Each year, the staff of Bricsys search out an architecturally spectacular space in which to hold the annual user conference. This year, it was a conference hall connected to the shopping mall connected to the Louvre museum in Paris. Security at the world's most-visited museum was noticeable, with my backpack being checked three times.
 Roughly 350 attendees in the Carrousel du Louvre conference hall- - -
NEW. With BricsCAD Shape, Bricsys is hopes to displace SketchUp. Shape is a new, solids-based, free, 3D sketching software. Actually, we all are hoping something, anything replaces SketchUp.
SketchUp, now owned by surveying giant Trimble, is terribly popular among those doing early design work. Someone using SketchUp, however, cares more about ease-of-use than its format. But those who have to bring SKP files with its unstitched 3D surfaces into another CAD system, don't like it. BricsCAD Sketch solves this problem.
 BricsCAD Sketch showing 3D manipulator (in yellow) placing components
Shape is a stripped down version of BricsCAD V18, with drag and drop blocks from component libraries, onto which colors and patterns can be applied -- including glass. The modeling and editing of 3D solids is done with BricsCAD's direct editing functions, the unique Quad cursor, and the new 3D manipulator. It's due to ship in January.
- - -
NEW. To get into viewing buildings and sites with point clouds, Bricsys CEOErik de Keyser is in talks to buy a VR [virtual reality] company. I was unable to nail down the name.
Point clouds come from x,y,z data files generated by 3D laser scanners. Point cloud viewing is not yet in BricsCAD, but Mr de Keyser has a plan: that when BricsCAD does read point cloud files, it turns the dots into intelligently connected 3D solids.
 Demo jock getting his VR headset ready
Why buying a VR company is necessary to do this escapes me. Nevertheless, we saw at the conference a live demo of a VR-goggled demo jock viewing a massive 70GB data set (acquired from a variety of 3D sources, such as Solidworks), with an integrated point cloud, dramatically shown as a sunken cargo ship, which itself integrated several 3D solid models.
- - -
We saw new BIM capabilities, like drawing a rectangle in a wall and then replacing it with a parametric window. Or setting up a parametric array, in which the number and spacing of elements is controlled by parameters, for designing and modifying repetitive elements, such as curtain walls and stairs.
 BricsCAD BIM slicing a building
The new BIMIFY command automatically identifies and classifies objects in the model, such as buildings, stories, walls, and slabs. (From what I have heard, a Revit model cannot contain more than one building; but BricsCAD BIM can contain an unlimited number.)
The Structure Panel is a new palette that lists all elements in a model, whether architectural, mechanical, or general. We can use the palette to sort and identify elements by layer, type, order, and so on.
BricsCAD BIM is now buildingSmart-certified for both IFC imports and exports.
Blocks in V18 can now always face the viewpoint. Also, it casts true shadows (not rectangular areas), and has fast layout switching.
- - -
Bricsys last year said AI [artificial intelligence] will be one of the advantages it has over its competitors. AI is here defined as the BricsCAD software seeing what you are doing, and guessing what you might want the CAD program to do for you next.
BricsCAD employs AI to make modeling suggestions
One example we saw joined two complex solids, such as walls. After you connect one pair, the BIM Suggest function guesses that you might want to join all other walls the same way. Its suggestions can, of course, be overridden.
Another development involves importing 3D model in STEP format: AI in V18 attaches parameters nearly instantly.
- - -
NEW. Bricsys has a new Civil add-on, which is not yet released, and of which we saw little. Demo'ed was associative DTM [digital terrain modeling]: carve out a flat area and plant a building on it. Move the building, and the flat area moves along with it, with the adjacent slopes moving as necessary.
 Real-time relocation of building with its land on DTM
At the same time, BricsCAD V18 gets a Civil 3D object enabler to load, display, snap to, and save ARx/Tx-defined civil engineering entities.
- - -
Chapoo, the online collaboration system from Bricsys, is renamed 24/7.
- - -
Here are some of my notes from the keynote given by Mr de Keyser:
 Bricsys ceo Erik de Keyser keynoting the developer conference
- At this point there is no reason to replicate the desktop experience on the cloud.
- DWG has a future for next 50 years, with backing of the ODA's Teigha API.
