u p F r o n t . e Z i n e
t h e b u s i n e s s o f c a d
Issue #679 | February 22, 2011
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In This Issue
Readers respond
bim, Bim, BIM
Readers respond to building information modeling
I was quite disappointed in your recent double article titled "Understanding Hybrid Workflows between CAD and BIM" in upFront.eZine #674 and #677. I really don't understand why you wrote this nonsense.
First, I'd like to make an clear objection against the use of the word CAD in an AutoCAD- or DWG-way of talking. CAD, in my opinion, still stands for Computer Aided Design. Part of this is BIM, as being 3D CAD that uses a building information database, let's say defining objects, attributes, relations and behaviour as you design. Revit, ArchiCAD, and AllPlan are just a new generation of CAD system. It is better to say Computer Aided Building Design systems, defining more intelligent objects and their characteristics.
Second, about your title of "Hybrid Workflows." I guess you mean the problem described halfway through upFront.eZine #674, "AutoCAD users want access 3D models created by Revit or ArchiCAD". Do you really call this a problem? I don't think it exists.
All BIM-software is well aware of the fact that they generate 2D documents from a BIM and these documents follow the ISO PDF standard or the Open Design Alliance's open DWG standard, , or Autodesk's heavenly, 3-yearly re-encrypted, TrueDWG, or RealDWG. These 2D documents can be easily opened by free PDF or DWG viewers, or edited using any of the more-or-less open PDF or DWG editors. (Some of them advertise in your ezine). And after some terrifying warnings, these open DWG documents can even be opened by AutoCAD! But why on earth do you call this a "hybrid workflow?" This is the most structured and preferred workflow I can imagine.
Look how nearly perfect the CAD workflow are nowadays in using tools like SketchUp, AutoCAD, BIM, and derived 2D drawings:
Do you have any idea to make it better? In the above example, computer-aided design process 2D drafting always has it's place, and it will always have. Nowadays, many 2D documents are drawn automatically using BIM. But nothing clashes here. Drawings don't clash whatsoever with the BIM. You are completely missing the point in your article, because drawings serve another part of the design process than the BIM does. Sorry to be so critical, this time!
- Siem Eikelenboom
IDEOMA intelligent systems, The Netherlands
In response to Mr. Chaney's comments about "BIM is Mainstream: Are Architects Better Off?", I'm not naive enough to think that because I'm employed with an Autodesk Channel Partner that anything I say, can and will be held against me in court of self-appointed CAD geeks but...
We can sit and talk about which CAD software has the best features/functions all day long. All software has its shortcomings depending on who you talk to. You could also stand on the curb all day long looking both ways and never get across the street.
The reality is that BIM is an industry initiative, not an Autodesk marketing ploy. It is simply a better way to design and build a building. It lends itself to the collaboration, and to downstream flows of information that can also be leveraged throughout the lifecycle of the building management by the owner. Who, by the way, is rapidly becoming the driving force of BIM as the deliverable of choice for their projects.
The AEC firms that choose to "hammer" out AutoCAD are missing the key element of survival of the fittest; your AutoCAD expertise will not win you new projects in the industries that are spending the money in our economy over the next few years:
- Health care
- Higher education
- Infrastructure
My experience is that the firm of tomorrow is embracing technology and industry initiatives like BIM and IPD, and is positioning themselves to capture business that few others will even be invited to bid on, let alone win:
- Go out and put your "team" together and learn how to collaborate with all disciplines on the model.
- Stop trying to bury your investment costs into a project, and expecting the owner to fund your technology innovation and adoption.
What's more important, the $50K worth of artwork in your lobby to impress your prospective customers or the $50K worth of investment in software and training in your firm that produces the work you actually do.
Are architects "Better Off?" Only if their doors are open and the lights are on.
- Dan Looney, regional manager
Advanced Solutions, USA
What percent of architects would you estimate are using BIM?
- Gene Roe
The editor replies: I have little idea, but I think it has caught on significantly in the last couple of years. My guess is between 25 and 50%, but that number would vary by geography.
