upFront.eZine News Archives

Autodesk Core 1.0: Successor of ShapeManager, or a Toy for Enthusiasts?

upFront.eZine Issue #807

 

 

Guest editorial by Nikolay Snytnikov

Recently Ralph Grabowski in his article "Introducing Core, Autodesk's Other Solid Modeling Kernel" drew attention to the re-branded Gen6 geometric kernel, the technology used inside TinkerCAD's Web-based CAD system acquired by Autodesk in 2013. Along with the re-branding, Autodesk introduced Creative Platform based on the TinkerCAD API [application programming interface], which is supposed to be extended by contributions from the community. Autodesk says the platform and Core kernel are applicable for other offerings in its ecosystem of consumer products. So Creative Platform is not restricted only for use in TinkerCAD.

TinkerCAD's Gen6 (now Autodesk Core 1.0) is interesting to the CAD world, because (a) it was designed to run in a cloud environment using clusters of servers, and (b) it is a voxel-based [3D-volume element] solid modeler -- whereas other modern commercial modelers use B-Rep [boundary representation] solids. Voxel-based representations and algorithms are ideally suited for scaling up to hundreds and thousands of processors. However, they lack sufficient accuracy to represent CAD models. Without a significant improvement by Autodesk, Core can be used only for niche solutions in education and 3D printing, where the accuracy requirement is weaker. Further details on this subject and a discussion of parallelization in other kernels (Parasolid, ACIS, CGM and the recently developed RGK, Russian Geometric Kernel) can be found in my article "Evolution and Revolution."

Why Autodesk Needed a Second Kernel

So why would Autodesk need to develop a cloud software platform based on a new kernel? Probably because the time-proven ACIS-based Autodesk ShapeManager (ASM) does not sufficiently support parallel computation. It does, however, have multithreading, such as multithreaded Boolean operations, as announced at least a year ago. (See Grabowski's report "From AU 2012: An Early Look at Fusion 360" following an Autodesk University 2012 press-conference.)

But there is no evidence that the capabilities are available to end-users today. This is easy to verify with ShapeManager-based applications, such as Inventor Professional 2014 and Fusion 360. Both CAD applications are installed locally on the PC and use the most recent version of ASM.

In scenarios consisting of the Boolean union of two bodies with many intersecting faces, solving the Booleans takes 2-3 minutes on today's typical four-core PC. (See the figures 1 and 2 below.) 

Figure 1 (at left): Two identical bodies with 20 NURBS faces each, with one rotated by a small angle are unioned.

Figure 2 (at right): Two identical bodies with dozens of torus-based faces.

 

The Windows task manager utility reports that only one processor core is employed by each application. When I compare their performance with another geometric kernel that explicitly supports multithreading, I see that the latter is significantly faster, because it uses all processor cores during solving. 

It should be noted that scenarios in the design office are for the most part simpler than my test case, and so are executed instantly, even on single-core machines, without the need for parallelization. Other times, however, performance becomes critical when end users work with large models containing a considerable number of faces. This then becomes a case for running CAD computations on cloud environments, performing all computations with CAD applications installed on remote servers.

For example, Autodesk's 3D design running in a browser powered by OTOY software and NVIDIA hardware, and installed on the Amazon Web Services environment. (See Octane Cloud Workstation - Autodesk Edition on Amazon.com.) When a seemingly-powerful remote server with hundreds of processors/cores doesn't respond instantly to the user's request, then frustration comes.

Speaking of Autodesk's 3D design system in a browser, announced in a press release in November 2013, I was disappointed when I could not launch any of the supported applications in my browser. As it turned out, it is not for anyone. I can use OTOY technology with Autodesk's applications only by choosing the appropriate GPU hardware (NVIDIA Grid) from the list of Amazon's available hardware configurations. And to be allowed to choose this hardware, I must have a sufficient client history, i.e. paying bills to Amazon for some time. I think the problem is that Amazon didn't install enough NVIDIA Grid GPUs in its servers, so it is forced to restrict the number of users. So, it's not easy to test the browser version of Autodesk software, but I believe that the capabilities of ShapeManager will not be different on this version.

If ShapeManager doesn't support multithreading, then there is a lot of work for the development team to do to adapt it to the cloud. And so perhaps this is what Autodesk wants to do: run the new Creative Platform as an experiment of how a cloud-based CAD system can be used by a community of enthusiasts, and the way in which it will be extended. Depending on the results of this experiment, Autodesk might either:

• Develop the Core kernel further
• Or else introduce parallelization to ShapeManager

In the case of further development of Core, Autodesk must first improve the voxel-based approach, as well as solve the precision issue. In any case, either kernel requires non-trivial algorithmic problems of geometric modeling solved.

At LEDAS, we have begun similar R&D projects, inspired by our participation in the RGK (Russian geometry kernel) project. One of our projects is aimed at developing a scalable geometric kernel for the cloud environment. Such a kernel is efficient at deploying all resources available from powerful computing environments with their dozens or hundreds of processors, and so is able to handle tasks involving native B-Rep data of any complexity, instantly, without compromising accuracy.

Nikolay Snytnikov is the Chief Operating Officer at LEDAS and a research scientist at the Institute of Computational Mathematics and Mathematical Geophysics in Russia.

[This article was reprinted with permission of isicad.net.]

 

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And One More Thing...

Bricsys releases BricsCAD V14 for Linux with emphasis on MCAD, with a redesigned context-sensitive Quad cursor, sheet metal design module, associative section views, and other features completely new for the Linux market. BricsCAD uses direct modeling to edit sheet metal parts, which unfold automatically and then can be exported to CAM systems.