- Autodesk's actions have become irrelevant. Or as Randall Newton of Consilia Vektor put it, DWG is now in a post-proprietary world, as organizations such as ODA and ITC, and companies like Bricsys push DWG in directions Autodesk no longer can control, even if it radically modifies the DWG format or replaces it entirely. (See https://www.consiliavektor.com/2017/10/21/dwg-is-post-proprietary .)
- After more than 15 years of development and marketing [dated from the launch of Revit], BIM has only 19% penetration in AEC, perhaps due to more being spent on marketing than on development, he said.
- Bricsys is adding history to drawings [as developed by the ODA] to keep all versions in a single DWG file, while keeping size increase tiny. AutoCAD does not do this.
- - -
To show off the speed of BricsCAD V18, we saw a 20-gigagpixel image opened in the program, and then zoomed in and out fluidly, with transparency changing in an instant. We saw a similar feat with a mile-long model of a processing plant: zooming in and out of the 3D piping model was pretty fast (brief halts between each zoom step); the new walk-through function was had a similar speed.
 Walking through a mile-long processing plant
Collision detection and drawing comparisons of 200,000 comparisons was done live in just eight seconds, versus eight minutes in AutoCAD 2017; a billion comparisons were completed -- again, live -- in four minutes (vs. an estimated 24 days for AutoCAD).
This increase in speed is accomplished through a new way to cache drawing entities, and is a brilliant way for Bricsys to illustrate its contention that Autodesk's just isn't keeping up development of AutoCAD they way it used to do.
- - -
Not everything new in V18 is new to AutoCAD users, and so BricsCAD V18 catches up on these features:
- DWG 2018 read and write
- Clean screen
- Layer previews
- Dimension style compare
- Civil 3D object enabler
- Grip-edit clipping boundaries
- 3D mouse support
As a reminder, BricsCAD runs full-featured on Linux, MacOS, and Windows. V18 began shipping last week and can be downloaded from https://www.bricsys.com/EmailDownload.do.
- - -
The day prior to the user conference, Bricsys held its third-party developer conference in the former Paris stock exchange building (Bourse). As I climbed the steps with my backpack towards of the Grecian-temple themed building (where money was worshiped), the Bourse-employed security guard asked, "No backpack?" and then let me through.
 Developer conference break time in the old Bourse, with the final share prices still posted on the blackboard
The item of greatest interest to third-party developers was the new BricsCAD Solution Build (BSB) for OEMs. It features a customizable installer and silent activation. New versions of BricsCAD do not affect the add-on. Windows only for now, but will be available for MacOS and Linux. For stability, customers can choose when to upgrade, and so are not forced into upgrades. For end users, the pricing is same as native BricsCAD, but developers get a 20% discount.
How interested? Third-party developers quizzed Bricsys executives for a full half-hour on the details of how BSB works in practice. In particular, they wanted to know what happens if a customer has a third-party add-on running on regular BricsCAD, then installs BSB with a third-party add-on, and then after this adds yet another third-party add-on. As BSB is not yet released, Bricsys will have time to resolve the multi-add-on scenario.
Bricsys is introducing a new level of marketing support for active third-party developers: Titanium. As always, membership in the Bricsys partner program is free, even at the Titanium level.
- - -
Intergraph (now named Hexagon PPM) chose BricsCAD precisely because Autodesk gave up on permanent licenses. To Intergraph, it made no sense for its customers to run CADworx with a permanent license on top of an AutoCAD whose license could expire after 12 months. The port to BricsCAD took close to two years, with the result that BricsCAD's API [application programming interface] is now even more thorough than before.
- - -
I want to end with the value proposition offered by Bricsys: that a single DWG can model all aspects of a project: civil, architectural, and mechanical -- something Autodesk ex-ceo Carl Bass said was too complex to accomplish. (See http://www.cadalyst.com/cad/bricsys-we’re-not-holding-back-dwg-part-1-37431.)
 Bricsys aims to put all BIM disciplines into a single model
Bricsys proved him wrong by by editing an (MCAD-designed) elevator shaft inside a BIM model. The Bricsys trick is to use simple xrefs [references to external drawings] to solve the problem: display and edit in-situ the master model, technology developed first by Autodesk. Xrefs in BricsCAD assemble BIM projects, attach MCAD parts into assemblies, and also implements multi-user editing so that multiple designers can work on a single project.
 Xrefs allowing a form of multi-user design mode- - -
There was much, much more revealed at two days of Bricsys conference, such as advancements in sheet metal design. My blog postings listed below contain more information. http://www.bricsys.com
Coming up: We cover the "State of BricsCAD MCAD" speech held at this conference in a future issue of upFront.eZine.