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More letters from readers on BIM:
I am an engineer in Germany with nearly 25 years' experience in CAD and databases. My small company of six developers has written software for 15 years now, focusing on facility management.
The whole building process and the changes made during construction are important for the building, of course. But what is more important for the owner is the future of the building. The construction process takes about one year. The owner uses the building for 10, 20, 30, or more years.
All software companies talk about BIM. But if you ask Autodesk, Graphisoft, Bentley, and others, they have no answer for this question, because they have no software today for operating buildings for 30 years. In addition to BIM, their customers need other software products to reuse the data for their own processes, like dividing the cost of a building on cost units and so on.
BIM is a process that does not stop when a building is finished. A building is never finished. But when it is used for the first time, the BIM process is not the main process for the future.
The big software companies tell us that BIM is everything. So in the end, do we need to develop a new concept, say BIMX (BIMX = BIM + X)? Or would it be better to redefine the BIM strategy. What is your opinion?
- Ulf-Günter Krause
Avacad, Germany
Thanks for "Understanding Hybrid Workflows between CAD and BIM." Very clear.
- Dale Kopp
ClearLogicGroup, Inc
Why just upgrade, without real value? At the same time, let them know what would be of value to you in CAD and BIM. I am amazed at how many architects stand for the products as they are, and continue to say, "They are getting there." That's been going on for 24 years now, and some of them should be here by now!
My hope in the thoughts that you published two weeks ago in upFront.eZine is to have architects/contractors collectively become more vocal, and to push back at the programmer community to bring real, useful tools to the table for the prices they charge.
I had a response to my guest editorial suggesting the use of Rhino. It seems to be getting a lot of use lately in the arch community:
"After reading your BIM article on helpful or not to the industry I wanted to tell you where I find my joy, In Rhinoceros. Try visualarq.com, rhinobim.com, and other addons. I've used AutoCAD 10 - 14a (of course, I know the new stuff just to keep interoperability methods, but it's so inhibiting) and then Mech Desktop, but when Mcneel took Accumodel away from the limits Autodesk placed on it, Rhino's been the best tool. Now with Beta 5, it's only better. download.rhino3d.com/rhino/5.0/wip. Just saying."
- Mark Chaney
mark chaney architects
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And In Other News
The spree is back. Autodesk plans four acquisitions this year, and executed two of them last week, bang, bang. I'll let the bullet points do the talking:
Blue Ridge Numerics' CFdesign software handles CFD [computational fluid dynamics] to handle flow of fluids and thermal simulations. Autodesk plans to make CFdesign's data work directly wtih its own MCAD software, and with CAD systems from other vendors. http://www.cfdesign.com
Scaleform's Scaleform GFx software creates game UIs and interactive 3D with Flash and Creative Suite from Adobe. No mention of a link to CAD. http://www.scaleform.com
NAFEMS World Congress 2011 is in Boston MA USA between May 23 and 26. http://www.nafems.org/congress
Five months later, and its the annual COMSOL Conference also in on October 13-15. http://www.comsol.com/conference2011/usa/
If you use Gmail and turn on Google Docs support through Labs, then your email can now display AutoCAD drawings -- sadly, though, only in little-used DXF format. http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/12-new-file-formats-in-google-docs.html
Actify opens Actify Europe GmbH in Munchen, Germany. Company prez says, "We found that our principal reseller in Germany was not capable of developing the market and supporting our customers in the way we required." Ouch! http://www.actifyeurope.de
Does ANYONE still use fax any more? Scan a signed document and send it as an attachment through email seems to be fine these days for even the most legalist of corporations. EasyLink, however, announces Windows 7 support for its cloud-based PC-to-fax service. Subhead: "Integration Expands Corporate Availability of Desktop Fax." http://www.easylink.com
Power SubD-NURBS converts just about any Sub-D [sub-division] model to NURBS representations that are read by just about any CAD system. "Now your work flow can combine the conceptual design process of Sub-D modeling with the engineering, analysis, and manufacturing design process of CAD operations," says http://www.npowersoftware.com
