- update to 9.10 disabled my touchpad on netbook, 2hrs to figure out installing grub2 fixed it..wt*! #
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19
Mar 10
Identi.ca Updates for 2010-03-19
17
Mar 10
Developing software to a “cadence”
Most software companies tend to “surprise” us with their new release. Feels like a surprise, to us the user. In fact, I suspect its just as much a surprise to the development/release team as well. Up until about two years ago, we followed this same paradigm. We developed and released roughly annually and came out with just about 3-4, maybe 5 updates along the way. At the time, it seemed like it was working really well. We then took a step back and thought, what if we actually committed to a schedule?
The plan was an annual releases with quarterly updates. And get this, we planned to post the release dates to our user community. Seemed totally logical to me, the product manager. But, needless to say, there was quite an uncomfortable vibe in development and QA. Rightfully so, our product is immensely complex and we are tweaking and adding buckets of new functionality all the time. The pace takes a bit of getting used to. At the same time, we adopted a completely new development environment. Change is always good:)
Interestingly enough, the good people that develop ubuntu follow the same philosophy– they call it a “cadence”. Check out Mark Shuttleworth speaking about it below.
I am proud to announce that we are coming up on releasing our sixth release perfectly on time. The quality and predictability of our software has never been better. It allows us to respond to enhancement requests, fix bugs add new functionality and plan in a very efficient manner. The stress of delivering everyday is immense, but I feel that it’s what holds us all accountable. Not only accountable to the product, but accountable to the community.
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Now playing: Phish – Piper
via FoxyTunes
16
Mar 10
PHISH SUMMER TOUR 2010
Let the Summer fun begin. Not thrilled with the actual dates on this one, but will be a downloading fool.
It would be nice if these guys would check with me first. I am sure my family won’t mind if JC and I sneak away for a night 
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Now playing: Phish – Tube
via FoxyTunes
11
Mar 10
There is so much more to “the cloud” than people get!?!
I’ve been on a bit of a rant and tear on forums, blogs and twitter lately defending the big bad “cloud”. Seems that SolidWorks put everyone in a tizzy when they did a “technology preview” showing some of their futuristic works in progress. Joe Dunne, if you are listening- I thought it was killer! Really innovative, really helpful and really pushing the limits. What did you promise me? Nothing! You simply showed some things that are being worked on and what could be possible. You certainly implied that some of it could show up in a web browser near me real soon. Guess what, I can’t wait.
Some really interesting blog posts over at deelip.com with various CAD heavyweights chiming in on the cloud, the greediness of the whole thing and how people will ultimately make irrational choices to change vendors if pushed to the cloud. Are you kidding me? You don’t even know what the concept is because its not real. It’s conceptual at best right now. I’m the first to acknowledge that if they lock you out of your data, can’t provide a secure environment and try to gauge you out of your IP- than by all means, abandon ship!
I get the fact that mechanical engineers are conservative, don’t embrace change and tend to be slow to adopt new technology. Honestly, its to our downfall to do so. Embrace change and new ideas- it’s healthy! You have every right to be a skeptic and insist the ideas need to be proven to you. But, don’t be an old blowhard about it.
I realize I am unique in countless ways. But, I am using the “cloud/web/whatever” everyday to work really, really efficiently. I think many people don’t like to merge work and pleasure. But, ask yourself- ever bank online? Ever order something from amazon? Do you have a gmail or yahoo email account? Dare ask yourself have you ever used facebook, flickr, linkedin, twitter? If so, delete them all because, guess what they are all in the cloud. Not the same thing you might be saying?
How about this. How do you communicate with colleagues in other locations? Webex? Skype? Ever use Jing or screencast.com to share ideas and concepts with others? How do you do virtual design reviews? Ever use Google docs? If not, why? Because Word is “more secure”?? Cheaper?
So let’s turn it back to MCAD/CAE. I wouldn’t jump right into sketching and modeling via the web as an only option. Might be nice to have that choice- but surely, I don’t want to be forced into it. Some possible uses of the cloud..
