modeling used in CAD. http://www.IntegrityWare.com
And the latest in cloud apps from Autodesk labs are: (a) Project Neon generates high-end rendering stills and (b) Project Photofly generates 3D models by stiching together a series of 2D digital photographs -- both using the cloud. Register to try out at http://labs.autodesk.com
Oh, and one more thing: 3D Studio is now 20 years old. I was still Senior Editor at CADalyst magazine when Autodesk made the announcement, and our thoughts at the time were: (1) was this the new face of AutoCAD? and (2) would it fail like CAD\camera? We were wrong on both guesses.
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These were some of the news items that were posted during the last week at our WorldCAD Access blog <http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com>:
- On board the 'Celebration of Light' barge
-The precision of computer modeling is rather divergent
-The nVidia plan: To shatter coffee breaks due to ray tracing
-Milling really organic shapes
-PTC gains more work at EADS
-Living on this side of the hard-work/soft-work divide
- 5,000 daily readers, two million lifetime page-views
Letters to the Editor
Re: Readers Respond to Reading the DraftSight EULA
Many software systems have similar exclusions. The intent is to prevent "deep pocket" suits, where a victim goes after everyone associated with the creation of the thing that caused them damage.
Interesting to see aircraft design listed under the SolidWorks EULA exclusions. Particularly as SolidWorks provides case studies in this realm. <http://www.solidworks.com/sw/industries/aerospace-engineering-design-industry.htm >
EULAs are not settled law. They mostly provide a framework by which the software company's high-priced lawyers can defend or prosecute a case.
- Evan Yares
It will come as no surprise I disagree with your assumption EULA are an inside joke and that there exists an agreement between vendors and users indicating, "We agree to not read EULAs in exchange for vendors being allowed to write in ridiculous terms that they agree to not enforce." If that were the case Autodesk would never have responded as they have in my case.
In the eyes of vendors EULA are contracts. It can be seen as fun to make light of the clauses in EULA but in reality, in business, it is a fool who accepts EULA with problematic clauses without challenge.
Ben Decker of CADDIT wrote, "Want servers to stop collecting data about you? Stop using a computer." This statement is another example of the foolishness that abounds in our industry by those who should know better and, the solution suggested suggests very little consideration is being given to the issues raised as a result of allowing one business entity un-controlled access to another’s systems with no oversight.
As I have often said, I have little or no objection to the access provided I have control over the whole process - as I should. This is of course where Autodesk (and others) and I clash and my critics refuse to accept.
- R. Paul Waddington.
The editor replies: Only in rare cases is my assertion untrue, and unfortunately your's is one of those. But you should also recognize that I am poking a stick in the sides of vendors sides, making fun of their ridiculous terms.
After receiving a couple of emails I can see that some readers missed the point of my previous comments about the Dassault EULA. It WAS NOT intended to express any "implicit approval" for data-collecting, invasion of privacy, etc. My comments were only to be taken as they were -- a somewhat satirical response to a somewhat satirical post.
- Ben Decker, CADDIT
Australia
The editor replies: Some of my comments were also humour, such as the "misleading" point I made that under-18s can't use it.
I was reading the responses to your comments on DraftSight’s EULA, and I wondered why some people are so far from the mark or understanding the intention of these agreements? Sure it’s fun to pick holes in their contradictory and often downright ridiculous nature, but we do have a choice in negotiating the wording. I’ve been involved in a couple of instances where a EULA has been re-written for specific customers.
A few points:
* I don’t know for sure but EULAs are not saying you have to be 18 to use the software, just 18 to agree to the EULA. I’m not sure what it’s like in the US, but over here in the UK, we don’t have too many schoolkids dictating the purchasing decisions of schools, nor what the ICT and Design syllabuses contain. It's a legal agreement, and minors cannot enter into a contract.
* The EULA isn’t anything to do with the downloads being the same all over the world. Each country tends to have slightly different laws and hence most software actually comes with a slightly different EULA (although you may not be agreeing to the correct one if you don’t pick the country of use when you install).
* The point about not taking software out of the country of purchase (purchase, not download) is all about revenue. E.g. we can buy software a lot cheaper in other countries (although not as cheap as it once was when the British Pound was stronger). The clauses mentioned are to stop transferring cheaper licenses from one geographical region to another. (Interesting that in certain EULAs geographic region is defined as an individual building).
* Restricting use on a laptop on a plane is clearly ridiculous. Don’t forget that just because it’s written, it doesn’t mean it will stand up in court. You can’t, for example, restrict someone’s need to perform their day-to-day professional duties (provided those duties are legal and do not in themselves contradict the EULA). The clauses are there for permanency rather than temporary.
* Finally, SolidWorks not being used in the design of aircraft. Perhaps they should change their website and remove most of the Commercial Industries shown! Clearly a case of a*** covering (as we say in England). All EULAs seem to have it (or at least the ones I’ve got). "High Risk Activities" is how Bentley terms it. Even Autodesk's Design Review has a clause about the software not being a replacement for competency.
Thanks for the eZine as always!
- Nigel Davies
Evolve Consultancy
The editor replies: Odd that a EULA can contradict the beliefs of the CAD vendor's marketing department! I think it is odder that we are not allowed to operate free software in a second country.
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Re: The Tech folder contains templates for stationary
Uh, is this Canadian for "stationery," eh?
- Rick Sierk
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Hope all is well. Still enjoying the ezine.
- Phil Kreiker
I am an oldtimer in the CAD world, but CAD is not as important to me, do not use it as much as I used to. Keep up the good work!
- Kal Jabusch
Spin Doctor of the Moment
"3D TV could be mainstream in homes in two years.
- Georgina Prodhan, Reuters
http://in.reuters.com/article/idINIndia-50040720100711
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Entire contents copyright ©2010 by upFront.eZine Publishing, Ltd. All rights reserved worldwide. Letters sent to the editor are subject to publication. Article reprint fee: $250 and up. All trademarks belong to their respective holders. "upFront.eZine," "The Business of CAD," and "On your desktop every Tuesday morning" are trademarks of upFront.eZine Publishing, Ltd. Letters to the editor may be edited for clarity and brevity. Translations and opinions expressed are not necessarily shared by upFront.eZine Publishing, Ltd.
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