Tag Archives: Autodesk Inventor 2018

Corporate Forever Promises Are Worth The Paper They Are Written On

Reading stuff on the Practical Machinist CAD/CAM forums the last few days where Autodesk continues to be brought up by various people. Seems to be running about 5 to 1 regarding Autodesk with loathing in a big lead. Another company I despise is AT&T. Masters of lobbying corrupt government officials so they can get out of promises made like when they bought out Bell South and said they would continue rural broad band roll outs as a condition to buy them. To this day some seven years later I have fiber to the top of the ridge around 10,000 feet away where Bell South ran it and AT&T left it. I am lucky to get 75kbs and AT&T has ordered no new DSL equipment for years so when things break it is harder and harder for techs to even get us service.

So why mention AT&T today? I received an ad from them that was priceless and I will show you a couple of screen captures from it.

We will love you forever—-promise!

I included the intellectual property section so you know all these logos and junk belong to AT&T. I thought it was a nice touch that they would show a stone fool liberal idiot as an incentive to buy into their mess.

What is a promise worth these days with these big outfits? I think of Inventor Pro with Autodesk over the last year. There were a ton of extra programs I could access a while back. Just before my perpetual seat ended on 12-15-17 I went to download all I could and much to my amazement there was about a 75% reduction in aps Inventor Pro now had rights to even though the price was going up 25% by 2019.

I propose a new addition to anything anyone says at any time from Autodesk. I like the way AT&T said it and the intent behind it. “Offers, programming, pricing, terms & conditions subject to change and may be discontinued at any time without notice.” The famous old price creep everyone who has ever had satellite TV has experienced as soon as they can get away with it.

Just like Autodesk who has now had ten declining income quarters in a row now AT&T is losing subscribers left and right because bait and switch is not a viable alternative when other options become available. Neither is subscription only industrial software to industries when other options are available and I look with glee to Autodesks upcoming eleventh down quarter in a row and wait to see how mercenary evil guy Anagnost spins it as a plus THIS time.

My opinion for what it is worth is that AT&T and Autodesk share common values and avarice towards customers. Their promises are worth the paper they are written on only and of value just like the rolls of paper we all buy and use most every day. AT&T has my business because I am forced to go there. Autodesk does not have my business because they had no ability to force me there but they wanted to try doing so. Autodesk has lost my business forever and as soon as I can dump AT&T they will too.

Bye Autodesk, See Ya Don’t Want To Be Ya

I try to treat my customers like I wish to be treated. Sometimes in a one man shop time gets away from you and you have a delivery that drags out. I always stand behind what I do though and any promises made are abided by.

So today is the last day for my life as a paying Autodesk customer. According to that complete idiot Anagnost as he said at the last Autodesk user convention I am not of value. http://www.thecadinsider.com/2017/11/what-are-webastards.html

This week was spent in part downloading everything and as I went to the accounts page I see some changes made in the last few weeks. It used to be that Inventor Pro HSM Ultimate had a big list of things you could access and were a part of the overall package. Three out of four of them are now gone. Not that I ever used any of them but I think it is quite indicative of the perpetual seat elimination process Autodesk is embarking on. No doubt all these things and more will be added to subscription only packages now as incentive for people who are masters of their destiny and financial independents known as perpetual seat holders are shown the error of their ways.

Subscribers beware as what is happening to us now will be your fate too. In time, not a very long time I figure, Autodesk will start nickle and dimming to death their subscribers. What was there with features and add ons to get most of you on board will change and become extras to be added for a nominal fee to your ever shrinking base package of apps. Autodesk has proven themselves to be duplicitous in deed and nature so nothing that is promised today will bind them tomorrow. Like our perpetual seats there forever! Until they phase the programs out and stick a new name on the subs only replacement and cut you off at the knees. A perfect example is Cimco Edit for HSM. Cimco will license their product to any software company for $100,000.00 and that covers unlimited use as far as I can find out. Apparently that was to much money for Autodesk to spend to keep this valuable, to customers that is, part of the equation. You can however spend extra to get this same thing again and funny how that works isn’t it? To expensive for them but apparently not for YOU. R&D is pretty expensive too and that is being cut back also. You really didn’t need those bugs fixed or new features anyway did you?