There's also annotative scaling, a 30,000-parts library in parametric 3D, and more. Price is around $985; 30-day no-charge demo from http://www.bricsys.com/BricsCAD

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Heard on Twitter

upFront.eZine (@upFronteZine): Siemens launches $100 million fund to back Startups aiming to disrupt manufacturing" -> http://www.techcrunch.com/2014/02/17/siemens-launches-100m-fund-to-back-software-startups-that-can-disrupt-manufacturing/

upFront.eZine: Industry of the Future Fund from Siemens' Industrie 4.0 provides capital to firms whose tech has potential to change the landscape of mfging

- - -

Alex Bausk (@bauskas): "BIM lies ahead" is an incredibly deep phrase if you think about it

- - -

Owen Wengerd (@owenwengerd): [Outside The Box] Don't catch what you can't handle -- http://otb.manusoft.com/2014/02/dont-catch-what-you-cant-handle.htm

- - -

Randall S. Newton (@RSNatWork): Dassault Systemes revenue up 5% for quarter and year; Catia sales flat. Report inc. 11 custom charts http://bit.ly/1b6lC6P

upFront.eZine: Dassault announces 3DEXPERIENCE R2014x, which despite the release #, is the 1st release of 3DEXPERIENCE platform; "shipping" as of Feb 24.

upFront.eZine: List of law firms doing the dogpile on Dassault's purchase of Accelrys for the miserly sum of three-quarters of a billion dollars:

upFront.eZine: Rigrodsky&Long, Brodsky&Smith, Harwood Feffer, LEVI&KORSINSKY, Ryan&Maniskas, Faruqi&Faruqi, Kirby McInerney, Pomerantz, Finkelstein Thompson

- - -

upFront.eZine: "The Day We Fight Back!": Today is the day thousands of tech companies and groups protest NSA by doing not much of anything particularly.

- - -

upFront.eZine: Wired magazine calls TinkerCAD "3D design for idiots" but then it also calls Sketchup a "web-based drawing program."

- - -

upFront.eZine: I wonder in which year olympic athletes will finally be replaced by 3D graphics?

 

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Letters to the Editor

Re: Autodesk Completely Acquires Delcam

"Regarding Autodesk becoming the newest licensee of Siemens PLM's Parasolid kernel: I know of no serious player in the engineering software industry who has ever complained of anti-competitive treatment by the Parasolid folks. While there is sometimes wild speculation in the blogosphere, the Siemens PLM Parasolid and D-Cubed Components people have a rock-solid reputation with the people who actually know what they're talking about.

"If Autodesk chooses to transition Delcam products away from Parasolid, it'll be for their own technical and business reasons. Personally, I predict that they'll take a two pronged approach, maintaining Parasolid in existing products, and building a new generation of cloud CAM products with ShapeManager."
       - Evan Yares

The editor replies: "I assume the same (that Autodesk will do.) This was a question that didn't come up at the press conference last week, but I have since asked Adesk about it. See what they say."

 

"Delcam has been very successful with their products as they're currently architected and like the rest of their business we have no plans to make substantial changes."
     - Noah Cole, senior manager of corporate public relations and social media
       Autodesk

Mr Yares resonds: "As responses go, it's probably reasonable. Translation: 'We don't want to kill the goose that laid the golden egg'."

 

"I don't recall seeing any mention of Mechanical Desktop in your article. I used it for a couple of projects but found it to be fairly crude with several bugs. When AutoDesk wanted an annual subscription fee equal to the original purchase price (wtf) I dropped it and went to Alibre."
      - Alex Apostoli, AAE Structural Ltd.
        Canada

The editor replies: "MDT ran on top of AutoCAD, using ARX to do its mech-specific functions. So, it used the same kernel as AutoCAD."

- - -

"On another completely different note: while my office cubicle was disassembled and our area was painted and carpeted, I took advantage of the opportunity to ask if my employer wouldn't mind setting up my desk as a stand-up workstation. All that was required was a taller cubicle wall for one side and two small cabinet tops for my file drawer towers. Turned out pretty nice. I read up on it and found two great articles which helped me make the decision to go vertical (along with the two herniated discs just above my tailbone). Sitting just happens to be the worst thing for my back.

http://tristandenyer.com/benefits-and-drawbacks-of-a-standing-desk/

http://erickellyobregon.blogspot.com/2011/04/stand-up-at-work-literally.html

"Perhaps a number of your users are like me – getting older and can't sit for long periods of time? We'll see how this feels in a month. Nice thing is, I can just pop the work surface and drawer tower tops off and move them back down to 30" height and no-harm done. I want to push through any pain for a while and see if I can take this though.

"I'm still looking for a gel mat to stand on, and a pair of extra monitors (and a quad stand) since I am running an Alienware Aurora workstation with twin AMD Radeon HD6900 cards and a Mirror driver supporting four DVI cables."
     - Ron Powell

 

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Notable Quotable

"Problem is, there is no Easy button."
     - Patrick Hughes (@Time_Trvlr) on Twitter

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Graphisoft renders ArchiCAD 18

upFront.eZine Issue #820

 

 

 

For the 18th release of ArchiCAD, Graphisoft is emphasizing a new rendering engine in the 30-year-old CAD system. "Which means that BIM is turning 30 as well," added Graphisoft vp of marketing Akos Pfemeter.

Coordinating with the Discipline, Across Applications

While Graphisoft was most excited about the one-button and high-end rendering, I found the BCF function more interesting. BIM Coordination Format is a new way to pass comments and redlines between applications, bi-directionally. BCF is supported by BuildingSmar; seehttp://www.buildingsmart-tech.org/specifications/bcf-releases/bcf-intro.

For example, to look for collisions between drawings created by different disciplines, we import an MEP [mechanical, electrical, plumbing] model as an IFC [industry foundation classes] file into ArchiCAD, which highlights in orange the conflicts. Empty interior spaces can be turned off from collision detection.

