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Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Autodesk Talks About the HSM Acquisition

Issue #762

 


Since Autodesk acquired HSMworks, there has been some "bad information," and so Autodesk last week set up interviews with the CAD media to talk about their plans for their new CAM software.

Ralph Grabowski spoke with Autodesk director of manufacturing engineering Carl White, who is responsible for HSMworks and Factory Design Suite manufacturing and production software), and product manager Anthony Graves. They were calling from Orlando, Florida, because "We are having user and reseller conferences here in Florida. We are talking to the HSM user group, and we have signed up 22 of the original 25 HSM resellers." The meetings are to reassure SolidWorks users of Autodesk's continued support and development of the product.

At this point, HSMworks 2013 is available exclusively for SolidWorks.

 

Unique to HSMworks

What is unique about HSMworks is its "distributed CAM" system. The engine underlaying HSMworks was designed from the first to be 64-bit and multicore. It the first on the market give years ago, and so far mostly the only one.

Processing of toolpaths is done by CPUs (not GPUs), and so distributed CAM allows multiple toothpath calculations by using not just all the cores in a PC, but all cores available on a network. To access other computers, a tiny program (800KB executable) is loaded onto the other computers, and then HSMworks evaluates available resources, specifically the CPUs and the RAM. These are ranked, and then toothpath calculations are distributed in order of performance.

A change to a part in SolidWorks might only take 15 seconds to propagate through the assembly, but then it might affect dozens of tool operations, which can take 45 mintues. Using the network, HSMworks does this work more quickly by using the unused cores on office computers, like ones that are used for word processing. This processing power is especially needed by the tool and die industry.

HSMworks was built on this base. For every core added, reduced toolpath calcs by 50%. 80 mins, and then go to 8 core, reduce down to 10 minutes. Mr White added, "You can see how the cloud might play into it as well."

New in HSMworks 2013

Mr Graves gave me a quick rundown of what's new in the 2013 release. HSMworks adds machine simulation, but unlike most CAM systems that rely on STLs, Mr Graves figures HSMworks is the best-integrated CAM product in SolidWorks. It works with SolidWorks parts and assemblies directly, and so can take advantage of mating and virtual components. It allows quick and accurate modeling of machine tools inside SolidWorks.

New in 2013 is toolpath trimming, where the user remove parts of tool paths. The new ramped strategy is an alternative to traditional contour machining that results in better finishes.

Why Autodesk Chose HSMworks

Autodesk chose HSMworks for the platform ability. Any MCAD program integrating HSMworks uses the same CAM platform and so has the same revision and the same functionality; all that needs to be adjusted is the API to the MCAD program. "In fact," added Mr White, "we were able to add some the HSMworks technology to 123D."

HSMworks was the last CAM company to start up. "Why would someone start yet another CAM company" asked Mr Graves rhetorically, "when there are already thirty of them?" Five years ago, integrated CAM was just come into its own, coming down from the heights of Catia and NX, and so HSMworks was the first one to be integrated into a mid-level MCAD program, specifically SolidWorks. If offered tight integration and lots of speed.

The founders of HSMworks thought not just of distributed CAM, but also of the new generation of users who getting into prototyping. They need to learn CAM, but prefer something that works just like the MCAD program that they are used to. And so HSMworks built a strong foundation under SolidWorks, but then made sure it would work with other MCAD packages. This is why Autodesk bought the company.

Q&A

Q: So far, HSMworks runs only inside SolidWorks. When will it run in Autodesk's own Fusion 360 and Inventor MCAD programs?
A: We are working on the, but are not sure yet of the release date.

 

Q: Will HSMworks be ported to any other MCAD programs?
A: The platform gives us that opportunity. We will see where there might be demand once we are done with Autodesk products.

 

Q: You've had distributed CAM for five years now. Why doesn't anyone else do this kind of networked multi-core CAM processing?
A: We are not sure. Cimatron does something like it, but you need to rent a hardware box from them.

 

Q: What are other CAM vendors saying about Autodesk becoming a competitor to them?
A: Autodesk has relationships with Gibbs, Vero, and others. They have specialized usage and have tuned their business to specific machines. They are still great partners to Autodesk. We want to expose CAM to designers, as an easier next gen version of CAM. "We are new to the business, and we are going to learn."

 

Q: Autodesk likes to boast that it lowers the price of software, such as for AutoCAD when it originally came out and more recently with Moldflow. Will Autodesk lower the price of CAM, especially for Inventor and Fusion?
A: We don't see the price changing.

 

Q: How many users does HSMworks Premium have?
A: We'd rather not say.

 

Q: What is the pricing of HSMworks?
A: There are two versions of the software:

  • The free HSMexpress does 2- and 2.5-axis CAM operations in Solidworks. Two-point-five axis machingin represents a lot of the work being done, explains Mr Graves. The free version includes parts simulation and post processors, and is worth $2,500 to $6,500 for similar technology from competitors. The intimidating factor is not just standing in front of a CNC machine, but also having to learn a strange new system. The idea behind being free is that it allows people to explore machining and find out "how easy it is."
  • HSMworks is 2- to 5-axis and basic 2-axis turning for $10,000 in the US only; different pricing elsewhere. The idea was to have an all-in-one package so that customers don't need to buy added functions. One package has all capabilities, and customers have one price to pay. While 5-axis is a very small percentage of all machining, but it has the advantage of reduced set up, reduced cycle time, and better finishing, and so HSMworks lets customers delve into it without paying more for the software.

