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GPL CAD to Linux
An anonymous reader pointed us to this
linux today bit
that points to
Varkon which has GPLd their
Linux CAD software. We definitely need some CAD round these
parts. Drawing wireframes in the Gimp doesn't work nearly
as well as you'd think.
There is BRL-CAD.
And they have an RPM of the code.
(This software has modules for computing laser and explosion/impact damage. Good real world stuff eh?)
Personally, I would prefer an AutoCAD Linux port (oops, I mean GNU/Linux... Sorry RMS ;) ) but I use Generic CADD quite extensively for my 2D work, and like it.
:)
Of course, a good thing never lasts, and Autodesk discontinued Generic CADD, so that's pretty much dead (anyone know where I can get/buy a copy of the last version?).
However, IMSI Software (www.imsisoft.com) produces a couple decent, fairly small footprint CAD packages, one being Visual CADD, which is very similar to Generic CADD, and was purchased from Corel awhile back. Has a lof of Generic CADD functionality, and native AutoCAD DWG file functionality.
There is talk about IMSI stopping Visual CADD development, even though they deny the product is dying. And Generic CADD is dead. I wonder if either company could be convinced to release the source for an attempted port effort?
You know, it's really too bad Corel sold off Visual CADD
But eventually, I'm going to pound on Generic CADD to see if it will run under DOSEmu. Ah, too many projects, too little time!
Oh well... Someday, I suppose I should make an account for myself...
Brad
now if autocad would just decide to support the unix platform...again after having given it up in 93 ish... a linux port would be nice and certainly wouldnt give you the BSOD..ah i can but dream
I don't think it's a bad thing, by any means. Something good may come of it. But Varkon's cad program has always been free, and *that* didn't convince anyone to use it. Their plan is to charge for support.
You'd think, if that was making them any money, they woulda stuck with their original plan. Apparantly not, so they're taking the gimmick one step further. Sortof reminds me of the kinds of grasping-at-straws Corel does these days.
I usually try to post more thoughtful :-).
:-).
commentary, but this time I cannot resist
Death to AutoCRAP!
Or maybe not. One can dream, though
ac3d works great as a 3d cad program. and it will export to may file types, including POV files. no it's not freeware but for 40 bucks any geek (even the teenybopper geek) can afford it. it really is nice and I use it for all my raytracing stuff.. (I have to because I dont have a 3 axis milling machine to make things on... but then nither does 99% of the slashdot readers.)
If you are doing serious CAD then you dont care about freeware/anyware as your job already shelled out the $5000.00 for the program.
CAD and other graphical applications are in desperate need of driver support from the 3D graphics vendors... low-end Voodoo cards won't cut it!
True when is linux gonna support the pripatory government video engine I have? It supposedly has the same power as 20 voodoocards stuck together for 10 different monitors (in essence 200 voodoo cards) I dont have any specs on it, I have no idea what kind of computer would plug into the thing. but I need that kind of graphics power!! I want a 9gagillion polygon rotation at 900frames per second!
BTW, this is sarcasim.. Get a life about we need better video drivers... good grief...
so go to www.xig.com and get a commercial x server
Thanks for catching that, it is GNU/Linux or gnulix.
You've got to be kidding, the GIMP doesn't even have a damn LINE tool! How hard could it have possibly been to include one by default? Guess I'll just have to stick to X-fig for that kind of thing...
I don't think so.
:-)
I've had a quick look at the VARKON site and it all looks a bit complicated... and the chance of my employer switching from acad and nt are less than zero... I guess I'll just have to jack the job in -- I'm getting really sick of acad and nt
I doubt whether the AIA is the proper organization to oversee such a GPL's CAD system, but the idea of an industry consortium pooling resources to create such a system is a fascinating one. The big problem with a grass-roots Open Source CAD project is that a powerful, full-featured CAD system has a lot of very difficult prerequisites. Things like a B-rep solid modeling engine that is comparable to Parasolid or ACIS are very, very difficult and demanding (in terms of mathematical knowledge, etc.) to code. It is because of this high "activation energy" for an Open Source CAD reaction to occur that all atempts to date have either failed or have been of a "toy CAD" scale. It would take a lot of long-term dedications without the benefit of much in the way of intermediate useful results for a real Open Source CAD system to happen.
MetroLink Extreme3D GLINTMX version is now in beta. Both they and XiG will be supporting all of those 'too expensive for us mere gamers' kinda 3D accelerators in the future.
I have been trying to nudge Parametric to get more info on a linux port for some time now. FlexLM supports linux, PC's are cheaper hardware, unfortunately proe still costs $20,000 a license. If you want to jump on the bandwaggon, ask your sales guy about linux.
try tgif. it has several times the feature set of xfig and the interface is much nicer, which isn't saying much since xfig is nasty. xfig also supports more output/input types.
IMHO once you get used to the xfig interface, it's not bad. It's only different... While the more common way is to choose first an object and then the action, in xfig you do it the other way around. This makes some tasks harder and other tasks easier.