The holy grail of MCAD is the automotive account. PTC is pretty pleased at landing the Hyundai of Korea account, and now has opened a Research and Development Center of Excellence whose job it is to figure out the PLM needs of the auto industry. The R&D center is located in... South Korea. Coincidence? http://www.ptc.com/industry/automotive
Bentley Systems has a site where students and faculty can access their software free, but only with an access code. Unlimited home use of 50 packages. http://www.bentley.com/en-US/Community/Academic/STUDENTserver/
Nemetschek's Allplan's Allfa facilities management software now has an entirely Internet-based version that makes it practical for access by smartphones. http://www.allplan.com
Tyco Fire Protection Products ported their formerly AutoCAD-only SprinkCAD to Bricscad. A 3D residential version is available exclusively on Bricscad. http://www.sprinkcad.com
solidThinking started making downloads of its 8.5 update available this week, and we'll have a report on it in the next issue of upFront.eZine. I found the advances in morphogenesis pretty interesting. http://www.solidthinking.com
Speaking of conceptual design, Autodesk Labs transplanted Maya into Revit for Valentine's Day. "It allows designers to experiment with "form-finding" in the conceptual design phase by simulating forces directly in Revit Architecture and Project Vasari." You get an idea of how it works from the videos on this page: http://labs.autodesk.com/utilities/nucleus/ -- although, quite frankly, as a pedestrian, I wouldn't want to cross that bridge.
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These were some of the news items that were posted during the last week at our WorldCAD Access blog:
- The trend seems to be that GUIs are defenestrating, kinda like Unix & DOS used to be
- The battle over ".dwg" ends next week, Thursday
Letters to the Editor
This letter makes a combined comment based on two different letters in episode #677: poor transcription proofreading and quoting Carol Bartz. Approximately a decade ago, as VP of the Silicon Valley AutoCAD Power Users, I edited a transcription of an interview recorded with former Autodesk ceo, Carol Bartz. The transcriber was familiar with legal, rather than computer terminology, and had Bartz referring to "calm and oily" trends for AutoCAD programming. I realized that she spoke of "COM and OLE" trends; that is, use of the Component Object Model / Object Linking and Embedding.
- Steve Wells
Conceptworks
Ever heard of a "reactivation fee?" I may have been living too deep in the cave, and so have never heard of such a thing. To SolidWorks sales guys who can explain, with straight face, that it just isn't practical for SW to be able to "save as" to an older version, I can see where a reactivation fee would seem natural.
- Jess Davis
Davis Precision Design
The editor replies: Yah, the fee is a scam to force customers to stay on maintenance (subscription). The biggest fear of large CAD vendors is to lose that steady income from subs. During the recession, large CAD vendors pulled all kinds of tricks to prevent customers from saving some money by going off maint for a year or two.
Regarding Tim Armstrong's "I think this is going to be a situation where 1 plus 1 equals 11" statement, there are 10 kinds of people in the world; those who understand binary, and those who don't.
- Bill Fane
I think it is no secret that I have significant concerns over the cloud for a number of reasons. I ran across a study today regarding the cloud, and it is an eye opener as to what can be expected where the cloud is implemented. ESPECIALLY when the cost-cutting inevitably begins, as companies offering this wonderful thing begin to enhance their bottom line.
- Dave Ault
Notable Quotable
"Elopocalypse."
- The Register's description of the aftermath to former-Microsoft-exec-now-Nokia-ceo Stephen Elop's decision to bet the company on Microsoft software.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/02/16/nokia_plan_b_ends/
Contact!
upFront.eZine is published every Tuesday, except during summer and Christmas vacation. Editor: Ralph Grabowski. This newsletter is read by 12,000 subscribers in 70 countries. Your comments are welcome at editor@upfrontezine.com! Deadline for submissions is every Monday noon.
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Entire contents copyright 2011 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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