If you have SolidWorks 2010-2012, then you can download HSMexpress at no cost from http://www.hsmworks.com/download

What Ralph Grabowski Thinks

Autodesk needed its own package for CAM, just as it has acquired or written ones for many other verticals; the question was not if, but when. There is some evidence Autodesk may have tried writing its own CAM software, judging from the qualifications of some of the people it hired but then later laid off.

One of the hallmarks of the CAM software industry is that it has "too many" vendors. The conglomeration we've seen in other parts of the CAD industry never really occurred in CAM. Thus Autodesk had its pick of the litter, most of which have decades experience bundled in, and many of which already run with Autodesk software.

Instead, Autodesk bought the most unlikely company of all, one that (a) is the youngest; and (b) doesn't work with any Autodesk software. Why make such a disconnected purchase?

Being youngest probably made HSMworks the hungriest to be bought out. I speculate that the company has a very small customer base due to (a) being the newest kid on the block at just five years old; (b) its extreme pricing strategy of $0 or $10,000 that offered no middle ground; and (c) running on just one MCAD package, and not offering a stand-alone version with links to other packages.

Autodesk probably liked that (a) the purchase price was relatively low; (b) the technology at just five years old was relatively new; and (c) the ability of the software to run on multiple CPUs, matching its ambitions for the cloud.

The technical challenges for Autodesk are: (a) to port HSMworks to Inventor and Fusion; and (b) to get the distributedCAM code running on thousands of CPUs (using GPUs would be easier) for running on cloud servers.

The marketing challenges for Autodesk are (a) to convince the many other CAM vendors already serving Autodesk customers that HSMworks is not a threat to them; and (b) that customers should nevertheless replace their $0-$2,5000-$5,000-$7,5000-or-$10,000 seats of Mecsoft with $0-or-$10,000 seats of HSMworks.

 

Out of the Inbox

Last week, we wrote about the upcoming ZW3D MCAD software from ZWSOFT, and twice managed to mistype the software's name as "ZWCAD." Too much upper-case and too much ZW, but it was my fault. ZWSOFT has now announced the release date for the beta: January 28.
       Anyhow, the company also has a 2D mechanical add-on to ZWCAD (that's ZWCAD, not ZW3D) and this week they release service pack 1, which links to TeamVault and whose PowerErase adjust related dimensions automatically after an object is deleted. http://www.zwsoft.com/products/ZWCAD_Mechanical.html

In upFront.eZine #758, we ran the exclusive interview on how Imagination Technologies is putting ray tracing into hardware. That was just preview, and now-- Oops, I have to wait until tomorrow to write about this press release.

Vectorworks Cloud Services now offers versioning, letting users see earlier versions of the drawing files. http://www.vectorworks.net/cloudservices/

I have great admiration for what programmers pull off these days, and so when I see a press release that says "we'll be announcing an exciting new release of the Kenesto Social Business Collaboration platform," I feel conflicted, because I can't get excited about social business collaboration. There is just one systemthat all my clients use, and it is called email. Nevertheless, I'll let Kenesto make its elevator pitch to my readers:
      "We like to think that what we're doing for Social Business Collaboration is somewhat analogous to what SAP did for the ERP market. That is to say that we're combining several individual social collaboration capabilities together into a single, unified platform." http://http://www.kenesto.com

I have been watching since 1991 the attempts of competitors to grab customers from Autodesk, with varying success -- SolidWorks MCAD software being the most successful. (The earliest attempt was a full-page ad in CADalyst magazine from Intergraph showing a large picture of a sheherd's crock with the headline, "Follow the leader," which made absolutely no sense to users of the market-leading AutoCAD program.)
       Now Graebert has launched a consultancy to assist design firms and third-party developers switch from AutoCAD to DraftSight (distributed by... SolidWorks!).
For $250/seat, Graebert will switch your firm to DraftSight, including converting the plug-ins and special functions your firm uses. For third-party developers, there is the offer to assist with the DraftSight API and the opportunity to sell to three million users.
      The press release directs us to www.graebert.com, but once there it's hard to find more information. After some poking around, I found this page: http://www.graebert.com/en/corporatedevelopment/convertds

 

Notable Quotable

"The world's obesity crisis is, after the Moon landings, humanity's greatest achievement."
      - Ed West
      http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/edwest/100194278/the-worlds-obesity-crisis-is-after-the-moon-landings-humanitys-greatest-achievement/

 

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Posted at 12:11 PM | | Comments (0)

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

ZW3D Press Briefing

Issue #761

 

Orchid Jin of ZWSOFT presented a Webinar outlining the new functions in the company's ZW3D CAD/CAM software. Formerly known as VX, the software has been owned by ZWSOFT since its 2010 release. This is the 17th release of the program, and Ms Jin said it has 300 new features along with 300 improvements.

It seemed to me that the greatest programming effort when into making the managers more flexible. Managers are like the Feature Manager in SolidWorks, but ZW3D has two: one for CAD and another for CAM.

The CAD one handles multiple sheets (drawings). It now lists alignments and tables. During the demo, I saw that it the manager now allows you to edit features, drag operations and features around the tree, and even turn parents into children. Any change can be undone.

The CAM manager now has folders, which lets you group operations, and icons that are informative (instead of uniform). Like the CAD manager, you can now drag and drop operations to change their order.

UI and Importing

Next big change is that ZW3D now handles multiple windows. You can open more than one drawing and/or model, and then switch between them with Excel-like tabs. The ribbon is cleaned up and customization is easier, apparently (this was not demo'ed). See figure 1.