Celebrate with me as I say good-bye to a once great company that has been suborned by evil slave-owning mentality hucksters who will say anything and promise anything and under the new paradigm guarantee only one thing for real. Your complete financial enslavement to a system that will be set up to bleed you. You are now not a customer that Autodesk has to satisfy once you go subs you are chattel property where your opinion does not matter and pay up and shut up. Then pay more and shut up. Then pay us before anything else and shut up about it if you want to keep working. Ain’t life grand when you have such a wonderful mutually beneficial working relationship with your software authoring company?

As of midnight tonight my decision to remain free and in control means you Mr Baked Beans can go get screwed and do so with none of my money ever again.

For those of you looking for powerful CAD or MCAD software while fleeing the Autodesk plantation may I recommend Solid Edge to you? I don’t honestly know how good Cam Express is but Siemens is offering a deal right now where you get CAD and CAM bundled together. I can without reservation wholly recommend Solid Edge and even when I was an Inventor customer all my design work was done in SE and imported into Inventor. Once you learn and use SE Inventor is just to painful to contemplate ever using except as a parts placer for HSM. Oh and permanent seats too for those who don’t believe in slavery or drinking millennial subs never own anything but spend more kool-aide

Autodesk Inventor Ultimate 2018 CPA MBA Marketing Insanity

Before I begin the bashing I do have some good things to say today about the HSM side of Ultimate. It looks like the assigning of Jeff Peck over the HSM group is bearing fruit. The latest developmental downloads have seen the pace of improvement pick up and so finally HSM is moving forward again. Almost I could be persuaded to give Autodesk another years worth of $$$ but I draw the line at fiscal coercion which is their preferred future modus operandi IF they can get away with it. Going on ten quarters of declining profits now even though the stock market which has little bearing on true dividend earnings for shareholders any more seems to like them so far. I have met some really good people with HSM and it is the plantation overseers I object to. They are the whole problem and it is a big one for rational cost containing consumers.

Yep CPA’s and MBA’s will in time go down as the group of management responsible for the moving of industry to China, the complete lack of loyalty to anything other than manipulating stock values for their own personal benefits and the gross increase in upper level income and perks relative to historical norms. This is the mindset that will make lots of millionaires in the C suites while at the same time they are removing the ability of their customers to afford much of the offerings because their high paying jobs have been eliminated by offshoring. It is why cars and trucks are now up to huge costs and long notes.

“According to new data from Experian Automotive, the average new and used-car loan terms are now at record highs of 67 and 62 months, respectively. What’s more, roughly 30% of new car loans being written today are for loan terms of between 73 and 84 months — a 19% increase over the first quarter of last year and the highest percentage recorded since Experian began publishing this figure in 2006.” http://tinyurl.com/ycwbjbb7

Here is a comment on executive pay by historical norms from 2014. http://tinyurl.com/k8v9q3h
“From 1978 to 2013, CEO compensation, inflation-adjusted, increased 937 percent, a rise more than double stock market growth and substantially greater than the painfully slow 10.2 percent growth in a typical worker’s compensation over the same period.
The CEO-to-worker compensation ratio was 20-to-1 in 1965 and 29.9-to-1 in 1978, grew to 122.6-to-1 in 1995, peaked at 383.4-to-1 in 2000, and was 295.9-to-1 in 2013, far higher than it was in the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s.” When coincidently hourly wages bought far more and economic growth was as an average greater than the last fifteen CPA MBA run years. In 1967 I made $1.65 an hour at McDonalds. It bought FIVE gallons of gas though and all things being equal I would have to make $12.25 after taxes today to do the same. My first new car was a $2,700 1974 Hornet Hatchback and I paid that off in six months with my $9 something per hour Chrysler assembly line worker wage. I don’t think you could even get a three year long loan for vehicles back then.

