SolidWorks, you're next!
That already kind of happened. A couple former SolidWorks CEOs started OnShape which is a CAD webapp. It's not as mature as SolidWorks which has been around for 20+ years of course, but it's a very capable CAD application.
The future of AutoCAD
51–60 of 81 posts
Re: The future of AutoCAD
#52AutoCAD is vast, recursive, and bloated. I really hope someone comes out with a lightweight version that does less, better.
The road to Sausalito is littered with the corpses of AutoCAD challengers. Generic CADD was pretty good. Bought and shut down. I also remember Visual CAD (which I don't think is the same Visual CAD a quick google search is turning up). I forget who bought them. There's a zillion others I no longer remember. Unbelievably, as bad as AutoCAD is/was, Bentley Systems' MicroStation was a hellspawn of turrible. I've never r…
> I've never really understood how AutoCAD and Office maintained their dominance.
Joel Spolsky explained it: most users use only 20% of the app. But each user uses a DIFFERENT 20%. Thus you won't go nowhere until you are almost at feature parity, because everybody will have one little thing you didn't implement, but which is critical for them.
Re: The future of AutoCAD
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
The road to Sausalito is littered with the corpses of AutoCAD challengers. Generic CADD was pretty good. Bought and shut down. I also remember Visual CAD (which I don't think is the same Visual CAD a quick google search is turning up). I forget who bought them. There's a zillion others I no longer remember. Unbelievably, as bad as AutoCAD is/was, Bentley Systems' MicroStation was a hellspawn of turrible. I've never r…
"MicroStation was a hellspawn" I think you mean is a hellspawn. I think they still have a solid foothold in some sectors.
My condolences. I'm still flabberghasted that semi-automated file repair skills was SOP for users, because the Bentley brothers couldn't figure out how to reliably save files.
Re: The future of AutoCAD
#54SolidWorks, you're next!
I believe onshape is developed by ex-solidworks employees.
Re: The future of AutoCAD
#55AutoCAD is vast, recursive, and bloated. I really hope someone comes out with a lightweight version that does less, better.
The road to Sausalito is littered with the corpses of AutoCAD challengers. Generic CADD was pretty good. Bought and shut down. I also remember Visual CAD (which I don't think is the same Visual CAD a quick google search is turning up). I forget who bought them. There's a zillion others I no longer remember. Unbelievably, as bad as AutoCAD is/was, Bentley Systems' MicroStation was a hellspawn of turrible. I've never r…
> I've never really understood how AutoCAD and Office maintained their dominance
Network effects. Once you reach a certain level of dominance in the kind of market they are in, the fact that it easier to find staff that know the product and the people you exchange days with are using the product, the cost of unfamiliarity and potential data exchange errors means anything else has a very high barrier to overcome even to be considered. An incremental improvement isn't enough, you have to either be wordshatteringly better or have near infinite runway and some non-feature advantages to leverage (the latter is how Excel and Word dethroned 1-2-3 and WordPerfect, but who is going to play 1980s Microsoft to dethrone AutoCAD?)
Re: The future of AutoCAD
#56Re: The future of AutoCAD
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
The road to Sausalito is littered with the corpses of AutoCAD challengers. Generic CADD was pretty good. Bought and shut down. I also remember Visual CAD (which I don't think is the same Visual CAD a quick google search is turning up). I forget who bought them. There's a zillion others I no longer remember. Unbelievably, as bad as AutoCAD is/was, Bentley Systems' MicroStation was a hellspawn of turrible. I've never r…
"MicroStation was a hellspawn" I think you mean is a hellspawn. I think they still have a solid foothold in some sectors.
Sadly I have to work in one of the sectors. It is very common for geometric design of roadways. I think it is a result of State Departments of Transportation buying into the system and never wanting to change.
Re: The future of AutoCAD
#58AutoCAD is vast, recursive, and bloated. I really hope someone comes out with a lightweight version that does less, better.
Recursive?
Maybe a reference to AutoLISP?
Re: The future of AutoCAD
#59AutoCAD is vast, recursive, and bloated. I really hope someone comes out with a lightweight version that does less, better.
The road to Sausalito is littered with the corpses of AutoCAD challengers. Generic CADD was pretty good. Bought and shut down. I also remember Visual CAD (which I don't think is the same Visual CAD a quick google search is turning up). I forget who bought them. There's a zillion others I no longer remember. Unbelievably, as bad as AutoCAD is/was, Bentley Systems' MicroStation was a hellspawn of turrible. I've never r…
AutoCAD is nowhere near as dominant as Office is; SolidWorks, CATIA, NX, Pro/E etc all have their users too.