Figure 1: The new user interface of ZW3D 2013

 

The display engine is updated toOpenGL 3.0, and so rotating the model is smoother and regenerations are 24% faster. There was no mention of new translators, but STEP, IGES, and Parasolid files are imported cleaner so that there are fewer open faces.

Sketching

In the sketch environment, the new Smart Constraint function automatically detects constraint types on sketches. Conflicting constraints are highlighted by color, and a palette reports the status of constraints.

The lengths of arcs can now be dimensioned, and there was reference to "direct external references" that was not explained. There is a new dimension style manager, along with centerline annotation and more ways to dimension chamfers. There is a new editor for visual control features, and a new panel for surface roughness symbols.

Modeling and Assembly

The new free wrap function lets you wrap surfaces and patterns on to faces. The example we saw placed the wrap on a lamp shade. Draggers let you interactively adjust the array on the face, such as the spacing, position, and size of array elements.

As you pass the cursor over models, a new tooltip reports the draft and thickness.

CAM

The simulation kernel in ZW3D 20133 has been upgraded to MachineWorks v7.1, allowing improvement to other areas of the CAM module. For instance, verifying very complex parts is now more stable, and the programming of contact point containment is simplified. The CAM module now supports multi-step machining in the Z direction. A new D Loop function shortens roughing time by 20%, and a new Detect function makes manufacturing safer.

The tool manager is improved, allowing you to load and save cutter data individually or as groups, and the manager makes it easier to define holders.

Beta versions of the software will become available January 23, and the software is due to ship in mid-March.

http://www.zw3d.com

 

Joshua Smith of Kaon Interactive

Readers React
"CAD on small screens. Waiting on the even smaller mini projector or roll up OLED screen and the massively useful web-cad."
      - Greg Hruby
        Minnesota Department of Transportation

 

"Objective-C is object-oriented C. Apple gave the world OpenCL, which seamlessly marries with OpenGL, both of which are heavily written in either C99 and/or C++. AMD specifically extended OpenCL to be C++ certified after 1.1 was released. iOS fully embraces C, C++, Objective-C++, and of course Objective-C.

"The interfaces written in Objective-C consist of a small amount of code in the overall scheme of porting CAD to iOS.

"With LLVM/Clang [low level virtual machine] making life far easier for developers, it opens up a very modern compiler design for C99/C11/C++11 software development, amongst other languages. The ARM Targets in LLVM/Clang means that any serious development house isn't sweating bullets on porting from CISC to ARM's RISC. They're doing something wrong if that is their primary concern.

"CAD Programming will be a mix of C and C++, but also there is a lot of CAD written in Java, as there is in the world of heavier engineering applications such as purely scientific numerical analysis applications. Case in point: Mathematica, Ansys FEA/CFD, COMSOL, Siemens' suite of tools, not to forget MATLAB, and many others that use a mix of C/C++/Java to make it available on Windows, OS X and Linux simultaneously. Each one installs their own custom GCC/Java toolkits to boot so as to ensure their app runs without any missing shared object libraries or ABI incompatibilities.

"There is a solid history of how come it is and will become the de facto choice of corporations, globally. ARM, Intel, NVIDIA, AMD, SONY, CRAY, IBM, APPLE [obviously], GOOGLE, FACEBOOK, DoE to Wall Street and more are heavily invested in using LLVM/Clang:

"Khronos, being 100% invested in OpenGL, OpenCL, and the rest of their specs, is fully invested in LLVM/Clang, along with the likes of Adobe. Microsoft third-party developers have been pushing hard and helping get LLVM/Clang natively built and available for Visual Studio 2010 and newer.

"I'm getting off-topic with respect to language requirements on iOS being solely Objective-C but I needed to include the big picture of the C/C++/ObjC/ObjC++ Clang world with LLVM and iOS so the world is more well informed in your neck of the woods, wrt porting CAD to iOS, or to OS X natively for that matter.

"The paradigm shift to a touch UI in such a small form factor and how the interaction and ease-of-use will always be a huge hurdle for CAD, which isn't known for intuitive UIs."
      - Marc J. Driftmeyer
      ReAnimality, Inc.

The editor replies: "I did not know that Java was used so much in CAD. But then there last week's Java scare (my computer got hit, and so Java is now turned off). What effect does this have on Java-based CAD programs?"

 

"Thanks for finding and interviewing Joshua Smith from Kaon Interactive. I've been in the PLM space for more than 10 years now, but I know very little about the vendors who supply the underlying technology (like kernels, shaders, etc.). Your interview below was very educational for me as we proceed into the brave new world of 3D and CAD on tablets and smartphones. I appreciate your newsletter and your angle on things."
      - Jonathan Scott
       Razorleaf Corporation

Out of the Inbox

I like this better than software companies giving away license of software, which costs them nothing but gets them a tax credit: "Nemetschek Vectorworks, Inc. is proud to award the first Vectorworks Young Architects Student Scholarship to Gabriel Munoz Moreno. Moreno will receive a $2,500 award toward tuition and fees for his Bachelor of Architecture degree."

Siemens PLM's release of Femap V11 speeds data access by up to 25x and reduces memory consumption by up to 80%. http://www.siemens.com/plm/femap

In a carefully worded press release, LEDAS of Russia sets up a branch office in the USA. Technically, the shareholders of LEDAS establish a company named Ledas, Inc., together with their US partner, Michael Taytslin. Mr Taytslin is the former CIO of PTC.

Sometimes the headline sounds interesting, but then the body of the press release is incomprehensible, and so I cannot report on it.