This brings us full circle to the current thief now in charge of Autodesk. Another C suite dude who thinks a company’s sole reason for existence is stock manipulation for personal wealth creation. I would love to see what he thinks he is worth and the golden parachute in place so even if (when) he fails he gets to steal even on his way out. Gone is the forward-looking planning and today it is how can we lie today for gains today driven by increase in the value of stocks today. Never a word about shareholder income in dividends which made this country great and provided secure retirements for many. Today it is a house of cards here and if you can ride it up well and good. You stay there to long and you are toast. In the past, up until I figure about 2000, if stocks declined precipitously you were covered by the dividend income you bought the stock for. Capital gains was the icing on the cake and not the cake. Anyway.

I go to the Autodesk forum today. http://tinyurl.com/yakf6zs6 It is just to amusing for words but I will try anyway. Remember cost containment is for the anointed but not for the unwashed masses.

“Hi all –

We’ve been watching the feedback regarding the elimination of the backplotting capabilities in the version of the CIMCO Editor that ships with Inventor HSM and HSMWorks. It’s clear that this is a capability that many of you are genuinely missing. We’d like to give you a little background on what happened here, and what we’re planning to do about it.

For the past few years, we have had a technology sharing agreement in place where we could redistribute the Professional version of the editor, in exchange for access to the HSM CAM kernel. This agreement expired at the end of last year, so we had to renegotiate the arrangement.

The arrangement we reached, at considerable increased cost to Autodesk, was to redistribute only the Standard version of the editor, with a corresponding reseller agreement, where we can provide access to the Pro-level features at an extra cost.

We are considering an amendment to the agreement with CIMCO that would allow us to include the Professional version with certain levels of the Autodesk HSM product. This is still under discussion, and we have no firm plans to do this.

We apologize for the inconvenience, and truly regret that we weren’t able to provide advance notice of the change.

We’ll keep you posted about what, if any, adjustments we are able to make in this area. As has been noted in various forum posts, those of you with access to prior releases are still able to use the older version of the editor, with backplot capabilities.

Thank you very much for your feedback concerning how much you value the backplot feature.”

Now let me get this right. Mr Anagnost it is not OK for people to tell you what you should pay for a product but it is OK for you to do so to your customers. OK got it. Controlling your expenditures is prudent fiscal management but increasing your costs to your customers is a value added benefit you bequeath to them. Check. Gotta love the psychobabble garbage these people put on things to try to make extortion more palatable for the rubes.

My answer to you Mr Anagnost is go get screwed. This customer at least is willing to continue to do business with you on the terms that brought me here but understand I am not your cotton picker. The very second you tried to make this a coercive relationship is when you lost me and many others. I hope you fail and they strip you of your ill-gotten gains and the exit door puts a big welt on your butt on your way out. I watched one of your kind destroy the O’Charleys restaurant chain which was at one time the livelihood of about 14,000 people. By the time the MBA moron Greg Burns got done with it went from 600 plus stores to 200 some and had to be sold off to an investment company because it was failing. He too was grossly over compensated way above worth while he was there and got a nice severance package as he arranged the buyout of the chain HE had caused to fail.

I will never forget when one of Burn’s big shots started removing quality ingredients from food so as to save money and so he could get bigger personal bonuses each year for cost containment. A friend of mine was pretty silly and when asked his opinion on the latest Honey Mustard Dressing with a drop of honey and a ton of corn syrup compared to the old with lots of honey in it what he thought of it. He was told by the Vice President in charge of food quality for the whole restaurant chain that his negative opinion did not matter. That “people were stupid and we are going to educate them as to what they are going to like”. I kid you not and this was the beginning of the end for the old O’Charleys.

People do know what they like though and I in particular do not like the terms Autodesk now offers. Crash and burn Anagnost and the sooner the better. Your two faced self serving hypocrisy is here for all to see.

