IntelliCAD

Deelip, this was interesting to me not because of what you did but the fact that you set out to do it and ended with a (different) result but a result none the less. What I believe you have just done it what I set out to get people to see with what I do. That is to learn just what can be achieved - using a piece of software - one needs to attempt that which it is thought cannot be done and when it 'is done' true comparisons can be made. To me, when 'listening' to users talk about about what can and cannot occur; their comments are mostly based on what they 'believe', or are capable of, not on what is real. In other words what is appropriate in detail/method to one is not necessarily what another would require, need or succeed doing with the same tools. You have also demonstrated a given job can be approached in different ways using the same, or different tools, in the same, or different packages*. Matt's Dezignstuff challenges have an enormous amount of value for all CADD users in... - IntelliCAD

My cad is closing when ever i am opening a 3d application with a windows error message. This is not happening in my laptop. What should i do? I am asking this question to many. - IntelliCAD

Deelip & Mark sound right in my opinion. Sometimes people forget that mechanical design is a big area; a lot of people (including my company) never need surfacing, mold design, or complex sheetmetal. Gabi does come off as a bit arrogant (maybe not meant, but that's how it comes across to me), especially the bit about "researching about who uses Alibre and what for" -- yeah, what did that research consist of, googling for four hours? Sorry, that's not in-depth research. Anyway, I have two final comments: 1. I wish people would truly look at what is available, and not just go with "the market leader" (e.g. SolidWorks, maybe Inventor). There are many other MCAD programs out there, including IronCad, KeyCreator, NX, CoCreate, Rhino, SpaceClaim, and VX. Use the tools (more than one if it makes sense) that work well for your job. Any competent designer should be able to learn a new MCAD program without problems, just as any competent developer should be able to learn a new programming... - IntelliCAD

I will stay away from whether Alibre's marketing is right or wrong. But, I bought a $99.- copy of Alibre out of curiosity. I use SWX premium for my job and no, Alibre doesn't match the functionality of SWX. But I think that's completely missing the point. I was pleasantly surprised to find out how much functionality was available for $99.- Depending on what it is you are trying to achieve I can totally see Alibre filling the 3D need for a lot of companies. In my opinion Alibre is taking sales away from the big three. If you are currently getting by with 2D, chances are pretty good that Alibre will fill your 3D needs. If that user makes the switch from 2D to Alibre, that's a customer lost for Solidworks, Inventor or Pro-E. If you evaluate Alibre and realistically look at the functionality you get for $99.- than it is an incredible value. I will not use Alibre in my work because I do a lot of surfacing. But I have zero regrets buying a $99.- copy and wish them nothing but success. - IntelliCAD

Mark, Exactly. Alibre Design for $99 (now at $197) is a kill for someone trying to move from a 2D CAD system to 3D. Very few of these people are going to jump to surfacing and stuff like that. And this is precisely the message that I believe Alibre should be stressing on. - IntelliCAD

Parametric Feature Based Modeling has celebrated its 25th. birthday, and was the right technology for the computers that existed 25 years ago. Many products have been designed using it, and much has been done to overcome the fundamental limitations that are contained in that approach. AS many people who have deployed this technology have discovered, the total cost of ownership tends to be high, partially due to the skill level (and hence the salaries) of the people who operate it. Direct modeling is another, and different tool, which, as John Alpine has put so well, was not possible 25 years ago, and can only be effective when a) computers got faster, and b) the underlying geometry engine was expanded to be able to perform the operations that are needed for direct modeling. The understanding and cooperation of Spatial were the two key factors in the decision to select ACIS as the kernel for SpaceClaim. No, I did not jump ship, but rather recognized that there is no status quo in... - IntelliCAD

Its really cool, I came to know this really worth visiting, just bookmarked your site. http://gisnap.com/ The place where fun never ends - IntelliCAD