And then there are the intriguing press releases that hint at some new product, like this one from ASCON Group: "ASCON today announced that they have selected the Redsdk rendering application from Redway3d for adding real-time and photorealistic rendering into a future, prospective, unannounced yet software products." [Emphasis mine.] http://www.ascon.net

 Remember that ad from the ITC running in this newsletter looking for a new business development director? Robert Berry did, and he landed the gig. Mr Berry is formerly with TurboCAD and owns the CADCourse.com training site.

QuadriSpace will be releasing a mobile/cloud solution for collaborative review, instructions, and catalogs early this year. It'll have a commenting feature built into the mobile app. And that's all I know about it. We have an interview scheduled for later in the week. http://www.quadrispace.com

GRAPHISOFT releases ArchiCAD STAR(T) Edition 2013 for smaller architectural firms. I think the idea is that there it has advanced functions missing and reads files from only older releases of full ArchiCAD, in exchange for a lower price. Comparison chart here: http://www.graphisoft.com/products/acse2013/comparison.html

Celeritive Technologies is awarded patent 8,295,972 from USPTO for ideas in its VoluMill software's ultra high performance tool path technology.

ISD Software und Systeme GmbH this week releases HiCAD 2013 and HELiOS 2013 with 3D representation, enhanced FEM interface, and new modeling and sheet metal functions. http://www.isdgroup.eu/75_news__press_services/news.410m1002-1-333.htm

 

Letters to the Editor

"I came across some interesting reading on the ARMA website. The linked ARMA Hot Topic contains much interesting information relating to cloud computing security, reliability and legal considerations:

"MAKING THE JUMP TO THE CLOUD? How to Manage Information Governance Challenges" at http://www.arma.org/HotTopic/HotTopic910.pdf .

"ARMA International is a not-for-profit professional association and the authority on managing records and information – paper and electronic. Keep up the great reporting on the CAD industry."
      - Bob Rea

"I hope you are doing OK and would like to wish you and your family our best wishes for 2013, health and exciting new articles to write!"
      - Cédric Desbordes, world business development
        4M

 

Notable Quotable

"When we started SolidWorks people said to us, 'You're too young.' Now they are saying, 'You're too old.' :) "
      - Jon Hirschtick
        http://isicad.net/articles.php?article_num=15841

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Posted at 12:06 PM | | Comments (0)

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Joshua Smith of Kaon Interactive Talks About Running CAD on Small Screens

Issue #760 

 


Joshua Smith is chief technology officer of Kaon Interactive, and we got into a conversation by email about the technology of running CAD on smartphones and tablets. In the first part, Mr Smith responds to statements I made (identified by 'upFront.eZine'), following by our email exchange (identified by 'Grabowski'). http://www.kaon.com

upFront.eZine: Developers tend to write for Apple's iPhone smartphone and iPadtablet first, even though Google's Android overall has twice the market share. The reason is that Android suffers from fragmentation.

Joshua Smith: That's not the only reason, and I suspect it is not the primary reason in the CAD space. For the most part, you are talking about tablet apps here, not phone apps. Android has no market share to speak of in the tablet space <http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-ipad-market-share-2012-9>. Also, most vendors find that actually getting people to pay for iOS apps is much easier than getting people to pay for Android apps.


upFront.eZine: The primary problem, however, is a CAD vendor's biggest hurdle: the RISC-based ARM CPU [reduced instruction set computing] used in nearly all smartphones and tablets is fully incompatible with the CISC-based Intel/AMD CPUs [compelx instruction set computing] used in desktop and notebook computers. This means CAD vendors have to write many parts of the software from scratch.

Mr Smith: They certainly need to port, but the switch from x86 to ARM is not the issue. The issue is that [Apple] iOS code needs to be written in Objective C, and Android code needs to be written in Java. I suspect CAD vendors are mostly all using C++.

Similarly, OpenGL [open graphics language] and GLES [OpenGL for Embedded Systems] are not the same thing. Even for an OpenGL-based CAD program, there is going to be considerable pain making the port to GLES. Two issues in particular:

  • GLES has no fixed pipeline, so you must do everything with shaders
  • The poor performance of mobile 3D chips means you need to spend a lot of time optimizing your implementations to get decent frame rates.


upFront.eZine: Hopefully the Mali 600 GPUs coming out next year will fix this problem.

Mr Smtih: I don't see why it would. GLES [a.k.a. OpenGL ES] is an API [applications programming interface] spec, so it doesn't really matter what the GPU can do if the OS [operating system] only supports the GLES API. And that's the case on both Android and iOS. Press reports say the 600 will support OpenCL [Open Computing Language], but that doesn't really have anything to do with the rendering pipeline.

 

upFront.eZine: Even panning is inconsistent: some CAD programs use a single-finger drag, others require two fingers. Worse, users are stuck with memorizing a variety of multi-finger moves among multiple applications.

Mr Smith: There does seem to be a trend toward standardizing on 1-finger rotate, 2-finger pan, pinch zoom. But you're right that this is not yet universal.

 

upFront.eZine: Smartphones and tablets released next year are expected to have graphics on par with desktop computers, such as OpenGL and DirectX.

Mr Smith: This is not even close to true. The APIs might be available, but that doesn't mean performance will be anywhere close. There are orders of magnitude differences in performance today, and closing that gap will take much longer than a year.

 

Mr Grabowski: This is debatable, due to the efficiencies CAD vendors put into their mobile apps, efficiencies they do not need to implement in Windows.

Mr Smith: You meant that the graphics shown on the screen would be on par, not that the underlying graphics hardware would be on par. I agree completely with that.