Next, we attach notes to a problem area and capture a view that looks like a screen grab. To view the notes in another application, save the note as a BCF file, which is very compact and so easy to email. In the other application such as Tekla BIMsight, we open the BCF file and then click the image to view the model at the same angle as in ArchiCAD.

Now I would say that this approach is better than Autodesk's chat system, because BCF works between programs from different vendors; it does not store the data on a cloud -- the security concern for some AutoCAD users. While BCF has the potential to be a universal format, it is, by far, not universal.

Tracking the Changes, Semi-automatically

"The most time consuming, most hated part of the architect's job, especially revisions -- is keeping track of changes to the project," says Mr Pfemeter. There is the need to document changes: who owns the change? which drawings are affected? and so on.

In ArchiCAD 18, revisions are handled by the Change button, which places revision clouds and tracks the changes; it also works in 3D so that changes affecting multiple floors (stories) are captured.

The new Change Manager palette handles multiple changes, which no other package does according to Mr Pfemeter. For instance, it can assign multiple elements to a change in 2D, 3D, and perspective modes. This is done as by dragging and dropping a modified element (such as multi-floor staircase) into the Change Manager palette, simply.

Revisions are shown in colors in the tree of the Navigator. A new filter shows previous issues. Updates to the revision lists are handled automatically. Indeed, the revision list is a new type of GDL [Geometric description language] object, which can be customized through settings. See Figure 1.

 

Figure 1 (left to right): Issue History dialog box with list of changed drawings in blue; red revision history in drawing; Change Manager palette; and Navigator showing changed drawings in blue. (Click image for higher-resolution version.)

 

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Article continues...

 

Other Goodie, and Rendering

"Until now, PDF was an archival format for storing drawings," says Mr Pfemeter. ArchiCAD 18 now exports layers -- ho hum, so does everyone else. But the CAD system now also imports and explodes PDF files into ArchICAD lines and text, which then can be edited.

Multi-story editing lets us cut an elevator shaft by selecting all slabs, drawing a single rectangle, and then cut through all of them in an instant. This multi-story editing also works on meshes. Graphisoft is calling this "a temporary constraint," somewhat misleading in my opinion, as constraints are not involved: it's a multi-element, multi-story selection.

As for the new CineRender Engine 4 (aka Cinema 4D) rendering engine (compliments of one of Graphisoft's sister companies, Maxon), the most exciting function to me was the no-lights rendering mode, when using the Daylight Scene setting; no need to place lights is a huge time saver for someone as klutzy as me at placing lights in 3D space. In Night Scene mode, all placed lights are turned on automatically.

Many of the other functions Graphisoft demo'ed were already familiar to me from other CAD systems, such as ICS lighting specs -- but not these ones: the Noise effect simulates smoke or steam; caustics bends and focuses light through transparent elements; volumetric lighting simulates sunlight streaming through dusty air. Also, as a final touch, it can simulate the randomness of 3D grass.

Especially for architects, Graphisoft implemented white rendering with, again, just one click. It just ignores materials applied to elements. See figure 2. For experts, manual mode has 1000+ parameters and 800+ parametric materials.

 

Figure 2: White rendering with no materials is what architects like in early design stages. (Click image for higher-resolution version.)

 

The price is unchanged. The image on the box is a new medical center at Brock University in Canada. The software ships in early June. Get more information from http://www.graphisoft.com/archicad/archicad-18/overview

 

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And One More Thing...

NVIDIA launches a test drive [is this like a beta?] of its GRID system running the equivalent of workstation graphics over the Internet, like for eDrawings and AutoCAD -- "anywhere on any device" is the claim, although the client software (that you download) is for now limited to Windows and to IP addresses located in North America. The press release intimates that Linux and OS X will be supported in the near future, and makes no mention of the even more popular Android and iOS operating systems.

Before you try it out, I suggest first reading the user manual at http://www.nvidia.com/content/grid/pdf/grid-test-drivers-manual.pdf to get an idea of the limitations and possibilities. After registering and downloading the client software, you have 24 hours to run pre-installed applications, or install your own.

 

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For More News

• @upfrontezine: news updates and commentry throughout the day on Twitter
• WorldCAD Access: blogging nearly daily with articles about CAD and tips about computers; available on RSS and through email alerts

 

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Industrial design inside SolidWorks

Power Surfacing from nPower Software provides organic and freeform surface-solids modeling inside SolidWorks. Recently awarded Gold Medal for Best Software Product at SolidWorks World. Find out why the judges said, "nPower makes SolidWorks a surfacing monster."

Download a free trial version of Power Surfacing to become an industrial design superstar. And then visit our tutorials page to learn how to model difficult shapes easily.

http://www.npowersoftware.com/NewPowerSurfacingOverview.html

 

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== Professional 3D File Conversion/Viewing/Rendering Software ==

 For over 2 decades Okino (Toronto) has provided mission-critical 3D conversion software used extensively by tens of thousands of professionals. We develop, support and convert between all major CAD, DCC & VisSim formats. Robert Lansdale (CTO, lansd@okino.com) tailors each package to the specific conversion requirements of each customer.

Popular formats include 3ds Max, Maya, C4D, LW, ProE, SolidWorks, Inventor, SketchUp, DWF/DWG, DGN, CATIA, IGES/STEP/Parasolid, 3D PDF/U3D, JT, FBX, Collada & more. We know data translation, and provide immaculate developer-to-customer relations.
http://www.okino.com

 

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Thank You to Our Subscribers & Donators

These great people support upFront.eZine through their contributions. Thank you!

• James Martin
• Lamar Henderson
• Anonymous: "Hi Ralph, very much appreciate the unique and important information you share that I don't hear about any other way. The service you provide to the industry is very valuable. (Also, I prefer to remain anonymous if you choose to publish names.)"

