Every year since I don’t know when, SolidWorks World has established a group just for photos taken at the conference. The photo stream for SolidWorks World 2013 group has started! Check out the Flickr group and upload your own photos of the event. Here’s a short sample so far:
I was recently interviewed by Entertainment Engineering, an online magazine that covers technologies used in many types of entertainment devices and events such as movies, concerts, theme and amusement parks, electronic games, etc. The November 2012 issue focuses on the value of individual contributors and also of teamwork in the design process. Here’s the kicker, I’m quoted in the issue’s editorial article along side the great Steve Wozniak. Kinda cool.
The article for which I was specifically interviewed is called Teamwork Improves Section-View Options in SolidWorks 2013, which leads-off a series of interviews with various individuals from all over the engineering discipline. In my interview, I talk about the new SolidWorks section view functionality (now called Section View Assist) that has a whole new user interface that changes the way section views are created on drawings in CAD. This includes how I originally developed the concept which was then improved and refined via teamwork within the SolidWorks organization.
Section View Assist replaces the need to first create sketches before being able to create a section view. Instead, you can directly place cutting line on the original view and have the section view generated automatically. If you want to use aligned section view, you can add offsets to the cutting line directly in the Section View Assist interface (without the need to draw lines or edit sketches). Same goes to notch and single offsets. The new user interface saves time and steps. The improvement is nearly exponential. The more complex your cutting line, the quicker you can create it versus old methods using sketches.
What’s in Lancaster, PA in October? One of the largest SolidWorks new release rollouts in the U.S. At a quaint resort, a large auditorium is nearly filled with SolidWorks customers eagerly watching a half day of presentations about what’s new in SolidWorks in the newest version. They covered a multitude of topics from the What New’s document to a clever parody of Mythbusters, called Featurebusters.
The was even a bit about how to use SolidWorks to improve your golf game.
The event was hosted by DesignPoint. Even though Lancaster, PA seems to be a far-flung place (just try to get a direct flight, or even a reasonable 1-stop flight to there), the area has a lot of enthusiasm for engineering, and SolidWorks.
My adventures didn’t end with this event.
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Need I say more?
The official name of the new app is eDrawings for iPad from 3DS SolidWorks. This initial release is a great app with a lot of potential. For the first time, you can inexpensively open and view native SolidWorks files directly on a mobile device.
The app provides many of the familiar and fun functions from the eDrawings family. It is useful to quickly and conveniently communicate 3D CAD files to locations and environments were PCs and printed drawings just aren’t practical. It also provides an great method to view SolidWorks files for customers that do not use SolidWorks, from the shop floor to a corporation’s CEO.
When the app is started, you are presented with a menu of models and drawings. There is an area of sample models and an area for your files, called “User Files”.
The sample files provide good cases to try out eDrawings for iPad functionality. The User Files area lists any files which you have added to the iPad to view in eDrawings.
When you open a supported 3D file, you can rotate, pan, zoom in and out, zoom fit, zoom home (last view when file that was saved). Similar to other eDrawings applications, the eDrawings for iPad app can Play a model by transitioning between different views of the model.
For assemblies, you can highlight individual parts from the Components tree.
Configurations are also supported. Selecting a particular configuration from the Configuration tree will immediately display it within the graphics area. It is very easy to switch between configurations.
Assembly explosions are viewable from the Explode Assembly button. Individual configurations can also be separately exploded.
Highlighting parts from the Components tree is also available when viewing the assembly as an explosion. This makes it very easy to identify parts in the graphics area when browsing through an assembly.
Just as with the desktop computer, larger files consume more device resources. If you wish to view a large assembly, you may wish to close background processes if your iPad resources are stretched thin.
Disclaimer – Though this article was not reviewed by SolidWorks, nor its parent company Dassault Systemes nor any other entity, the author of this article is an employee of Dassault Systemes and is internally familiar with eDrawings for iPad. As such, this article should not be understood as being from an uninvolved and neutral third party.
One of my favorite shows on TV is Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe. Even though the keynote speaker was announced ahead of SolidWorks World 2012 (Tony Fadell), there was still a surprize guest speaker! Can you guess who (as if you didn’t already know): Mike Rowe.
Mike Rowe is a down to Earth kind of guy that has a passion to honor the men and women who do the jobs that the rest of us are thankful we don’t have to do. Rowe spoke about wanting to bring white collar and blue collar trades together. Though there is value in having degrees (of which he has one in Communications), he states that our society is too focused on that. In particular, he does Dirty Jobs to honor his Grandfather, Carl, who was a plummer and mechanic. With all the unemployment, there doesn’t seem to be enough people to fill jobs like plummers and electricians. A very good article covers details of his talk on Graphics Speak
He talked about mikeroweWORKS, built by the fans of Dirty Jobs, which seeks to help close the skills gap and link up tradesmen. His mission statement says it better than I ever could.
When travelling across country late last year with my wife, I discovered a section of our hotel store at the Grand Canyon that was dedicated to Dirty Jobs. There was a foam board cut out of Mike Rowe’s image. To joke with my wife, who never found her way into the store, I took a photo of me with the 2D cut out.
In a bit of irony, I actually did get a chance to meet Mike Rowe at SolidWorks World 2012, and yes, he gracitiously took his photo with me. Can you tell which is the real Mike Rowe?
A rather unexpected bonus at ATEC11 are the variety presentations, from the highly technical to practical real world application. Dr. Edward Price presented a video about the Chicago stormwater retention system, run by the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago. This program and collection of public works handles water pollution and sewer backup problems for 52 municipalities within Cook County. Price covered how Chicago is setting up a water management system that can handle 11″ of rain in one day (from the so-called 100-year storm; there have been several such 100-year storms in the past 10 years!). The system treats about 1.5 billion gallons of waster water each day. Overflow is often stored in several reservoirs, including one called Deep Tunnel. Treated solid waste from the system is used to convert old strip mine craters into beautiful prairie land via a program called the Prairie Plan. See the image below for a basic schematic of the water treatment system.