In fact, the closed, predictable nature of the iOS platform actually makes it easier to give terrific results on mobile than it is to get consistent results on the desktop. Mobile is a lot more like a game console, where the uniformity of the platform results in a big bang-for-the-buck when you optimize specifically for that hardware.

 

Mr Grabowski: You are the expert on this aspect, and so I defer to you on this one! But my understanding is that the 3D graphics display on iPads and Androids is limited to what the GPU can display, such as the types of shaded renderings. This is what some CAD vendors told me, and they are unhappy with the limited number available -- four, I think.

This is why I think that if the GPU improves its capabilities, then more kinds of renderings are available. What are the limitations, as you see them? Do the limitations go beyond the kinds of hardware-generated renderings available?

Mr Smith: The big difference between [fixed-pipeline] OpenGL and [programmable pipeline] GLES is the switch from a "fixed pipeline" to a "programmable pipeline":

  • A fixed pipeline like OpenGL defines shader modes and such.
  • A programmable pipeline like GLES doesn't. It doesn't define any modes at all. You start with a blank slate, and program whatever you want, by writing shader code.

And if you don't write shader code, it won't do ANYTHING!

So what those guys told you is not really accurate. You can do whatever shader modes you want, as long as you are willing to spend the time writing shader code. GLES and WebGL use the same shader model, so if you go look at demos of the crazy stuff you can do in the Chrome browser (google: webgl shader demos), any of those things are *already* supported on mobile.

But there's a catch: Mobile chipsets have few cores, low clock rates, and slow memory. So although you can get any shader model you want to run there, you cannot get much of any shader model to run there with good performance.

For example, when we ported our engine to iOS, we found that dynamic light calculations were simply too slow. So we precompute light maps, and apply them sort of like textures, using the shader we wrote. That's something that people working with OpenGL on desktops never would have expected to need to do. And, in fact, they probably have to go hire some people who know how to do this stuff, and those people are in very short supply!

The limitations of GPUs [graphics processing units] on mobile all boil down to one thing: power. Top-of-the-line desktop graphics cards take 150 watts. In mobile, it's more like 5 watts. The lack of power means slower everything, and a lot fewer cores.

PowerVR is a very, very clever set of technologies, but cleverness only gets you so far, when you have a 30:1 power disadvantage.

 

Running CAD on Small Screens

Part 4: Hard to Predict is the Future
This is the final part of the series based on a talk I gave in October at Bricsys International Developer Conference 2012, Amsterdam.

The future of computing has always been defined by "faster" and "cheaper." We are good only at predicting the future linearly, extrapolating from today's situation. In reality, however, the near future twists and turns unexpectedly; after all, the iPad did not exist three years ago. And so we cannot determine the route our portable devices will take to reach faster and cheaper.

Future Hardware

Even though desktop CPUs have stalled in speed for more than a decade now, portable CPUs are charging ahead in speed. From the future specs being touted this year, we can expect next year's portable devices that make full CAD nearly a reality through 2GHz eight-core ARM chips.

Over in China, prices are driven down through the development of their own AllWinner-brand ARM-based CPU/GPU that sells for $7 in bulk. One of my tablets uses it; it is an Android with 1.3HGz CPU, 1024x768 8" screen, 8GB RAM, and lots of ports. Price: $158, shipping from China included. (On a personal note, I like the 8" format; I find 7" screens too cramped and 10" devices too bulky.) Oh, and the price has fallen to $129 since I bought it last year, and the CPU is now dual-core..

My current tablet is an ASUS TF-101, which is now considered low-end with its 1GHz dual-core CPU, 1280x800 10" screen, 16GB RAM, and lots of ports. Price: $399 (or less), complete with keyboard dock that extends battery life to 16 hours and adds full-size USB and SD card slots.

The wild card is Windows 8RT, the version of Windows 8 running on ARM tablets and smartphones. Software developers like it, as I mentioned earlier, because of the ease of porting from desktop programs; hardware makers resent it, because Microsoft intends to compete with its own Surface line of tablets. I suspect, however, 8RT will be the next in Microsoft's history of failed tablet OSes.

Future Software

Today's portable CAD software mostly views drawings; some allow mark ups; only a few, such as GStarCAD MC and AutoCAD WS, allow some editing of drawings. We can expect more in the future, right?

The problem is (more problems!) that technology changes fast. How fast? Here is an example of how fast: this is what Autodesk has had to go through in trying to create an "everywhere" version of AutoCAD:

Generation 1: Twitch on servers. The company began in 2009 with a brute-force solution called Project Twitch that ran AutoCAD on servers, delivering it to us over the Internet. The drawback to this approach is latency, the delay in response time caused by the distance from the server. Today, Autodesk uses the technology only to provide a demo version of AutoCAD LT.

Generation 2: ProjectPlan for desktop. Autodesk bought ProjectPlan (aka Visual Tao), because they Israeli company had figured out how to display and edit GIS (mapping) data using a Flash plug-in embedded in Web browsers. Autodesk released its version for editing CAD drawings in 2010 as Project Butterfly, and then later commercially as AutoCAD WS (short for "Web services").

One drawback to this approach is that Flash is 2D-only, which is why the Web browser version of WS cannot display drawings in 3D viewpoints. The other drawback is that Adobe is deprecating Flash in favor of HTML5.

Generation 3: WS for Android and iOS. Near the end of 2010, Autodesk finished rewriting AutoCAD WS for the iPhone. A half-year later, the company completed rewriting it for Android. These smartphone versions use a different technology from Flash, and so benefit from being able to display 3D models interactively.

