After a bout of trying to get a couple things working on my home desktop, I was asking myself "why the #$%^#$ can't Linux Just Work?"
I looked at what was giving me trouble (a webcam, VMWare Workstation) and realized that it was only the closed-source software that was a problem. The FOSS part of my desktop has been relatively trouble-free (or if not, easily fixed with a forum visit).
So - I'm all for pragmatism, but I have to admit that all-open-source WORKS, but only within a pure FOSS ecosystem. My system is up-to-date, rarely broken by repository updates, and problems are usually fixed on a timely basis by the community. Mixing closed- and open- is where I spend hours in fruitless troubleshooting.
I third that. The FOSS community is sorely lacking a professional-quality 3d modeller/drafting software. Blender is fantastic IMHO, but for anybody involved in design and fabrication, there's just no way you could glue on enough functionality to make it replace something like Rhino. I'm surprised we aren't even close to a solution for this - with Blender, Inkscape, GIMP/Cinepaint, etc, I have almost everything else filled, but I have to go back to Autocad to get work done!
BTW, the best feature of Blender by far is its backwards-forwards compatibility: old versions of Blender can open files created in newer versions. This is behaviour that needs to be adopted by all software developers, not just FOSS!
So, I would venture the beginnings of a features list:
1. good vector output (printing and file export)
2. good 3d/2d import-export
3. solid modelling
4. NURBS modelling
5. polygon modelling
6. good fabrication functionality: unfolding/unrolling/sectioning/etc
7. scripting/plug-in framework for extensibility
8. lightweight
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After a bout of trying to get a couple things working on my home desktop, I was asking myself "why the #$%^#$ can't Linux Just Work?" I looked at what was giving me trouble (a webcam, VMWare Workstation) and realized that it was only the closed-source software that was a problem. The FOSS part of my desktop has been relatively trouble-free (or if not, easily fixed with a forum visit). So - I'm all for pragmatism, but I have to admit that all-open-source WORKS, but only within a pure FOSS ecosystem. My system is up-to-date, rarely broken by repository updates, and problems are usually fixed on a timely basis by the community. Mixing closed- and open- is where I spend hours in fruitless troubleshooting.
I third that. The FOSS community is sorely lacking a professional-quality 3d modeller/drafting software. Blender is fantastic IMHO, but for anybody involved in design and fabrication, there's just no way you could glue on enough functionality to make it replace something like Rhino. I'm surprised we aren't even close to a solution for this - with Blender, Inkscape, GIMP/Cinepaint, etc, I have almost everything else filled, but I have to go back to Autocad to get work done! BTW, the best feature of Blender by far is its backwards-forwards compatibility: old versions of Blender can open files created in newer versions. This is behaviour that needs to be adopted by all software developers, not just FOSS! So, I would venture the beginnings of a features list: 1. good vector output (printing and file export) 2. good 3d/2d import-export 3. solid modelling 4. NURBS modelling 5. polygon modelling 6. good fabrication functionality: unfolding/unrolling/sectioning/etc 7. scripting/plug-in framework for extensibility 8. lightweight