Solid Edge Huntsville 2017 “Community College”

Yesterday was the SE “University” event in Huntsville. Basically an 8 hour long way to brief and superficial imitation of the real deal which may have ended for good last year. I am not sure what is being attempted here and with the new Mr Big in charge of SE the anonymizer is back in place. I can’t even remember this dudes name and really don’t want to bother looking it up again. Suffice it to say that he has been assigned to squelch publicity and enthusiasm for SE so NX can garner more sales. In any case these little local events are not much and this is sadly by design I fear. I really miss Karsten who was active in the user community and cared what happened. This new dude no one sees or hears from and quite frankly I imagine SE employees wonder just what he does since nothing is done by him I can see except putting the annonymizer thing on SE. Maybe we should start a sort of internet game where you try to find things and see if we can figure out where he is and what he does for his salary. I have talked pretty badly about SE’s UGS and Siemens overlords in the past and still hold them in contempt. SE however is a superior product.

Saratech was the sponsoring VAR and as has been my experience with them in the past they do a good job. Of course they are there to sell themselves too but they are not offensive about it. I don’t know what if any help Siemens provided for this event although I am certain SE did since it was held in an adjacent building to the SE headquarters in the same complex. Sadly missing this year were any of the actual developers and focused in depth topics. There were no feedback sessions either since there was no SE employee presence there to collect it like was traditional with the real SEU’s. Thanks Saratech for helping this event out.

32 in attendance.

Any major design program has gobs of things most users will never use. The primary focus this year seemed to be on reverse engineering. I have not actually played with it yet but there looks to be some fairly significant strides forward in dealing with point cloud data and of even more interest to me STL files. I had a Gold Faroarm some years back and the idea of reverse engineering has always appealed to me. Dealing with collected data is not a straight forward issue and any help in this area is a good thing. No I have no hands on experience with this new aspect of SE nor do I expect to but if your shop does deal with this check out perpetual seat SE (yep I had to say it since Autodesk wont offer you this) and see what it will do. You need to find the right individual to help you though since scan data presents all kinds of modeling problems. The guy who talked about this from Saratech was pretty good so they do have at least one real user on staff to help you.

Sheet metal as always has been one of SE’s primary standout capabilities and this has continued to be developed. Better Synchronous implementation in ST10 and the ability to create parts in place in assemblies is improved this year. Sheet metal is one of the things that drew me to SE in 2009 from VX now ZW3D and I have never regretted the move. There have been times where I have felt the pace of improvement was not sufficient to justify the yearly fees but after a few years with Autodesk I know it can be far worse elsewhere.

Can you tell Autodesk is someone I would not recommend dealing with? Here is another reason why. Support for Autodesk products is primarily we will help you install and get it running. After that they have their hand(s) out for more money to answer actual software questions. I ran into a familiar face from GTAC which is the corporate user support group inside of SE in Huntsville yesterday. It reminded me once again of how generous the support options are for SE users compared to, well, lets say Autodesk for instance. I can also say that support from my VAR over the years has been entirely sufficient in all ways except for CAMWorks for SE which I quickly abandoned and never intend to use again.

SE is by far the single best MCAD program out there as far as I am concerned. Having dealt with Autodesk Inventor for three years was a real personal hands on eye opener to the advantages of SE over other popular MCAD programs like Inventor. I have been an advocate of Synchronous Tech since ST1 and since ST3 can say it was for prime time use. Inventor was SO bad and their idea of direct editing so bereft of intelligence that after spending some time trying to learn it I just quit. It was clear there was nothing there for an SE user and so Inventor was relegated to being a parts placer so I could use HSM.

I don’t write a whole lot about SE anymore and I have not made a video in some time. I take for granted the capabilities of SE and to me they are just there and tools I have used for so long I forget how powerful it is compared to the other stuff.