Generation 4: HTML5? It's been quite a rollercoaster ride for "everywhere" AutoCAD, which went through three generations in just two years -- at a huge price tag for Autodesk, who has received around $0 in revenue for all the work. AutoCAD WS has not been regenerated a fourth time yet, but if it were, I would expect it to be rewritten in HTML5, the current darling of programmers writing apps for the Web and portable devices.

While Autodesk does not yet have HTML5-based CAD, tiny companies already do. They are using a combination of HTML5 and Javascript to display rendered 3D CAD models in the latest releases of Web browsers like Chrome and Firefox. A server reacts to user's interactions and pushes updates to the browser. Examples include the following:

What is exciting is that these browser-based CAD systems operate in Chrome and Firefox running on portable devices that support HTML5. (See http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com/blog/2012/06/running-browsercad-on-android.html .) I am unsure, however, of the viability of these startup companies.

The technology Autodesk that employed for each generation made perfect sense at the time; it's just that portable technology zags so fast that we cannot predict where it will zig next. After all, three years ago, iPad did not exist; today it is the largest selling "PC."

 

Out of the Inbox

The New Year's acquisition binges carry on...

  • Autodesk of USA acquires of PI-VR of Germany, which makes software for automotive real time visualization.
  • Hexagon of Sweden acquires New River Kinematics of USA, which makes 3D analysis software for portable metrology applications.
  • xPLM Solution of Germany acquires Sinteg of Switzerland, which makes softwarr for product documentation.
  • 3D Systems of USA acquires COWEB of France, maker of 3D printers.

But not just acquisitions. There's a flood of new releases this month, too:

 

Letters to the Editor

"Happy New Year! I noticed in this issue the announcement of Vero's acquisition of Sescoi misspelt as 'Sescio.' This is pretty interesting news as Vero continues to consolidate the CAM market. Makes one wonder who's next. I did a double-take because I was familiar with Vero's acquisition binge and Sescoi is a fairly nichey CAM product. Thanks for bringing it to my attention!"
      - John's Biz

Re: Running CAD on Small Screen

"As always, we appreciate the mention in the latest issue of upFront.eZine. Please don't forget that we also have two free apps: free TurboViewer and free TurboSite Reader; both are blazingly-fast viewers. In the mall [construction] example you cited, these would have easily done the trick. In fact, they'd do the trick even if there was no connectivity, as all of our mobile apps can work remotely.

"Regarding pricing, we wholeheartedly agree that value prop is all important. For example, the price of TurboSite is insignificant compared to the cost of doing fieldwork and site visits the old way."
      - Royal Farros, ceo
       IMSI/Design

The editor replies: "I know about your free apps, but (as I think you caught on) I am encouraging CAD vendors to get out of the 99-cent market."

 

"Forget CAD on small screens, check out this tablet:
http://www.macrumors.com/2013/01/08/ces-2013-lenovo-27-tablet-and-nectar-fuel-cell-iphone-charger/"
      - Henrik Vallgren
      Streamspace.com, Sweden

The editor replies: "I wonder how much it weighs!"

 

"Along the same lines, I heard that Ford has started development of a pocket-sized minivan, which, while somewhat bulky at 8"x4"x2" (requiring deep-ish pockets), promises to allow people to carry nearly useful quantities of cargo at an incredibly low rate of speed for very short distances (relative to humans). In tests, Ford executives may have stated 'We are able to load nearly three full ounces of horse manure into the cargo area, and, though the driver has to balance on the top of the minivan with one hand while operating the steering wheel, the brakes, the accelerator, and the clutch with the other hand, (automatic transmissions are on the wishlist, which we ignore every few minutes), the truth is that our prototype gets nearly 200 full yards per tank of fuel.'

"Future developments could include an Edison-era wax cylinder musical recording player, an espresso machine, a ski lift, and a Tomahawk cruise missile vertical launch system -- simply because we paid someone nimrods huge sums of money to think it up, not because those things have any relevant utility."
      - Peter Lawton

The editor replies: "Worse are the touch screen interfaces Ford has in their new cars. I've had to experience them twice now in rented cars. The screens should be ruled illegal, they such a dangerous distraction when driving, even to do something as simple as change the fan speed."

 

"Just wondering if you could clarify how you came by the figures to state 'Apple iOS is primarily popular on tablets'. I'd always believed the iPhone outsold the iPad. Here's some Apple figures which seem to back that belief up: 37m iPhones vs 15.4m iPads <http://www.macrumors.com/2012/01/24/apple-reports-best-quarter-ever-in-q1-2012-13-06-billion-profit-on-46-33-billion-in-revenue/>. Do you not count the iPhone as a SmartPhone? Or has the picture of sales changed since these figures were published?"
      - Nigel Davies, director
      EVOLVE-CONSULTANCY.COM

The editor replies: "I may have written this too vaguely. I meant that of tablets, iOS is the most popular OS."

 

Re: Scanning and Modeling Large Petroleum Facilities in Hazardous Conditions
"I read your review of EdgeWise. I've been exposed to it as we are using it to help pull some data from a LaserScan as part of a Project I am leading. Very impressive software. I'm curious about your last comment: 'Q: Is ClearEdge only for pipes? A: EdgeWise Plant is for pipes; the MEP version is for cylindrical objects; building tools is being developed for AEC, with a beta version next year; also can do terrain modeling.'

"From talking to the people at ClearEdge, I was led to believe that no AEC tool was being developed. Can you share what this will include? Will it allow me to model structural elements like beams and the like? If so, then someone has to 'splainin' to do!!!!"
      - Dave Angelotti

The editor replies: "Could depend with who you spoke. The AEC angle was told to me the last time I interviewed them some months ago, and then again in the Webcast. I was given no details, but I assume that it would act like the Pipes one, but search for I beams shapes instead."