- Suppose edrawings (or something similar) existed in a web browser and better yet, it allowed you to upload and shoot an email or text to someone and they simply entered a password and were spinning your model in real-time. Take it one step further, suppose you could collaborate on the model together, in real time?
- How about PDM? Seems logical that people would want to have the option to having the MCAD vendors hosting the vault etc.. It could reduce the IT overhead drastically for one thing. But that exists today, so what else would you want it to do?
- Ever have to deal with tech support and have a need to upload your files or show a screen shot or record a video? Wouldn’t it be great to avoid the hassle and work in a secure web environment that you could grant access to your info without having to deal with firewalls, vpn etc?
- How about simulation? Feeling good about having FEA/CFD etc loaded on your desktop? Be nice to have unlimited computing power and access to modules that you only need this month.
Ok, I know that I either got you thinking or pissed you off. I completely realize that people aren’t going to embrace this with open arms. But, what I suggest is to think – “how could I leverage the web more?” The more you speak up, the more you help design and guide what the vendors will try and sell you.
09
Mar 10
How does SaaS benefit “us” — the user?
Are you sick of hearing about the “cloud” and how its the future? Lots and lots of skepticism with a sprinkle of panic, it seems, about running software as a service. People seem to be worried about some valid points, such as, security, cost, “who owns the data” and a variety of other “things”. Seems to me, that many of the concerns absolutely have to be addressed and are being addressed but why are people still skeptical? Change! The engineering circle is always slow to change. Things must be laid out in a crystal clear fashion or at least have the data to backup the claims.
What’s the benefit to us as a user?
- Pay as you go/pay for what you need model. Allows for flexibility on making a capital investment for a piece of technology that is yet to be proven valuable and that is used only some of the time.
- Near instant fixes to “problems”. No need to update software or download anymore, its just there and it works.
- Access to software from anywhere, from any device on any platform. Freedom to choose what you want, not being dictated what to use by others.
I could go on forever, but even the short list above seems valuable. But the interesting concept is the name “Software as a Service (SaaS)”. I have been thinking about this one lately, what is the “service”? Access to the software? The fact that the software is more accessible, is that really a service?
What if vendors truly provided a “service” along with the software? Instant chatting, file sharing, file storage, project work, implementation, training, additional computing power, real engineering help all via the web? Now things could get interesting. Imagine having the “platinum” package and you have access to a support infrastructure “on-demand”.
Suppose you are in the midst of an engineering project and you want to create a really slick rendering for a proposal, but you never quite got the rendering stuff or better yet, you don’t have access to it with your license. You could log into “the site”, your model is already there and chat with the “service” team and you guys spec it out really quickly what I want. The turn around time could be anywhere from minutes, to hours to over night. Why? The web enables and promotes efficiency. The vendors will have to think this through well enough to be able to support it, but their “services” company can easily be around the clock, around the world. The models are already “up there”. Now its just getting the specifics. Especially if you have a “services” contract built into the cost of the well, service?
Think of how this scales out to automation of processes, SIMULATION, design help, the list is endless. I’d be interested to hear people talk about the service side of it and worry less about the software. At the end of the day, do we want to engineer or do we want to drive software?
16
Feb 10
Engineers should not fear “the cloud”
I’m going to go on record to state that I’m a huge fan of “the cloud”. They are two words that seem to really send people into a bit of rage lately. People want a definition, they want clarity What is the cloud? Call it what you want, I don’t care, I know what you mean and I want it. I want it now.
I think my friend, “the cloud”, has gotten a bad rap. It definitely took a ribbing at SolidWorks World 2010, where engineers were trying to make a drinking game out of it all. My sense is that its easy to make fun of something that you either don’t quite understand or that you don’t exactly see the value. I suspect its the latter in most cases.