*yawn*
And american tax dollars are useful how?
Releasing software that our dollars created seems like a good idea. Whining 'its not free software' is assinine. Which is better? Tax dollars creating software that isn't released in source form, or releasing the source, but restricting it to US Taxpayers?
BRL-CAD has been released the way it is now for YEARS. Longer than Linux. And they have been improving it.
When I was in college and AutoCAD 11 was the standard, we saw a demo by the Microstation people. They had it running on a Sun workstation and on a Windoze machine.
Haven't seen it since, but it was way better than the AutoCAD of the day.
Yes, Microstation is primarily Unix based. Unfortunately they limit themselves to the commercial Unixes. The only CAD program they offer for Linux is the crippleware Student Edition of Microstation. I have no idea how well or poorly it works.
----
Open mind, insert foot.
Bentley has a Linux port of the previous version of Microstation, but it is no-support, academic- only.
Seems to me for something like CAD, the best way for it to go GPL is for an organization like AIA (architects) to buy one of the smaller CAD companies. The higher-end stuff is largely of interest to professionals, open source will probably only get us a fairly low-end package.
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
I took a look at some of the screen dumps of this thing on their website and it looks pretty slick.
I'm really glad to see this happening. I really anticipate alot of lesser known vendors to begin releasing their code GPL as they find it will give them a boost in popularity and give them an opportunity to make more money off of service and support. This will also put pressure on the big boys, which is always healthy for the market.
--
-- Knowledge shared is power lost. -- Aleister Crowley
There are a couple of nice (but quite young) gnu CAD apps developing out there, but the addition of a good working CAD system under the GPL is gonna make my life a lot nicer. (and maybe even cause VariCAD to make litte less money off of me ... :-)
/dev
"There's no secret. You just press the accelerator to the floor and keep turning left." -- Bill Vukovich
You should've grabbed a copy of the last version of Generic CADD when Autodesk marked it down to a list price of $99. I had to special order it from a local software store and I think they charged me $80 for it. It works fine under DOSEmu. There was a point there during the ascendance of Windows where a lot of very good, stable DOS software was available for cheap...
Yeah, BRL-CAD looks interesting, but it is not free software.
I think you hit the spot when you say that the biggest obstacle to getting high-end CAE systems like ProE and I-DEAS is the lack of good 3D-drivers.
I have been an admin for I-DEAS on both Irix and NT for the last two years, and I have longed for the days when there will be support for CAE-systems on Linux. Heck, they were originally coded for Unix-systems, how hard can it be to port the code to Linux ? I guess this issue is closely related to the fact that CAE-systems mainly use OpenGL for displaying graphics, and that has been one of the week spots of Linux as of yet. I hope that will change since SGI has made OpenGL OSS.
--
This would be a welcome addition. I've had to admin Pro/E machines and it is very frustrating on WinNT. But I can't blame a company for buying Intel hardware because of price/performance and the ability to hand-me-down the workstations after they've been outdated. I think the biggest obstacle to acceptance of Linux for Pro/E (or other high-end CAD) is the lack of good 3D drivers.
Now I grew up with autocad, can't say I liked it, probable for about 5 years now. Mostly architectural. I knew there biggest compitition was microstation, saw a few larg firms actually switch over. now if I am not mistaken this is UNIX based. can anyone confirm or denie this ???
Personally, I would prefer an AutoCAD Linux port (oops, I mean GNU/Linux... Sorry RMS ;) ) but I use Generic CADD quite extensively for my 2D work, and like it.
/I'd/ like to see ParaCAD on Linux.
/.ing...).
AutoCAD?!? Are you mad? AutoCAD really is the Windows of the CAD world - it sucks dead goats through a straw.
FWIW, my Dad runs a one-man-and-his-dog engineering business, and the single thing that's stopping him ditching Microsoft tomorrow is the search for a decent CAD package. ATM he uses ParaCAD. Seriously, I would be interested to hear suggestions of a package that's up to the job (mechanical and electric engineering, BTW) under Linux.
(And no, I'm not going to post a URL for his business - he doesn't need
Iain.
Actually I don't think that the student edition of MicroStation is crippleware. The downsides of it are:
People from Bentley have been asking for support getting Intergraph (their marketing partner) to let them do a commercial release for Linux, but so far they haven't gotten enough solid interest to move Intergraph. Then again, Intergraph is a solidly pro-Microsoft company.
Cool, always nice to see more GPL'd software. Although if you don't like drawing vectors in Gimp there is fig.
(Meanwhile, my work progresses on an 'engine' that can form the core of CAD/GIS/CASE/etc packages. So far the display list manager is (more or less) working. Still in progress are the compiler/interpreter for the control language and the database interface. (Well, there's lots more to do beyond that, but that's the minimum I want to get done before I release anything, so that there's at least the basic framework.))
-- Alastair
I really like this. They spoke with me and RMS a couple of weeks ago about this and it's nice to see they finally took this step. I'm looking forward to seeing this in action soon, I could definitly use it.