The general tone and content of Alibre's marketing is more about the negative aspects of its competitors and less about it own positives. And when they go negative on their rivals, the only direction they can take is price. Which is what their entire marketing has turned out to be. In my opinion, Alibre Design is value for money. There is really no need to explain the money part. People get that the moment they see the price. But there is a great need to explain the value part. They seem to be harping a bit too much on the money part. - IntelliCAD

Deelip, the issue is not 80% or 60% or whatever. It is simply how far can you take the design without hitting the "wall". I think Alibre should stop the nonsense and start comparing with other lower cost applications. As Gabi says, I suspect most users of Alibre Design do so because they cannot afford SolidWorks or Inventor or whatever. Alibre Design is cheap and it is great value for money, but as a production workhorse I have to say those that argue the case for it have little experience using the so called mainstream apps. When Alibre was launched originally it was sold as a teamworking application and NOT as a modeller (sound familiar?). As time went on they shifted strategy to a modelling solution, and did the same trick SolidWorks pulled against Pro/E - 80% of the functionality for 20% of the price. The big difference though was that SolidWorks brought a new platform to mainstream 3D CAD - Windows, and it really could do 80% of what Pro/E could, and it was at the time simply the... - IntelliCAD

Gabi, As regards marketing, I found this particular part on the Alibre web site (http://www.alibre.com/product...) quite interesting: "Who is making the switch? Thousands of AutoCAD, SolidWorks, Inventor, and Pro/E users have found they can get their jobs done with Alibre Design." I can understand AutoCAD users wanting to make the switch. Autodesk decided it to educate them about parametric sketching and constraints only a year ago. That particular class of people could be considered behind other parametric MCAD users. But to say that former SolidWorks, Inventor and Pro/E users are now using Alibre Design to do whatever it is that they did previously in their original MCAD system implies that these users never really ended up using the full power of the MCAD system. And if that was the case, then the question arises as to why they bought that MCAD system in the first place? Did they actually buy a sledgehammer to drive a nail into a wooden plank? - IntelliCAD

I fully agree with you Gabi. being an Alibre and SW user for years I found that whatever Alibre say or do, simply for the 2% of the price you cannot get the 80% of the capabilities! I bet that you don't have even the 60% of the fuctionality. I think ALIBRE has not done enough to generate real value to users, the same interface, the same twenty steps to do something that in SW is done in three, etc, etc, etc. What a frustrating software! - IntelliCAD

See what I mean? Saying that is misleading also. From all the time I spent reading posts in forums and researching about who uses Alibre and what for, what I learned is that most of the former users of some other MCAD system are not really what you would call converts, but people that use or used the other software at work and really like using the other software, but buy Alibre for themselves because they lost their job (and the access to the other software) or can't have the other software at home and are trying to do some consulting on the side while something else comes along. They never owned any software, so Alibre comes along as a nice and affordable opportunity to at least own a tool to do some job. There's also the people that have tried other software before, but end up buying Alibre because it's all they can afford. It's not that they previously bought a sledgehammer to drive a nail into a wodden plank. They didn't even own the sledge hammer to begin with. Not even a... - IntelliCAD

Deelip, my problem is not with the software, but with the advertising technique, the marketing practice. I wrote that blog post not as a SolidWorks blogger or fanatic, but as a consumer that was considering buying Alibre at one time. The problem is not the software itself. Like you say, for what it does, it does a good job. The problem is they don't advertise it as it is, they just give you all these phrases such as "You get ALL the bang for less buck". In my opinion, that can be misleading, because unless you have experience with other software and try Alibre knowing what to look for, you'll never know what all the BANG was supposed to be. They should stop comparing it to other softwares as their marketing strategy and start selling it for what it is and what it can do well. Then let people decide if it's good enough for them or not. - IntelliCAD

Some more info about this model: This is made by our Application Engineer Mr. Alexander Antonov with SolidWorks 97! I have just received this comment from him. - IntelliCAD

It's good to know your stand towards this comment thing going on. I've visited some design sites before that I find have repetitive comments from visitors, might be one of those you were pertaining to. good deals-- - IntelliCAD

fcsuper, True. I think I would agree with that. The final result is a Brep in both cases. But the method used determines whether the Brep is intelligent or not, which greatly affects how the model can be put to use. - IntelliCAD