Related blog posts on WorldCAD Access:
[Disclosure: Bricsys paid for some of my airfare, accommodation, and meals in Paris.]
|
|
And Now the Rest of the News...
|
|
| One of the most recent posts on my WorldCAD Access blog:
- - -
CGS Plus offers a fine collection of civil engineering add-ons that work with BricsCAD and AutoCAD, primarily written to European design standards:
- Plateia for roadway design and reconstruction
- Ferroiva for railroad ROW, track design, and maintenance
- Aquaterra for waterway engineering
- Electra for overhead power line design
- Autopath for determining the turns and sweeps of vehicles
- Autosign placing traffic signs and road markings
All programs are available with a permanent license, or through monthly payments. The company says its software is installed at 8,000 firms in 33 countries. Learn more from http://www.cgs-labs.com/Software.aspx
- - -
For late-breaking CAD news, follow upFront.eZine on Twitter at @upfrontezine. |
|
"Re: GIS Day
Don't forget that the annual celebration of GIS is just around the corner, November 15. http://www.gisday.com.
- Don Beaton
USA
Re: Notes from Graebert's Annual Meeting 2017 in Berlin
In upFront.eZine #957 you translate Kongress- und Tagungszentrum to "Conference and Day Center." In my view the correct translation for Tagung is "meeting" so it should be Conference and Meeting Center. By the way, thanks for reporting on the meetings of the ODA, Graebert, and Bricsys.
- Arnold van der Weide
The Netherlands
The editor replies: I saw only the word "tag" and missed the "ungs".
- - -
I just received upfront #957 and noticed that you recently became acquainted Unicorn. Unicorn is a standalone physics-based photo-realistic renderer (PBR) for Windows; rendered images appear in almost real-time, depending on the graphics capabilities, specifically when using nVidia GPUs. It has a performance that scales uniformly when adding appropriate hardware.
Unicorn supports importing models from a large number BIM/CAD applications and works well with many of them (including, for example, Revit) affording a live-connection between the design phases, using modeling software, and the the photo-realistic rendering of the design. Upon installing the software, of the two options, I recommend choosing TRIAL since it will provide the top-most full-featured experience for 15 days. In addition, this resource should help a user to get started: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLuzXmzWDJs5DtoNdg3rSR-rRPnVcGr25L
Given a potential connection with academic institutions, if you know of anyone who might be intersted, kindly be aware that Unicorn Render Studio (i.e. the top-most professional license) is free for faculty as well as for students and of course for the institution itself.
- Diego Matho
- - -
Was it really the "2018" meeting?
- Herb Grabowski
Canada
The editor replies: It was the 2017 meeting. Thank you for noticing; I blame the mis-dating on jetlag.
- - -
Thanx for another informative eZine! One thing that grates on me every time I read about 'subscriptions' and 'penalties': It's extortion. These guys are forcing their customers, using market leverage, to pay for their R&D. This would be unheard of in the old days. Would you have believed your eZine could fire-up someone like this?
- Chris Cadman
The editor replies: Forcing customers to change their financial matters under the threat of losing the tools on which their livelihoods depends is a nasty business. Autodesk has been profit-less for nine quarters now, and competitors are upping their "we offer perpetual licenses" campaigns.
Re: Bricsys Developer Conference 2017
In the 2D world, the AutoCAD user interface is deeply entrenched amongst users, and features like dynamic blocks are certainly used in larger projects. It will be nice if the default BricsCAD user interface programmed did not infringe any copyrights, and to have a customizable interface to program dialogue boxes. The editing of blocks in external and nested reference files with familiar dialogue interface is a commonly used feature, too.
- Arthur Gan (via WorldCAD Access)
Malaysia
The editor replies: The court in the USA ruled long ago that user interfaces cannot be copy-written. Autodesk holds patents on dynamic blocks, making it difficult for workalikes to mimic the BEdit development interface. Dialog boxes in BricsCAD are customized through the DCL dialog control language, just as in AutoCAD. (I wrote the only DCL reference and tutorial on the market; see http://www.worldcadaccess.com/ebooksonline/2015/07/tadd.html.)
|
|
"All in all, getting rid of surplus complexity ain't so bad."
- Sorry, I lost the reference to this statement. |
|
|
|
Comments