Photos really don’t do SolidWorks World justice. As James Cameron said last week, “I believe in the physical present of the observer”. Well, that doesn’t stop us “observers” from providing photos of our experiences.
The buzzword at SolidWorks World 2010 was “cloud”. There was a running gag at the convention, take a shoot of “espresso” (or whatever else your mind can imagine) every time someone uttered the word “cloud” in a presentation or speech. If this game was real, we’d all be dead from alcohol poisoning, er I mean caffeine overdose. All this talk about cloud computing involves creating a new SolidWorks branded interface that uses Enovia technology as its backbone.
According to Bernard Charles, CEO of Dassault Systemes, and Jeff Ray, CEO of Dassault Systemes SolidWorks Corporation, this marriage of SolidWorks with Enovia will bring new functionality, capabilities, and advantages to SolidWorks customers. The first product of this new approach is the brand SolidWorks PLM. The first release of a SolidWorks PLM product will be later this year, according Ray. I’m not sure of the exact name for that first product, but they did use SolidWorks Product Data Sharing at one point.
SolidWorks Product Data Sharing
It’s my impression (at this point in time) that the initial release of SolidWorks Product Data Sharing will not have the full functionality that many users need. A demonstration showed some of its capabilities, which are very rudimentary when compared to Enterprise PDM or SmarTeam. The main focus for the new application appears to be an advanced communication tool, and not an actual functioning PDM or PLM.
The user interface will take on two forms: web client and SolidWorks add-in. In the add-in, users may upload files from a window pane within SolidWorks. They may add comments. If more than one person is logged-in, the comments can function as a real-time chat. Functionality will allow users to invite other non-SolidWorks users via the web client version. Files will have previews, including assembly trees that graphically layout relationships between files. In the web client, 3D viewing of files will include on-screen commenting (redlining) within the view.
Security of the Cloud
Jeff Ray claims the workspace of the new cloud applications will be secure. In fact, Jon Hirshtick is adamant in his belief that cloud computing is far more secure than having data on local hard drives. This doesn’t come from opinionation. It actually comes from experience. SolidWorks is currently fighting a person who stole the source code for a SolidWorks application and is trying to sell it. The person was a former employee in India who stole the code by simply copying from his hard drive and walking out with it one day. Having this data on a cloud network with encrypted access may’ve prevented this theft.
Going the course
Charles and Ray pounded the pavement at SolidWorks World 2010 to get their message across. Despite any flak that Dassault Systemes gets for their new direction, they are going to stay the course. Enovia V6 is the future of Dassault Systemes. Bringing SolidWorks in line with that future is a priority. Charles stated that Dassault Systemes is not divided into SolidWorks and Enovia V5, it is united as V6.
I asked Ray a question about which form the new products will take. The answer, for now, was only that they will offer their customers the choice to remain with their current system or use the new system. In my view, this is corporate speak for “its going to replace what is currently on the market and although they will not leave customers high and dry, they will likely begin to reduce focus to the current system.” But I could be wrong.
Concerns?
Now, in this article, I’m simply reporting on the new direction of SolidWorks as presented to everyone at SolidWorks World 2010. I do have very real concerns about this new approach, which I will cover in a separate editorial (hopefully within a few days).
Several presentations stand out in my mind from the Wednesday General Session. This was the session that really got down to the business of talking about the SolidWorks community and the future of the SolidWorks software.
Richard Doyle introduced the SWUGN regional leaders to the General Session. I’m guessing this is the first time many people even heard of this group. This is an important group that is responsible for increasing the number of SolidWorks User Groups nationwide; and worldwide too.
Another memorable presentation was Engineers in Crisis comedy skit used to introduce us to many of the new functions and improvements that will appear in SolidWorks 2009. The skit consisted of a supposed talk show host addressing many frustrations that CAD users (unnamedly SolidWorks users) experienced when using their CAD software. The frustration was collectively referred to as PAS (Performance Addiction Syndrome).
Who isn’t addicted to something that performs well? They showed short videos of some engineers who were going mad because of issues they were having with an unnamed CAD program. To help, three “doctors” presented the videos and then explained the solution offered in SolidWorks 2009. This one particular engineer in one of the stories was vexed by “too many steps.” This was prolly the funniest of the bunch. I remember when they showed him getting out of his co-worker’s car. His co-worker double beeped his remote to lock his car. The engineer (Bill, I think) preceded to yell something like, “You only need to beep it once! Doing it twice is too many steps! Ughh!!!” The interviews with his boss and co-workers were icing on the cake.