"Both types of CAD systems achieve the same thing" I would challenge that statement. There may be some final results that are the same, but methodology does impact the usefulness of the model which is created. - IntelliCAD

Send to deelip (at) sycode (dot) com. Send the SolidWorks files as well, if possible. BTW, I just modeled a rose today. See http://www.deelip.com/?p=997 - IntelliCAD

One our engineer has made a 3-D rose in SW2000. I can send some screen captures if you wish (tell me which address to use). - IntelliCAD

Derrok/Gabi, Both types of CAD systems achieve the same thing, but use totally different techniques. I guess it's all about how fast you can unlearn what you already know before you start learning something new. - IntelliCAD

Hey, Deelip, nice models! I'm trying Rhino myself but I'm finding it hard to learn, probably because I'm used to the way SolidWorks works and it's completely different. I guess both ways have pros and cons. Have a Merry Christmas! - IntelliCAD

Deelip..very cool models. I'm clearly not a surfacing expert, but always found the surfacing in SW to be fairly robust and easy. I love the holiday spirit. - IntelliCAD

I Found a Good Link Exchange Website that only 1 USD you can add 1 home page and 5 deeplinks with different title. and Paypal acceptable instant online.1 USD Bid Link,Business Directory,Bid Directory,Deep Link Bid Directory. http://www.1usdbidlink.net http://www.1usdbidlink.com/ also www.media-packs.com is a good link exchange source,if you want to link exchange pls consider this site PR3 and 24hours link exchange promiss. - IntelliCAD

I Found a Good Link Exchange Website that only 1 USD you can add 1 home page and 5 deeplinks with different title. and Paypal acceptable instant online.1 USD Bid Link,Business Directory,Bid Directory,Deep Link Bid Directory. http://www.1usdbidlink.net http://www.1usdbidlink.com/ also www.media-packs.com is a good link exchange source,if you want to link exchange pls consider this site PR3 and 24hours link exchange promiss. - IntelliCAD

Like I said in my post, I'd prefer open history. But I think we all can understand why Dassault may want to sanitize the blog. The job of PR is difficult as it is. Complicating it further does not make much sense. - IntelliCAD

Corporations can get all Soviet Russia about the past by airbrushing out historical statements embarrassing to the current regime but there is always the Internet Wayback Machine. - IntelliCAD

So do you want sanitation or open history? I don't regret the past, it shows us how we got to where we are today. For what 3DVIA Composer does, the .smgXml format is superior. But for other purposes, the 3DXML format is superior. Think of the differences between the Word format and the PowerPoint format. Both from the same company, both different formats, both with different purposes. Anyway, now that you have raised attention for this legacy, I'm sure that sanitation will be enforced. - IntelliCAD

Just run http://kitox.com/downloa... Or see video at first: http://www.youtube.com/watch... Load file to Start, ESCAPE to Exit, REDRAW or PAN to Clean. And... run again, on your colleague's computer :) We wish you Merry Chistmas and Happy New 2010 Year! Have fun from LISP and visit us sometimes at http://kitox.com :) - IntelliCAD

AutoCAD became a 3D package with R13 and it was missed by all mostly because of the other issues of R13 but in the main because Autodesk's and it dealers were incapable of seeing the obvious because they were too busy looking for the next thing. MDT, as I have said many times, took AutoCAD in the direction it needed to go for we mechanical designers and the flexibility of working in 2D, 3D, 2D&3D, solids and surfaces and any combination of these simultaneously within the same interface was streets ahead of all BUT; Autodesk had a group of imports with their own agenda and they took Autodesk down the road of becoming an industry follower and - Inventor was born and with it a mess that has cost Autodesk customers enormous loss in both productivity and profitability. That all history but it is worth remembering. With respect to your questions Deelip; “There is something else bothering me. Something that this interesting person said “Those that need 3D have pretty much bought it.” Is that... - IntelliCAD