Re: 3D Systems Swallows Up Geomagic

"The acquisition did not make it into her new book. I finished reading it about a week ago. See http://wohlersassociates.com/blog."
      - Terry Wohlers
       Wohlers Associates, Inc.

Re: Stratasys and Objet Complete Merger

"It is indeed a merger. The new company, Stratasys Ltd., is an Israeli company with an Israeli CEO (David Reis). Stratasys founder Scott Crump will serve as full-time executive chairman. The company will maintain dual headquarters in the U.S. and Israel. Former Stratasys stockholders hold about 55% of the merged company's stock, while former Objet shareholders hold about 45%."
      - Terry Wohlers
        Wohlers Associates, Inc.

Re: Autodesk University 2012

"Thx for your great AU coverage. It was great for us folks that couldn't make it this year."
       - Rick Stavanja

Re: Exclusive Interview: Geomagic Spark Encompasses That Other Cloud

"I don't dispute the number, but where'd you get 30K users for SpaceClaim?"
      - Randall Newton

The editor replies: "That is the number Kevin Scofield of Geomagic told me. You are the first to remark on it. (I was waiting for reaction.) "

 

"What is the point of you getting an exclusive when you publish 4 days after everyone else has it?"
      - G. R.

The editor replies: "My interview was not a regurgitation of the press release, which is what everyone else covered, including WorldCAD Access. This was the first interview given, together with an online demo, which beat all other publications by several days. Hence, exclusive"

 

"Have you experimented with the Sketchy Physics plugin for SketchUp? This thing is mad fun. It's probably not realistic enough for engineering simulations (the units don't appear to correspond to anything) but for a free plugin made by some guy in his basement it's pretty dramatic, and much more accessible than Inventor, etc."
      - Samuel E. Ketner, Technology Education
        Atlee High School

The editor replies: "I hadn't heard of it, so thanks for the tip. I wonder if it is like that old DOS physics-based game, The Incredible Machine."

 

Spin Doctor of the Moment

"Google has not yet shown they are truly serious. From the outside, they are an advertising company."
      - Julia White, general manager, business division, Microsoft
        http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/26/technology/google-apps-moving-onto-microsofts-business-turf.html

 

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Posted at 12:00 PM | | Comments (0)

Tuesday, January 08, 2013

David Pinchefsky of NexGen Ergonomics

Issue #759 

Exclusive interview: David Pinchefsky of NexGen Ergonomics


Ralph Grabowski: When you contacted me some weeks ago, I suddenly remembered the copy of Mannequin software on my bookshelf. What's happened to it?

David Pinchefsky: It shipped in 1990 as the very first software running on PCs for positioning humans. In 1997, there was Mannequin Pro, still running on DOS, but in 2000 the HumanCAD software company went into bankruptcy, and so in 2001 we acquired the assets.

We rewrote the interface to make i look like Windows, even though it still ran on DOS; Mannequin 10.2 was the last release to run on DOS. We did a rewrite for Windows with HumanCAD 1.x series in 2007, and then rewrote it all over again for the current release, HumanCAD 2.x.

Grabowski: Now, you are not just a software company?

Pinchefsky: We have the largest product line in the world for testing ergonomics, such as analyzing the pressure on seat design, the vibration of vehicle parts. We are both a manufacturer and a distributor.

Grabowski: Tell me about some of the functions the software does.

Pinchefsky: Our software simulate mannequins in positions through a range of motions. It is to see if designs fit people, and to see what percentage of the population can accommodate the product being designed. (See figure 1.)


Figure 1: HumanCAD showing range of motion studies.
 

Clearly, some populations tend to be smaller and others larger, and so wee can easily change the anthropology of the mannequins, such as "1988 US Army," or "NASA STD 3000" or "British." A slider bar change the percentile, such as 95% of the population. We have posture libraries to preset finger positions and other body parts, such as seated or standing -- and can define your own.

The software offers instant views of vision cones, first person views, reach cones, and kick cones. Cones are the ranges of sight or motion possible by the mannequins. We have IK and FK, and we employ SimTK in our environment, similar to openSIM.

Grabowski: What are "IK" and "FK"?

Pinchefsky: Sorry for the jaron! IK and FK are inverse and forward kinematics.

Grabowski: How man mannequins can your software have in a 3D scene?

Pinchefsky: It can have multiple mannequins. The number is limited by the PC's memory. In most cases, though, only a couple of people is normal, such as in a car or in a factory area. Up to a dozen is normal.

Grabowski: From which CAD systems does the software import models?

Pinchefsky: We support file formats, not CAD systems. We can import 3D models in 3ds, STEP, IGES, DXF, OBJ, STL, and other formats. And then our software can export the mannequins back to the programs that read these formats.

Grabowski: Who are some of your customers?

Pinchefsky: We have customers in almost every country of the world. Customers include occupational physicians, universities involved in ergonomics research, those who do forensic analysis, and to see if people fit inside medical scanners.

We have customers who design, control rooms, such as at nuclear power plants, and factory layouts. In distribution centers, owners are looking for risks, such as palette heights. Most customers figure out the software on their own, or need no more than one or two hours of training.

Grabowski: Who might be some of your competitors?

Pinchefsky: There are none in our space, other than static mannequins for placing in scenes. All our competitors were acquired by CAD vendors, such as Dassault Systemes and Siemens PLM.

Grabowski: What is the price?