(To donate by PayPal, click http://www.upfrontezine.com and then choose the Donate $25 or Donate $500 button.)

 

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Letter to the Editor

Re: What I Learned at Solid Edge University 2014

Thanks for attending Solid Edge University and publishing your article in upfront.eZine #819! I work in marketing for Solid Edge and just a couple of comments from me that may be of interest to your readers:

The Solid Edge Apps web page that you refer to is a new resource to help our customers find the most commonly used Apps by category (Analysis, Manufacturing, Standard Parts etc.). We are adding the most popular apps into this area right now and you are correct that there are just 30 or so listed here right now. At the bottom of the page is a link to "All Solid Edge Partners" and it is here that you can search on the 500+ technology partners whose software works with Solid Edge.

Great that you were impressed by the Create Sheet Metal from 3D Part capability, and we would agree we should have featured this more prominently in our marketing materials for Solid Edge ST7. It is featured in the "Fast and Flexible Part Modeling" video on our Solid Edge ST7 web page.

     - David Chadwick, mainstream eng global product marketing

       Siemens Industry Software Limited

 

Is WorldCAD Access down? I'm getting 522 and 523 errors from http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com/. Great running into you last week.

     - Blake Courter

       GrabCAD

The editor replies: WorldCAD Access is hosted by Typepad, and they are experiencing a DDoS attack. The workaround is to read the blog use Google's cache.

 

 

Your links under "For further reading" don't work. And don't make it sound like having KeyShot as an external rendering application is a bad thing. It is the way to go. Solid Edge is the first major CAD vendor to see the light.
      - Thomas Teger, vp of products & strategy

        Luxion

 

Thank you for all the information supplied over the years. As I have retired, I no longer have sufficient interest in the way CAD is changing to keep up with the changes.

   - DB

     New Zealand

 

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Notable Quotable

"However, the cost of training workers to use the new tools exceeded the investment in software, and is not yet complete."
       - Stephen Wolfe, Graphic Speak
         http://gfxspeak.com/2014/05/05/introduces-experience-platform

 

 

What I Learned at Solid Edge University 2014

upFront.eZine Issue #819 

 

 

Even at age 18, Solid Edge is largely an unknown. An unknown MCAD package with more than 500,000 users of the 3D version and another 600,000 of the free 2D one.

So, how come so invisible? It has to do with history. Originally, Solid Edge was developed by Intergraph, one of the earliest CAD companies, but one unfamiliar with marketing MCAD. When UGS bought it, Solid Edge came under the shadow of Unigraphics, a high-end MCAD system subsequently renamed NX. When Siemens AG bought UGS (renaming it Siemens PLM Systems, then Software), the Huntsville-based Solid Edge became a tiny part of a $76 billion-a-year German conglomerate.

After the SPS division launched the brilliant plan to create Synchronous Technology for NX and Solid Edge, it blundered on the launch marketing by over-promising the capabilities, which I think created distrust in potential customers. (Six releases further and ST still isn't implemented 100%.)

So, the brand name suffered from nearly two decades of being under marketed, over shadowed, under valued, and over marketed. Well, that and the oh-so-bland gray of the Siemens corporate color scheme. Working their way out of this pit of history, the Solid Edge folks now are thinking differently. For instance, last year for the first time they invited the media to Solid Edge University, expenses paid, and this year close to 40 media attended from around the world. That's good news.

 

Figure 1: During the break at the main session of Solid Edge University 2014

 

Less good news is the difficulty the company has in attracting third-party developers. The exhibit hall was also the dining room, with 20 (I think) vendors in small booths lining the walls, some of whom work with any 3D CAD package, like 3D printing. This is pathetic; even a company as compact as Bricsys has over 300 third-party developers. A press release from Siemens PLM Software states, "There are now over 500 Solid Edge apps available," but on their apps page < http://www.plm.automation.siemens.com/en_us/products/velocity/solidedge/applications/index.shtml>, I count 28.

The good news, however, is that Siemens PLM Software says it recognizes the shortfall, is working to attract more, will launch an on-line app store, and points out that some of the ones they have are significant.

 

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Article continues...

 

About Solid Edge ST7

Siemens PLM now numbers Solid Edge releases from when Synchronous Technology was introduced, sort of like a BC/AD system. Version 7 is due out in June, and incorporates 1,300 enhancements -- although we were not given the entire list, and so who knows what level of granularity counts as an enhancement.

Nevertheless, lots of useful functions were added in many areas -- with the significant exception of surface modeling. The biggest cheers were, as always, for improvements to 2D drafting, the loudest cheer of all for automatic spacing of geometric dimensioning. One new function is automatic placement of these dimensions, made possible after Siemens PLM Software settled with patent troll Auto-Dimensions.

Other highlight functions:

• 3D sketching for parts, assemblies, and sheet metal
• faster operations with massive assemblies
• editing of fixed-length curves
• placing multiple components along a path
• patterning (arrays) along 3D curves
• creating holes based on bolt-screw specifications
• generating 2D blanks from 3D parts
• starting with a redesigned Start page
• rendering with Keyshot (although through a file link to the external renderer)
• including better material definitions

One feature blew me away. Starting with a 3D solid prismatic shape, Solid Edge automatically generates either a sheet metal part (complete with bends and reliefs) or a frame -- along the edges, automatically. Here's the thing: this wow!-fucntion gets no mention at all in the marketing for ST7, Neither in the official press release nor in the seven-page What's New PDF at http://www.plm.automation.siemens.com/en_us/products/velocity/solidedge/st7/#lightview%26uri=tcm:1023-220333%26title=What's-New-in-Solid-Edge-ST7-Fact-Sheet-40384.

