You would be surprised, but electrical and control systems engineering is still struggling into the digital age. Many very large projects are still effectively

You would be surprised, but electrical and control systems engineering is still struggling into the digital age. Many very large projects are still effectively designed the same way they were when it was ink on velum, just now it is inkjet dots on a page. Data based engineering is the way of the future, and packages exit that allow substantially less manpower and greater accuracy (and I mean real packages, not Intools), but there is so much vested interest in the EPCM type model and the traditional way of doing things. Change is coming slowly, but not because of lack of software tools and methodologies, just lack of boldness and vision by those that don't want to be accountable for a stuff-up on a multi-billion dollar job. I work for consultants that specialise in trying to do as much data based type engineering as possible, but still for about half the clients we end up translating the end results from a database into .dwg files, at significant extra cost. One client is forward thinking, we don't deliver drawings, or any paper, they get a database as the final deliverable. One specialist engineer produces the entire electrical design for a major mining hub on their own, replacing up to 20 traditional designers and drafts people. Just a brief story to highlight how change isn't always about the means, sometimes it is as much about the will.