Creativity & SolidWorks

Creativity is arguably the most needed feature in a designer's
toolkit, and then executing is the next step.

Then the tools become important on executing a creative solution where
competing demands of materials, costs, physical requirements, &
function collide.

What are your top 3 ways SolidWorks lets you be more creative?

Bo

 

1. Thinking up non-offensive expletives whenever it crashes.
2. Thinking up workarounds to bugs.
3. Imaginative excuses to the boss for why my work is later than expected,
due to the above.

John H

 

John, that is good for the purpose intended. I might note, I can't
recall crashing SolidWorks in the last few months, but whatever suits
your style.

For me, the 3 most important SolidWorks benefits (not that they are
exclusive to SolidWorks, but that is the only 3D CAD I use right now):

1. Sections almost anywhere (it IS a pain when I try to do a section
and it fails, though that is rare)

2. Configurations allowing a wide array of design options to be
checked inside one file during development

3. Visual Checking of Assembly clearances and interferences and gut-
feel checking of proportions (& use of Measure).

Those 3 points allow fast development of concepts.

Bo

 

Solidworks is more of an impediment to creativity. At best, it
stimulates creativity by forcing one to work around its limitations.
Sort of like writing haiku.

I certainly never think about how wonderful Solidworks is when I'm using
it, I usually think either: "Why the f__k doesn't it work the way it's
supposed to!" or "I sure wish I could do THAT with Solidworks!."

 

So which CAD package do you use?

If it is SolidWorks, then why?

Thanks - Bo

On Jan 29, 8:23 pm, John P Kimmel

 

When I joined my present employer I was looking forward to the prospect of
using SWX and in many ways it is a great system, with many nice things about
the interface and many powerful functions......but....and it's a huge
BUT....

It is not reliable. Of the 4 CAD systems I've used extensively it's
definitely the least reliable, and I think it's probably fair to say it's
the least reliable piece of any type ofsoftware I've used. The only one I
can recall coming a close second was an early version of Internet Explorer.

It's unreliability falls into 2 areas:-

1. Crashes and freezes.
At least once per day. I've taken it up with my VAR and had no answer.
It's running on certified Dell hardware with the correct drivers. I'm not
the only one here to suffer these problems.

2. Bugs that change the end result of the data.
I'm sick and tired of seeing drawings needing an update when I know the
parts/assys haven't changed. Sometimes the BOM gains a few extra lines,
including items that have been excluded from the BOM. Later it will
miraculously cure itself, only to recur again yet later still.

Sections on drawings flip of their own accord.

Cropped views become uncropped or "inverse cropped". If you go to edit the
crop rectangle it all snaps back again.

You frequently see people complaining about mates failing and needing
suppressing/unsuppressing to get them working again.

3. Bugs that are just a PITA.
All systems have these, but SWX has as many or more than most.

It's a shame because there is so much that is good, but I'd sacrifice some
functionality and even ease-of-learning (as distinct from ease-of-use) for
reliability.

John H

 

John, then the magic question becomes...drum roll...of all the 3D CAD
packages you have use, which do you consider the best &/or most
stable?

Many Thanks - Bo

 

John,

1. I sympathize with you on the crashes & freezes. Though I have
managed to minimize those, I do wonder if a good part of this is
Windows XP? The reason I say this, is for me, if I run ONLY
SolidWorks and nothing else I rarely get a crash. That is just a
subjective comment.

2. I too see things mess up in mates. Since this seems to be
reported by a lot of users here, I wonder what your VAR says, and
whether repeatable items have been turned in to SolidWorks.

Mates are so critical to proper functioning of 3D CAD, I really can't
see how SolidWorks could avoid fixing those in a hurry. The same
thing can be said of drawings, which is even worse, because it can
screw up production.

Bo

 

Your sentence below is an astute observation, and I missed the
subtlety in my original post.

My position should have been better stated as to how a person's
creativity is best put to use with SolidWorks, or similar form of
statement.

I too, don't like bugs. I've been sick of beta testing after only a
single release back in the 90s. All they do is eat up a user's life
with no real benefit I ever saw.

But I see a real benefit in 3D CAD & particularly SolidWorks, to allow
me to get a creative solution "into the solid" quickly and easily (for
my work) so I can refine it like I never could in 2D.

Bo

 

I-DEAS.
Sadly it's development has been severely curtailed since UG took over - it's
at version 12 now, but the last big release was version 9 in 2001 (I think).

The 2 big things it lacked for my type of work were part configs and
cosmetic threads, and these are things which I love SWX for.
NX has these, and so they wouldn't add them to I-DEAS once UG took over and
decided to merge them.

I-DEAS has many great & unique features, as well as lacking many great
features, but I always felt I could rely on the data being consistent and
secure, and in my opinion that's got to be the #1 requirement of a CAD
system.

John H

 

All of these comments just makes me wonder which companies are going
to be the "Survivors"?

I-DEAS looks like it will die a slow death while UG migrates the
users.

CATIA will likely keep a hold on high-end work & PRO-E will stick
around for a long time.

I hope SolidWorks gets seriously in gear on bug fixes. Even if that
means a move back to UNIX, then the sooner the better. I plan on
avoiding VISTA for ever if possible. I have committed myself to stay
with SWks 2006 for a long long time.

I'm just one person, but I am switching more of my ways to tools that
do the right job the right way with minimum fuss and complexity for
me. Right now I can run Mac OSX, Windows & Unix native on my Macs,
and that is a big plus in freedom, with Apple doing the tight
integration to minimize "glitches".

If SolidWorks doesn't switch, I may eventually be forced to start
migrating to something that does run on UNIX. Microsoft OS's are not
efficient for 3D CAD given all the issues to contend with. One only
has to read this forum, for everything from Drivers to 3GB switch, to
Video CARDS, to network performance, to badware of all types that muck
the OS.

Tools should just work. As much as I love SolidWorks, it is going to
have to earn the next dollars I send to their VAR, and as of yet I
don't see that happening now.

Bo

 

Back to Unix (esp. Linux) would be a huge improvement. I use Linux
for everything but CAD, and it's annoying to have to boot up Windows
in VMware for CAD. The EDA vendors seem to have this figured out;
hopefully the mechanical CAD vendors will too.

Same here.

Right now I'm using student edition for school, but when I get to the
point of buying my own commercial license, if there isn't a SolidWorks
for Linux, I'll go with Pro/E.

Malware alone is a sufficient reason to avoid Windows, but I agree
with your other reasons as well.

Eric

 

Didn't PTC recently discontinue support for ProE on Linux?

 

That is the plan. At least UG are offering an excellent migration plan, with
no loss of data or associativity. From what I've seen of NX I really like
the look of it, and I presume it runs on unix too (like I-DEAS) - at least
older versions of UG did.

Was SWX ever on unix?
If not, I doubt they have the developers to make anything other than an even
bigger dog's dinner of it.

I think NX runs on Macs now.

John H

 

John, SolidWorks never ran on UNIX (at least at retail), but the group
that 'built' SolidWorks all came from Computervision and the UNIX
arena, so they were totally immersed in UNIX.

Unigraphics did release its Mac OSX stuff in June 2006:

http://www.architosh.com/news/2006-06/2006a0623_UGS-osx.html

Bo

 

Unigraphics released an initial version of NX for PPC G5 Macs in
mid-2006 and noted they would support the Intel Macs later, but I
haven't seen a note about any further releases from UG yet.

Bo

 

If they did, they haven't updated their web site, which says
it is available.