So, there you have it. An MCAD system that's progressing in remarkable ways (admittedly with some help from the NX division) and one that's trying not to stay under the radar any longer.

http://www.plm.automation.siemens.com/en_us/products/velocity/solidedge/st7

 

[Disclosure: Siemens PLM Software provided me with airfare, accommodation, most meals, and ground transportation.]

 

For Further Reading

Solid Edge looking like a Big CAD company in Atlanta by Roopinder Tara
http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com/blog/2014/05/solid-edge-looking-like-a-big-cad-company-in-atlanta.html

Solid Edge ST 7 running on Surface Pro tablet 
http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com/blog/2014/05/solid-edge-st-7-running-on-surface-pro-tablet.html

New numbers place Solid Edge #2 behind Solidworks
http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com/blog/2014/05/new-numbers-make-solid-edge-2-behind-solidworks.html

 

And One More Thing...

Autodesk's third paroduct named "Spark" is a 3D printing platform the company will make public, and so hopes to connect CAD users, 3D printer makers, software developers, and materials providers. The company will release its own 3D printer later this year for $5,000 but not aimed at the maker market. Autodesk says it is "uniquely positioned to lead the development of 3D printing platforms given its long-standing leadership creating intuitive, feature-rich software interfaces that make design easy and accessible," although it might acknowledge that some companies it hope to work with had a 30-year head start in 3D printing. http://www.autodesk.com/campaigns/spark

 

For More News

• @upfrontezine: news updates and commentry throughout the day on Twitter
• WorldCAD Access: blogging nearly daily with articles about CAD and tips about computers

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Searching for ODA members interested in licensing facet modeling

 QModeler is used for Boolean operations in the BModeler package from Bricsys. With additional partners looking at QModeler agreements, now is the time to make a money-saving joint license. Contact me at henrik.vallgren@streamspace.com.

More information at www.qmodeler.com

 

 

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Industrial design inside SolidWorks

Power Surfacing from nPower Software provides organic and freeform surface-solids modeling inside SolidWorks. Recently awarded Gold Medal for Best Software Product at SolidWorks World. Find out why the judges said, "nPower makes SolidWorks a surfacing monster."

Download a free trial version of Power Surfacing to become an industrial design superstar. And then visit our tutorials page to learn how to model difficult shapes easily.

http://www.npowersoftware.com/NewPowerSurfacingOverview.html

 

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These great people support upFront.eZine through their contributions. Thank you!

• Solid Modeling Solutions (2 subscriptions)
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(To donate by PayPal, click http://www.upfrontezine.com and then choose the Donate $25 or Donate $500 button.)

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Notable Quotable

"Last year has been spent learning the lesson that imposing grand corporatist visions on users is dumb, and it seems like a lesson that's been well-learned."
      - Tadhg Kelly 
        http://techcrunch.com/2014/05/18/welcome-back-xbox-one/

 

 

Q&As from the Nikken Sekkei Visit

upFront.eZine Issue #818

 

 

by Ralph Grabowski

Graphisoft took us CAD journalists on a morning visit to Tokyo's Nikken Sekkei (established 1900), an international one-stop architecture firm working primarily in Asia with 1,200 architects. The firm began trying BIM ten years ago, and then made BIM the company standard three years ago. ArchiCAD is their main program. It is the core of the design process, although other software is used as well.

Last year, Nikken began partnering with Graphisoft directly to make ArchiCAD better, and so some of the new functions are the result of this practical advice. Eight Nikken Sekkei employees liaise on product development with Graphisoft. After an introductory talk about the firm and some of its newest projects (see Figures 1 and 2), the principals answered questions from the CAD journalists.

 

Figure 1: A dramatic architectural design by Nikken for a bank client in China (image credit: Nikken)

 

Q: Why Graphisoft? 
A: They are flexible in adapting to Japan, listening to our issues, and cooperating. What was crucial to us is that they adopted the OpenBIM concept. If BIM is closed, it disturbs our work, because Japanese standards are unique in the world.

Q: Who in the firm uses BIM, the actual architects or their assistants?
A: We call it "Self BIM." The architects use BIM themselves for architectural, MEP [mechanical, electrical, plumbing] and structural design, with help from the support center.

The front loading from BIM makes more work for architects [initially], but with training and learning and better connection with the other software we use, the learning curve becomes less harsh. For instance, ArchiCAD is assisted by our Digital Design Lab that operates the computational design and simulation software.

We use Rhino primarily, along with T-splines and Grasshopper for conceptual design. These models are fed into ArchiCAD. Many other packages are used for lighting, sound, people movement, air circulation, analysis, documentation, and so on.

Q: How big are your projects using ArchiCAD?
A: We have seven BIM Teamwork servers; typical project sizes range from 100MB to 2GB. We have an average of 10 users online at a time [per server], working on an average of three projects at a time. [The company totals 200 projects a year.]

 

Article continues following this advertisement...

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---

Q&A from the Nikken Sekkei Visit, continued...

 

Q: Do you do FM [facilities management]? 
A: We are interested in it, and are strongly investigating it. When our clients hear "BIM," they are very interested in what we do. We are looking at software to connect with the BIM model. FM does not tend to be in 3D; most of it is done by 2D, text, or spreadsheet. But since we produce 3D models, we think 3D FM is possible.

Q: What is the benefit to 3D FM? 
A: Then we would not have to generate 2D drawings. If we run FM in 3D, we can get more information on how the buildings operate, to help us design better ones in the future.

 

Figure 2: The Yamaha tower in Tokyo's Ginza shopping district includes a concert hall designed by Nikken (image credit: Nikken)

 

Q: How do you capture as-builts? 
A: Maybe in the future, we will use laser scans. The contractor used laser scans to document the Skytree tower [designed by Nikken], but this is not normal practice now.