If you have read anything on The Virtual Engineer, you will know that I am a huge fan boy of the good ole “cloud”. What is my definition of the cloud? In very simple terms it is web-enabled, web-based, web-hosted, web-stored, web-collaborated computing. Common theme here, “the web”. We all use it, many of us depend on it and some of are are even slightly addicted to it.
upfront cfd external flow simulaiton
So, why does using the word cloud cause anxiety? I’ve been thinking about this for quite some time, because I clearly don’t get it. Am I the minority? Not sure. But, it dawned on me the other day that I have felt the pain of “the old way”. If you haven’t, I’m not sure you will appreciate the value. The old way is a collage of bloated hard drives, sorry-ass USB external drives, various copies of files, handfuls of thumb drives full of stuff. I’m tired of being a VPNing, remote desktoping, begging for more horse power, tired of ftp-ing slave to status quo. I want a new way. I want to have access to my files, wherever, from whatever- laptop, netbook, iphone. If I want to share my files, I want to be able to send a link to someone with highly encrypted password protected safety. I want to be able to, at a minimum, preview my files in a browser. How can I be the minority? Doesn’t everyone want this?
But, the above is just the tip of it. I’m a simulation driven, upfront CAE doing, design guy. I am drinking a Big Gulp size of the the Kool-Aid. But, you want to talk about pain. I’m not sure there is a better reason today for engineers to openly embrace the cloud than in the simulation community. But not just the simulation community, the “upfront cfd” simulation community. Why?
- Design engineers tend to want to try numerous what-if scenarios, resulting in numerous back to back runs that ideally could run around the clock
- CFD models are getting bigger and bigger and are requiring more and more power
- Every design engineering department on the planet is trying to reduce cost of hardware, minimize capital investment- so paying for what you need, when you need it is a no-brainer
- More and more engineers find that they are on the go, out of the office and need access to their data, models, computing power from anywhere
I think we are on the cusp of a major break through in the way we engineer. There are a ton of things that need to be figured out. Security, licensing, bandwidth, hardware etc are simply just the basics that need to be worked out. Exciting to see some of the most talented people in the world working on it.
15
Feb 10
Upfront CAE should help drive design decisions
If you are leveraging upfront CAE (fea, cfd & the like) than kudos to you. You are most likely a step ahead of your competitors. I’d love to hear your candid experiences, both good and bad. There was a big push for upfront CAE about 10 years ago. CosmosWorks, Design Space and others really gave some street credit to upfront structural and some thermal simulation. Hats off to them. They did a great job waking up the engineering community and making “upfront” a reality in the minds of engineers.
Unfortunately, they took the “top down” approach. They were both respectively veterans in the CAE space that had “analyst” tools that were successful in their own right, and now they were changing their tune and exposing their technology to the design community. They found themselves in a very difficult place. They were taking what they knew and tried putting it in different terms. So, the end result was making FEA “easy to use” and making structural analysis “possible for design engineers”. But, I bet if you poll engineers and ask them how many are looking for an “easy to use FEA tool” or an FEA tool created for “design engineers”. I suspect, you will get a mixed bag. Let’s face it, most engineers are not looking for an FEA tool or a CFD tool, for that matter.
Engineers and their managers are looking for a tool that allows them to make better design decisions, reduce the number or physical prototypes, provide information whether a design passed or failed based on some failure criteria. Right? Most engineers could care less that its FEA or CFD. They expect and in many cases, demand that its easy to use. They also should not have to deal with status quo. They need tools that help them make decisions.
Where am I going with this? Don’t be fooled when looking to improve your design process. Don’t just get in line and assume that the “traditional analysis” companies or even worse, the MCAD companies, really understand how to help you make better design decisions. Each one of them is focused 100% in what they do. And what they don’t do is upfront CAE.
Traditional FEA/CFD companies are focused on working with analysts. MCAD companies are focused on 3D design. Each has a “solution” for you or so they claim. But, the reality is they are not focused on what you need.
There are very few companies that know and own the “upfront” FEA and CFD markets. Go out there, bang on google, cream rises to the top.
Don’t take my word for it. See for yourself. But, don’t believe the hype. Make sure you are making the right decision.
13
Feb 10
Week of snow ended with a Trey show at Electric Factory
Spent the last week or so somewhat couped up in the house with the family thanks to the 45″+ of snow we received over a few days here in Philadelphia. I’m all for a little snow or even alot of snow. But, I’m done shoveling digging cars out, pushing snow off the roof etc..