Anyway, the point was that SolidWorks 2009 would be adding functionality and simplifying some tasks. Just to name a few:
This skit was immediately followed by a demonstration of the speed differences we can expect from SolidWorks 2009. They had a side by side comparison between SolidWorks 2008 and 2009. It does appear that performance will indeed be massively improved. This is of course based on the presentation. I will reserve my final judgment for when I get a chance to use 2009 for myself.
Another amazing day at SolidWorks World 2008 started at this day’s General Session. Both keynote speakers are greats in their own time. Dr. Donald A. Norman has a pedigree too long for me to go into here without having to site multiple references and a lengthy list of achievements. He was billed by the SWW8 introduction as being in the ranks of Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking and Thomas Edison for having been presented with the Benjamin Franklin Medal from the Franklin Institute. His speech was a cleaver. He discussed the design of every day things in the context of what is good design and what is poor design. One point he made was that a good design is intuitive. It doesn’t need signs just so that the user can understand the product. He spent quite a lot of time showing poorly designed products with signs everywhere on them and comparing these to well designed products that are so simple, no explanation is needed, or perhaps it only needs explanation once and then never again. He showed examples of how pointless signs are, especially when their meaning is lost. The irony of this is that I found such a pointless sign within an hour after his presentation right at SolidWorks World 2008. Those of us who saw Dr. Norman’s presentation will likely have a deeper appreciation of this sign, and yet be just as confused by what it could possible mean as anyone else would be.
Seriously, what in the world could this sign mean and why is it taped to the wall, and how come it mentions “Solid Works”? Is this instructions to the SolidWorks software not to hit the wall, or randomly placed instructions for humans not to hit SolidWorks? Or is it that for some reason, the sign’s maker was concerned people attending SWW8 would have sudden and uncontrollable urges to go around hitting this particular spot on the wall? If so, what’s so special about this spot that makes hitting it worse than striking some other spot on the wall? Oh, and why did they spell SolidWorks with a space in the middle as “Solid Works”? So much information is packaged in this meaningless sign.
The other keynote speaker was Dr. Robert Ballard. He is another person with a long laundry list of accomplishments. His most pop culture oriented claim to fame is that he was co-discoverer of the HMS Titanic. Dr. Robert Ballard talked about his program to bring ocean exploration into the class room, literally. This is being accomplished by using the most advanced communications technology available. I think he was almost bragging about the fact that he has I2 access for his many projects. I2? A.K.A. Internet 2. It’s the next generation of the Interest that is much faster and has much higher capacity than our slow old dumpy Internet. DSL vs. Cable? This is nothing and meaningless. I2 is the future. Of course, normal human beings cannot get access to I2 right now, and prolly won’t be able to for many years, but it was fun watching Dr. Ballard go into his many uses of it. How does he use I2? Because of its extremely wide bandwidth, he is able to transmit huge amounts of data. This allows him to send a ship out to sea that can launch an ocean exploring robot. That robot can be controlled from a land based location which is no where near where the exploration is going on. Everything the robot sees is transmitted half-way across the planet where it is also being controlled. This great feat was Dr. Ballard’s goal since the 1970’s and now he has made it happen.
Now, the question of this General Session really is, who is this mysterious female photographer who is silhouetted against the stage backdrop that was taking photos of all of us?
One of the stars that kept popping up all over the place at SWW8 was the famous/infamous Matt Lombard. As mentioned, I attended his Hybrid Modeling breakout session. Before showing up, I didn’t know what to expect. First of all, his breakout session was in one of the large rooms, that could seat possibly 500 people. I don’t really know. I know it was pretty full in comparison to other sessions this year. I’m not going to go into too much detail about the session’s agenda since I covered that already. Instead, there are other items of note.Â
In a moment of surreal quality, right in the middle of an audience member asking him a question, Matt recognizes him and declares something along the line, “I’ve been looking all over for you! I have it right here.” He then proceeds to find a copy of his SolidWorks book and brings it down to his faithful attendee. At the same time, I see a hand reach out from the front row or so grasping some amount of dollar bills. Matt makes the exchange, declaring some self-derogatory statement and continues the presentation.Â
This photo here is of Matt lording over the model he is about to render subservient to his will.
Two other moments came up where he recognized others in the audience (if I remember right, SolidWorks perennials of some sort)  and declared his complete amazement that they where there listening to little ol’ him. Just because you write a highly regarded book about SolidWorks doesn’t preclude you from being in awe of others.
The session was informative and entertaining in the shear unexpected natural phenomenon known as Matt Lombard.Â