Q: How do you create the as-built models? 
A: We supervise the construction site; it is the rule in Japan that the architect supervises. Through this, we get the as-builts from the contractor. The clients ask us to store the model for them, especially when it is a precise 2GB model!

Q: During the shop drawing phase, the drawings are 2D. So, part of your team converts the shop drawings back to 3D BIM? 
A: We can specify that the contractor document construction changes in the BIM model to an LOD [level of detail] of 1:300 (design drawing) or 1:400 (construction drawings).

Q: What about energy analysis and estimation? 
A: We do an analysis from the BIM model with BEST (Japanese made) software and Thermo. It is a very natural process for us here in Japan: as soon as we have a shape in Rhino, we perform an energy analysis. CFD [computational fluid dynamics] is 3D, and BIM is 3D, so it works well. I was surprised to learn American firms mostly use 2D CFD analysis.

Q: What document management system do you use? 
A: Our own internal system. We use in-house software for earthquake analysis, because Japan has its own standard, which other programs don't do.

Q: Do you trust other people's files, or is there group responsibility? 
A: We are now starting to encounter this problem. We use a trusted overseas partner to remodel it in BIM, because it would be very expensive in Japan. IFCs [industry foundation classes] sound very nice, but it causes very many problems. Maybe one day there will be a standard in Japan; we asked Graphisoft to add our standard to their program. The Japanese government this week announced a BIM standard for their own buildings. But they are nervous of a national standard, because a similar effort for civil engineering failed a few year ago.

 ---

Summing up: "It is not easy to implement as a standard for everyone, but we want it to grow as fast as possible, with the main objective being cost and quality."

http://www.nikken.co.jp/en

[Disclosure: Graphisoft provided me with airfare, accommodation, and some meals.]

 

And One More Thing...

Terry Wohlers has been producing his annual Wohlers Report on 3D printing for 19 years. The 2014 edition is now available, and it finds that sales exceeded $3 billion for the first time, with an annual compounded growth of 35%.

With the explosion of interest (and hype) in 3D pricing, this report is particularly valuable for introducing the types of 3D printing technologies; describing the industry players; and forecasting trends. 35 charts; 60 tables; 248 illustrations; 276 pages; $495 fromhttp://wohlersassociates.com/press63.html

 

For More News

• @upfrontezine: news updates and snarky commentry throughout the day on Twitter
• WorldCAD Access: blogging nearly daily with articles about CAD and tips about computers

---

Industrial design inside SolidWorks

Power Surfacing from nPower Software provides organic and freeform surface-solids modeling inside SolidWorks. Recently awarded Gold Medal for Best Software Product at SolidWorks World. Find out why the judges said, "nPower makes SolidWorks a surfacing monster."

Download a free trial version of Power Surfacing to become an industrial design superstar. And then visit our tutorials page to learn how to model difficult shapes easily.

http://www.npowersoftware.com/NewPowerSurfacingOverview.html

 

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Thank You to Our Subscribers & Donators

These great people support upFront.eZine through their contributions. Thank you!

• Dave Jones
• Marc Lind of ARAS (corporate donation): "We are big fans of your newsletter and blog. Keep 'em comin'."
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(To donate by PayPal, click http://www.upfrontezine.com and then choose the Donate $25 or Donate $500 button.)

---

Letters to the Editor

Re: ANSYS Buys Spaceclaim

Venture money poured into SpaceClaim is $49M, according to Crunchbase. Evan Yares is off by $10M. Here is the link, http://www.crunchbase.com/organization/spaceclaim
      - Siddhartha Oza, product manager
        Glovius

The editor replies: "Hmmm.. Evan says he got his numbers from adding them up from SEC filings. I wonder if this might be more accurate that what TechCrunch is reporting?"

 

Re: What I Saw at COFES 2014

I think I'm a techno-realist, which I would define as someone who really believes that the latest technology is amazing, productivity-boosting, and headed toward a somewhat promising future -- for the thin slice at the very center of the target customer group at which they are aiming.

The rest of us get to "eat the crumbs that fall from the master's table," often due to that word you brought up last week -- compatibility! Even with a program as open and configurable as AutoCAD, I often find I have to wait five years or longer to implement some new feature into my CAD development, because of incompatibility with legacy files, or because of users who just don't seem to want to increase productivity ("we've always done it that way"), or who can't afford to work on the current DWG format, or sometimes just because of one tiny facet of a feature that ruins it for my particular industry.
      - R. P.

The editor replies: Now, that' a good third stance.

 

Attached is the scan I made of the English side of Masao Morito's business card.
     - Bill Cochell, director of custom applications
       Design Parametrics

The editor replies: I had lost Mr Morito's business card, and so did not remember his name for my mention of iCAD. Three readers sprang to my assistance!

 

Thank you for introducing me and our product in your article. And please allow me to correct a word in your article: CGM is not the name of our kernel, CSG (Constructive Solid Geometry) is the method we use for our own kernel.
      - Masao Morito, senior manager 
        Strategic Marketing & Technology Division, iCAD Ltd.

 

Re: What's Inside? IntelliCAD 8

In your recent IntelliCAD 8 review posted on your blog [at http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com/blog/2014/04/whats-inside-intellicad-8exclusive-coverage-now-that-the-intellicad-technical-consortium-is-over-the-huge-multi-year-hurdl.html] you sated the following:

Now that the IntelliCAD Technical Consortium is over the huge, multi-year hurdle of rewriting IntelliCAD 7 (so as to remove all Microsoft-owned code found in IntellICAD 6 and earlier)

This is not the case. Our goal for IntelliCAD 7 was not to remove existing Visio-Microsoft-owned code, but to refactor our usage of the ODA [Open Design Alliance] libraries. Previously, in IntelliCAD 6, we used the ODA libraries only for read/write of DWG files; we maintained our own internal database. This caused a lot of delay when porting to new ODA updates, as it required us to make huge modifications to our core database code, and did not allow us to properly handle custom objects.