I had tickets for two TAB shows. One at the Jefferson Theater in Charlottesville and one for the Electric Factory in Philadelphia. Needless to say, my cville trip was cancelled dude to lack of train service, so I ate that ticket. But, thankfully not trying to venture south, allowed me to hang with my brother and catch the show at the Electric Factory.
Trey at the Electric Factory in Philly
We both had to fight our way downtown and hooked up some pre-gaming at the North 3rd Bar in Northern Liberties. Classic bar with fantastic food and beers. Can’t say enough great things about this place.
Cruised up to the Electric Factory and got ready for a 3.5 hr jamming show. Highlights for me were Sand, Let Me Lie and an uber energetic First Tube as the final song in the encore.
Sound quality is rough, but I think you get the sense that the energy is high. The band was having a great time. Really solid way to end a blizzard of a week. Continue reading →
01
Feb 10
The forecast for SolidWorks is Cloudy with a ton of awesomeness
Gotta admit, this morning’s presentation by Joe Dunne and company on some of the future of SolidWorks development was well worth my trip in itself. All kinds of chatter going on via twitter prior to them taking the stage. There was a big “white” monitor that had a black drape falling off of it as well as a small netbook up on the main stage. Many were anticipating buzz on support for the MAC. But, what we got was way more than that. We are talking full web based, new way of thinking about MCAD, OS agnostic goodness. Pictures say a million words, let’s take a look.
- Joe Dunne on main stage with a netbook
- Full OS agnostic MCAD (see my buddy on the end?)
- The future of MCAD – search/access/reuse
- DS is helping drive the cloud with V6????
- Sketch objects, search, reuse- really awesome!
- multi-touch for engineers
There is so much I can say about what they were showing. Just so spot on with vision and understanding of the problem with really slick innovative solutions. The timeframe is unknown right now, although they promise something with Enovia in 2010. I can speculate what that is, but let’s hang tight and see what they come up with.
Pictures don’t really do it justice. The most exciting part of it all is that this is just the beginning. Things will change in the near future. The biggest change that I am anxious to see worked out is the licensing and access. Companies like salesforce.com are blazing the way based on user login. Over lunch, I heard guys worrying about security. Honestly, this is being worked out in other industries such as CRM and banking, engineering data will follow suit.
BUT, who owns the data? What happens when the cloud goes down? What happens when you are late on a payment? What happens when a storm knocks internet out? All real, relative things that need to be worked out. Glad its these guys taking the lead.
01
Feb 10
Dassault Systemes has a big presence at #sww10
General Session #1 started off with a bang this morning. Big crowd pushing to get into the theater, rock music blaring and lights blazing all over. Attendance is in excess of 5000, over the 4300 last year. Not bad. The vibe is high energy, as usual with this lot.
Jeff Ray got up and introduced Bernard Charles, CEO of Dassault Systemes. This, apparently, was the first time that Mr. Charles has attended a SWW. He gave a good insightful presentation on who Dassault Systemes are, gave a bit of history and referred to them as an investor in SolidWorks. He spoke about the six “lovemarks” in DS – specifically, SolidWorks, Catia, Simulia, Enovia, Delmia and 3dvia. Lovemarks still makes me giggle, probably sounds better in French At the end of it all, I think it went over fairly well. But, can’t help feeling like big brother was up there about to drop a bomb on something. Here is an image of the “brands”.
He then did a demo of 3dvia on an iphone. I am getting a much better idea of what 3dvia is all about. I met Cliff Medling last night and over a few Fat Tire’s he schooled me on some of the coolness that is 3dvia. Check out 3DVIA TV.
At the end of the day. I think Dassault Systemes has had a very positive effect on the SolidWorks product and organization. They may come across as this large corporation, but its clear in my next post that their input in “cloud” technologies is huge for SolidWorks.
RSS
A mechanical engineer that is obsessed with technology. I am the Product Manager for CFdesign and work in a virtual office in Philadelphia, PA USA. Outside of technology, I am an avid Liverpool FC supporter and a massive phan of the band PHISH.
