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CAD today is like video editing 10 years ago: lots of legacy high-end pro level tools, faced with increasing consumer-friendly competition. I used to cut on Av

CAD today is like video editing 10 years ago: lots of legacy high-end pro level tools, faced with increasing consumer-friendly competition. I used to cut on Avid, for instance. They made a push into consumer tools too-little, too-late. I'm sure Autocad wants to put together an end-to-end toolchain for making things. Design, instruct, print, assemble. The HP of things.

brudgers 15y ago
There has always been consumer level competition for Autodesk products. The reasons they have not been successful are: 1. When you are designing things like bridges, little software bugs have big consequences and among the things Autodesk does well is software testing. 2. Autodesk started out with really stinking good software engineers and they have always kept up that tradition. It's no accident that they chose LISP as their first programming interface - the founders knew how to code and how to architect a piece of software. 3. They made an incredibly bold move almost twenty years ago when they rewrote the entire AutoCAD code base to be object oriented - and they took the heat then never looked back. It's what has allowed them to extend their flagship product to stay cutting edge. I'll point out that CAD is significantly more mature than video editing was 10 years ago - actually it was more mature ten years ago than video editing is today. It's a market with no real consumer space - people will make and edit many videos, they will only draw up their dream house once or maybe twice - and if they are serious about it they will be using a bootleg version of AutoCad any way.
- Adaptive 15y ago
  The difference now is that we are entering a period where it's not just houses. 3d printing is suddenly a real thing. That's the play here.
  - brudgers 15y ago
    Most people who are interested in making objects as a hobby have machine tools so that they can be hands on - the idea of sitting in front of the computer rather than a table saw just isn't attractive. It's analogous to artists not running out to purchase HP Designjets and other large format printers - it's the craft which brings most people joy. Abstracting the process onto the computer only attracts a certain segment of the population as a hobby - work of course is another matter.

brudgers 15y ago

There has always been consumer level competition for Autodesk products. The reasons they have not been successful are: 1. When you are designing things like bridges, little software bugs have big consequences and among the things Autodesk does well is software testing. 2. Autodesk started out with really stinking good software engineers and they have always kept up that tradition. It's no accident that they chose LISP as their first programming interface - the founders knew how to code and how to architect a piece of software. 3. They made an incredibly bold move almost twenty years ago when they rewrote the entire AutoCAD code base to be object oriented - and they took the heat then never looked back. It's what has allowed them to extend their flagship product to stay cutting edge. I'll point out that CAD is significantly more mature than video editing was 10 years ago - actually it was more mature ten years ago than video editing is today. It's a market with no real consumer space - people will make and edit many videos, they will only draw up their dream house once or maybe twice - and if they are serious about it they will be using a bootleg version of AutoCad any way.

Adaptive 15y ago
The difference now is that we are entering a period where it's not just houses. 3d printing is suddenly a real thing. That's the play here.
- brudgers 15y ago
  Most people who are interested in making objects as a hobby have machine tools so that they can be hands on - the idea of sitting in front of the computer rather than a table saw just isn't attractive. It's analogous to artists not running out to purchase HP Designjets and other large format printers - it's the craft which brings most people joy. Abstracting the process onto the computer only attracts a certain segment of the population as a hobby - work of course is another matter.