We redesigned IntelliCAD 7 to utilize ODA as our internal database, so we now:

• Properly support custom objects
• Exposed a new C++ API
• Greatly simplified our ODA updates.

This effort took a lot of time and resources, as all internal commands were refactored. It also completely changed our entire graphics engine. Nevertheless, we still have a lot of original code in IntelliCAD as there are hundreds of man years of experience/work that would be senseless to rewrite.

Again, we did not remove code under Microsoft's copyright; legally we cannot do that. It's clear that our existing code is a derivative of the original code the ITC received from Microsoft. Our new code was created by the same team, slowly deriving from the original code to properly use the redesigned ODA libraries – but we must maintain the original Microsoft copyrights and declare that new portions are a derivative.

      - Dave Lorenzo, development director
        IntelliCAD Technology Consortium

The editor replies: I must have misunderstood one of the technical sessions at an ITC conference. Thank you for correcting my wrong impression.

- - -

I've been laid-off and will no longer be receiving emails at this address. I re-subscribe when I'm employed again. Thanks for your quality eZine.
      - B. G. 

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Notable Quotable

"We tried to explain that loving Apple products wasn't part of my job description, but that never registered."
      - Miguel Helft, Fortune magazine, speaking of Katie Cotton, Apple vp of worldwide corporate communications
        http://valleywag.gawker.com/goodbye-to-katie-cotton-the-queen-of-evil-tech-pr-1573505515

 

 

What I saw at COFES (and what I didn't)

upFront.eZine Issue #817

 

 

by Ralph Grabowski

The annual COFES (congress on the future of engineering software) is about conversation between CAD vendors, analysts, and journalists, but that doesn't mean vendors can't whisper about new stuff they have. I'll tell you about some that I heard about, and one that I didn't.

iCAD from Fujitsu

Large manufacturing companies sometimes develop their own CAD systems, and one of these is Fujitsu. Their iCAD software (short for integrated computer aided design) has 30 years of development behind it, but now Fujitsu is looking to sell it to anyone. From a press release, I learn that the base price appears to be about $13,000, plus add-ons; Fujitsu hopes to sell 10,000 licenses a year.

At COFES, their representative (sorry, I lost his business card!) explained that it is specific to designing machinery, and so it loads 1,000,000 parts into 2GB RAM very quickly. An interference check of 36,000 parts is completed in 20 seconds; It does not do complex surfaces or freeform models, which can expand the data by as much as 50x and so take up much more memory.

It includes translators for standard formats (STEP, IGES, DWG, and so on) and importers for SolidWorks, Inventor, and ME10. Pay extra for Catia V5, NX, and Pro/E translators. The kernel is named "CGM," and is no relation to Dassault's CGM, he tells me. I could not, however, find out more about this CGM, except that it was independently developed, and so proprietary to Fujitsu.

• Japanese: http://www.icad.jp
• English: http://www.dipro.co.jp/english/products/cad_cam/icadsx/index.html

 

IntelliCAD 8 beta from ITC
Rob Berry is the new head of IntelliCAD Technology Consortium, and he was at COFES discretely handing out information sheets about IntelliCAD 8, now in beta. On WorldCAD Access, I wrote about what's in the new 64-bit release:http://worldcadaccess.typepad.com/blog/2014/04/whats-inside-intellicad-8exclusive-coverage-now-that-the-intellicad-technical-consortium-is-over-the-huge-multi-year-hurdl.html

• ITC: http://www.intellicad.org

 

Article continues following this advertisement...

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Discover how the Solid Edge 3D design system provides the speed and simplicity of direct modeling with the flexibility and control of parametric design
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---

What I saw at COFES, continued...

 

'Geometric Modeling' book from Golovanov

During its technical sessions, C3D Labs announced a new book "Geometric Modeling" by Nikolai Golovanov of ASCON Group. Mr Golovanov is the lead architect of the 15-year-old C3D kernel employed by KOMPAS-3D MCAD software and several other packages. (C3D Labs was formed to commercialize the kernel).

"Geometric Modeling" is a university-level textbook that describes the mathematics needed to construct and manipulate curves, surfaces, and solids. The book was originally written in Russian, and then Joel Orr helped edit the English edition, due out in a few months.

• Russian edition ($35): http://www.setbook.org/books/1241629.html
• C3D Labs: http://ascon.net/solutions/c3d_kernel/

 

Online MCAD from Lagoa

I was to meet with Lagoa at COFES, but the arrangement fell through. Reports from two CAD journalists were useful to learn what this company is up to.

What we have here is a new cloud-based CAD company whose background is physics-based effects for computer gaming. This means that things like an avalanche or an explosion looks real in games because of the way the particles interact with each other and with other objects -- bouncing, rolling, colliding... all in real time. (I should note that numerous companies do physics-based gaming; the tech is even available on Android phones.)

Lagoa wants to take its gaming experience and apply it to 3D CAD modeling. The aim is two-fold: make CAD easy enough for your mom to use; and allow analysis to take place during design -- so that there is no post-design analysis phase. The company plans to have a free version, as well as charge $50/month/user or $200/month/user.

Now, the interesting thing is that Lagoa is in the same neighborhood as Belmont Technology (since renamed OnShape), the latest grouping of CAD guys around John McEleney and Jon Hirschtick, both founders and former ceos of Solidworks. Whereas OnShape is still keeping quiet after two years (Mr Hirschtick was at COFES), Lagoa decided to seize the initiative to go public first. Also interesting: both use the Parasolid kernel.