Pinchefsky: It is $7,000, plus extra for the CAD exchange and ergonomics modules. We have discounts for government agencies and educational institutions.

We have lots of plans to add functions, such as more detailed skeletons and more tools.

http://nexgenergo.com/ergonomics/humancad2.html

 

Running CAD on Small Screens

Part 3: How to Benefit from CAD on Mobile Devices

Last time in upFront.eZine, part 2 described the challenges faced by CAD in mobile operating systems This series is based on the talk I gave in October at Bricsys International Developer Conference 2012 in Amsterdam.

One of the problems I found in writing this research paper is that the technology is progressing so quickly. I have to update this paper each time I present it, and I first wrote it in only August! Last month, for instance, Samsung announced that it will ship next year eight-core CPUs for Android tablets and smartphones: one set of four cores runs fast for maximum execution speed, the other set of four cores runs slower for prolonging battery power, yet provides speedy execution of everyday activities.

With many drawbacks to running CAD on portable devices, why would users want to? They are willing to give up functionality for portability, says Nemetschek Vectorworks ceo Sean Flaherty. Smartphones and tablets lets users view and show drawings on devices they have with them at all times. Former Apple ceo Steve Jobs explained that it's like the small Swiss Army knife carried on key chains: the most useful tool is the one we have with us always, he said.

Ease of Access. In my home town, a new mall is being built, and I happened to meet the project manager at a breakfast event. Pulling out his iPhone, he showed the small crowd around him AutoCAD WS. He expressed his excitement how easily he could pull up detail drawings of anywhere on the site to resolve construction issues.

He's able to do this, because high speed cellular data transmission, like 3G and LTE, allow him to access files, like drawings, "anywhere" he can pick up a cell signal (or through free WiFi at the nearest Tim Hortons and Safeway stores).

CAD apps tend to be integrated with cloud storage, like DropBox, GMail, and Autodesk 360. Provided he keeps project files (or symbolic links to project files using "mklink") in his desktop computer's DropBox folder, he can bring up the most recent versions of files, without having to carry all multi-gigabytes of them on his phone, or even bother with remembering to refresh old copies with new versions.

Free or Low Pricing. The way that Apple structured pricing for its app store caused a freefall in app pricing. It used to be normal to pay $10 to $25 for PalmOS apps; now, it's normal to pay 99 cents. The low prices benefit users, because then they can try out lots of software to find the apps that work best for them; but it's hard on CAD vendors who have programmers to pay.

To overcome the pricing problem, some CAD vendors tie the mobile app to their desktop software. Some, like Nemetschek Vectorworks, allow only access only to their subscription customers. Others are trying tiered pricing; Autodesk, for instance, hints it might charge for an AutoCAD WS with more features than the free one.

The notable exception is IMSI/Design, who charges $500 for its TurboSite on iTunes store, which includes advanced functions like cloud-based translation from some 20 file formats. In showing me a confidential preview of his new app, a CAD vendor he plans to charge $300 or $400 when he releases it later this month.

 I encourage CAD vendors to charge more, at least $10 for apps. If your software provides value to users, then users will pay.

Next in part 4: Hard to Predict is the Future

 

 Out of the Inbox

2013 begins with acquisitions sprees:

  • VERO Software acquires Sescio International, and in doing so calls itself the #1 CAM specialists in the world
  • 3D Systems can't stop growing larger, swallows up Geomagic. In the process, Ping Fu gets to be demoted from ceo to vp and chief strategy officer. Wagging tongues want to know if the acquisition news made into her Bend Not Break autobiography released just one week earlier.
  • Geometric acquires 3Cap Technologies GmbH (automotive electronics engineering). giving the Indian company a reverse-off-shore presence in Germany.

- - -

Siemens PLM Systems synchronous technology is now a standalone 3D CAD editing program named 3DSync. It's free (after you fill out an application form) until May 15, and then it's $1995. http://www.siemens.com/plm/3dsync

 - - -

A bunch of independent programmers are coming up with their own mobile CAD apps. We saw lots last year from Big CAD, but here are two from one- and two-man operations -- and I'm not even upset that they don't run on Android!

  • cadTouch of Italy is getting more 2D tools (better cut options, chamfer, fillet, coordinate insertion), math toolbox, FEM toolbox, architectural module with basic AEC objects. http://cadtouch.com/
  • cado from Orange Juice Studios in England aims to be a true CAD tablet app, and not just a viewer. Primary advantage is its OMouse interface that wants to solve with my-fat-finger-is-blocking-my-view-of-exactly-what-I'm-trying-to-draw-and-edit problem. http://www.orangejuicestudios.com/

- - -

ITC ships IntelliCAD v7.2a to its members with 700 fixes and support for DWG 2013. http://www.intellicad.org

 

On our Blogs

Here are some of the items that appeared recently on our WorldCAD Access blog at http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com:

  • Fewer data, less statistic
  • Touching AutoCAD on the desktop
  • Your beta invitation to Russia's only AutoCAD clone
  • David Stein's new book: "Why Your Next IT Project Will Fail"
  • CAD vendors will be tempted into biasing their cloud pricing
  • It could be that CAD vendors will suffer from avoiding granularity

And on our Gizmos Grabowski blog at http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com/gizmos:

  • - The AZS600 touch screen all-in-one computer from Acer
    - Fixing a screwed-up memory card

 

Spin Doctor of the Moment

"Thank you, and we're listening."
    - Kevin Systrom, co-founder, Instagram
      http://blog.instagram.com/post/38252135408/thank-you-and-were-listening

 

 

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Posted at 11:55 AM | | Comments (0)

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