Lagoa's two-step development is not surprising. Several firms started with rendering on the cloud, because it is easy, relatively. (There is not much user interaction: upload a 3D model file, tweak a few settings, and then sit back and wait for the resulting JPEG or TIFF file to be made available.) Once the cloud infrastructure is in place for rendering, it can be extended to the harder task of 3D modeling and (harder yet) editing.

• Roopinder Tara: http://cadinsider.typepad.com/my_weblog/2014/04/logoa-announces-3d-mcad-modeler.html
• Kenneth Wong: http://www.deskeng.com/virtual_desktop/?p=8711
• Lagoa: http://home.lagoa.com/

 

About Our 19th Anniversary

May 1 is the anniversary of the launch of upFront.eZine in 1995, when it was the first independent email newsletter in the CAD world. After 19 years, readers still like to support it through their donations, and so once a year remind you. A donation is completely voluntary! There is never any obligation to pay to read upFront.eZine. Should you be able to support upFront.eZine, then the amounts I suggest are

• For individuals $25
• For companies $500

Donating by PayPal: Click this link http://www.upfrontezine.com and then choose the Donate $25 or Donate $500 button.
Donating by mail: cash, cheques, or money orders in US$, CDN$, Euros, and British Pounds sent to upFront.eZine Publishing, 34486 Donlyn Avenue, Abbotsford BC, V2S 4W7 Canada.

These great people support upFront.eZine through their contributions. Thank you!

• Susan Benjamin
• Michael Kaluski (two donations)
• Skyler Mills

 

And One More Thing...

ANSYS last week bought nine-year-old SpaceClaim for $85 million, and here is how the CAD world reacted on Twitter:

"Venture capitalists invested $39.5 million in the company since 2005" (Evan Yares).

"Spaceclaim has been totally non-responsive since @bcourter and others left; they lost touch with their users" (Jon Banquer).

"Analysis of SpaceClaim early growth (Feb. 2012), compared w/ SolidWorks: DS paid $310m, ANSYS paid $85m" (Randall Newton).

"BRKG [breaking]: Senior janitor at Facebook bought Spaceclaim for change money left after dinner" (Alex Bausk).

 

---

Industrial design inside SolidWorks

Power Surfacing from nPower Software provides organic and freeform surface-solids modeling inside SolidWorks. Recently awarded Gold Medal for Best Software Product at SolidWorks World. Find out why the judges said, "nPower makes SolidWorks a surfacing monster."

Download a free trial version of Power Surfacing to become an industrial design superstar. And then visit our tutorials page to learn how to model difficult shapes easily.

http://www.npowersoftware.com/NewPowerSurfacingOverview.html

 

---

For More News

• @upfrontezine: news updates and snarky commentry throughout the day on Twitter
• WorldCAD Access: blogging nearly daily with articles about CAD and tips about computers

---

Letters to the Editor

Re: What I Learned at COFES 2014

One doesn't need to be in India to get the "Yes, but..." reaction to cloud software. Here in the United States internet connectivity is poor enough to make a mobile-based product not viable. My last hotel stay was in a Hilton Hotel, where they charged $10/day, did provide a reliable connection, and dropped the connection quite often. At Starbucks, if the store is busy, the Internet is slow and unreliable. I even found this to be the case at Starbucks with the new Google-branded WiFi.

Presumably Google and its vendors would be using the latest technology. Even in Silicon Valley this is the case, as sitting in AMD's headquarters I couldn't get a reliable cell service to tweet pictures, let alone get any work over the cloud. The cloud at this point is a desktop product, so why spend millions going to a server-based system?

Software vendors appear to need to shift focus from the mobile/cloud and emphasize the server-based software instead. This way, users can focus more on the processing power improvements provided by multiple CPU cores across servers -- rather then a mobile/cloud product that is hindered by infrastructure outside the control of users. Letting companies host the software on their own servers appears to be the correct model, rather than one of remote hosting -- at least for CAD products where user interaction is near constant, which it should be, if we are to believe the hype.
      - Christopher Fugitt
        blog.civil3dreminders.com

 

A good read!
      - Cadman777

 

Please send Mr. Steve Wells a kind note mentioning that he is putting his company's IP at risk if he is still using MS Word 2003. This product (along with all of the Office 2003 products) is now unsupported by MS security updates, and is a wide-open attack vector for malware.
       - Lynn Brielmaier

 

Re: upFront.eZine's 19th Anniversary

Congratulations on making it this far in the CAD business. I see you as an investigate reporter that has not been bought, so I do enjoy reading your news feeds. My ex-partner Steve Shein actually came out to meet you [in your home town].

I ended up in LED sign buisness. This is a multi-billion dollar industry. At first, I thought this was a major step down: what similarities can there possibly be with a LED sign and a CAD system? Well there is overlap, but at a really low level. First of all, a LED sign is a piece of paper at a certain matrix size. You can still draw on it, insert images, drag them around, but you are confined to the paper size much like the old AutoCAD system was. There is no zoom or pan. Basic drawing tools still apply, line, circle, ellipse. Of course you need undo-redo. One thing that is really important in LED signs is video and animation. To do this efficiently is a job in itself with low cost single core ATOM processors.
     - Chris Hannukainen

 

Ralph, thanks for all the great work. Even if some of the topics are not in my industry or area of interest, it is nice to know what is going on out there.
      - Jim Balding
        www.theantgroup.com

 

Thanks for all the valuable editions I received, and wish you best of luck.
      - Nasrullah Khan

 

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Notable Quotable

"At this point in time, we can build a tower that is one kilometer, maybe two kilometers. Any higher than that and we will have to do a lot of homework."
      - Sang Dae Kim, director, Council of Tall Buildings
        http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/saudiarabia/10775194/Saudi-Arabia-to-begin-building-worlds-tallest-skyscraper.html