May I take a second here to tell you that if you have not investigated SE for MCAD you should do so? Especially if you are an Autodesk Inventor customer I can tell you life is better here by far and SE does not intend to turn you into an on demand endless ATM like Autodesk wants you to be. Lets see here. Better software, perpetual or rental options YOU choose and real actual support for what they sell you. If you are an existing Autodesk Inventor user you better be getting your life raft in order because Inventor is I figure going to be phased out and replaced with Fusion360. Ending Inventor is the only legal way Autodesk can end perpetual Inventor seats and I figure this is their intent. Both Bass and Anangnost have stated in shareholder meetings they are going to subscription only and this is the only way they can do that. Solid Edge wants you as a customer and offers real value and continuing improvements as compared to Autodesk who wants you purely as a cotton picker and chattel for THEIR benefit.

Autodesk ScrewU Ecosystem Grows

I guess that the very last part of all this Autodesk extortion modus operandai had until today one remaining bright light. I switched to Selway for my VAR and was told that support for me was available. I hardly ever use support so they never had the chance to prove that statement. In addition to that I never know what they would have offered me over a regular subscriber since I am a blogger. Suffice it to say today the last little bright light for me with anything Autodesk went dark. Strangely enough the guy who recommended Selway to me no longer works for Autodesk. Smart people are beginning to leave as the handwriting is on the wall.

October 3, 2017

Dear Autodesk, HSM customer,

You may have received an email from Autodesk referencing Manufacturing Collection. This has been creating some confusion.

As of October 1st, HSM is no longer available as a standalone subscription. It must be purchased as part of the Design and Manufacturing Collection, which is a suite of software designed to give you all the tools required to run a product design and manufacturing company. Navigate to this link for a full description of the software that is now available to you. https://www.autodesk.com/collections/product-design-manufacturing/included-software

This applies to subscription customers only. There is no change for customers who own perpetual licenses. If you own a perpetual licensee and would like to switch to a subscription to take advantage of this package deal. Please give me a call at (650) 664-9837

For subscription customers; you do not need to do anything. All customers will be converted to the Design &Manufacturing Collection automatically.

FAQ:

Q. Is there a price increase?

A. No: The price of the Design and Manufacturing Collection is $2460/year, which is $10 cheaper than what you paid originally for your annual subscription. Additionally, there are no longer two tiers of HSM, so multi-axis toolpaths and all advanced HSM functionality is now included at the same base price.

Q. Is Selway machine Tool support included in this price?

A. No: Autodesk will provide support for licensing and activation issues and there is support available at no charge on the user forums at https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/hsm/ct-p/213

Product support from a Selway machine Tool Application Engineer is available on an annual basis, under a support contact at $1,200/year, or by the hour at our normal hourly rate.

Q. Do I have to download all this software?

A. No: The software titles are available to you in your Autodesk dashboard at accounts.autodesk.com

Please contact us if you have additional questions. Selway Machine Tool appreciates your business and we look forward to continuing our valued relationship
Sincerely,

So if I read this right and I am Mr Normal customer what this amounts to is that support is now fee added after you pay fees going up each year faster than inflation for the software and the only possible benefit for many will be the addition of suites which have things you did not need or want enough to have purchased them voluntarily. Of course since it would be new to you and you would in all likely hood require support while learning to use new software you will oddly enough need to get your checkbook out and bend over. And if you ever start using all these nice things rest assured that Autodesk is working hard behind the scenes to make sure it will be very tough to ever leave them and go elsewhere with your data. The more you embrace of their glorious suites the more the tentacles will pull you in.

I have thought for some time now this whole subscription thing was also aimed at reducing the amount of money Autodesk has had to share with VAR’s. Var’s have to eat and survive to so fee added is going to become their way of life also. Autodesk will over time and I feel in the very near future limit all support to the forums only where by and large it will be other customers who will be supporting each other. I have no doubt that along with cutting R&D budgets and various types of software offerings customer support will be phased out too. Unless you are willing to spend per support incident or high yearly support fees with I am sure a support hours limit cap on them. Contrast this with Solid Edge where you as part of your yearly fee can actually contact support inside of the SE headquarters and they will talk to you. It has been that way since I came on board in 2009 and still is that way to this day.

But then SE is not run by robber barrons who think people should be retained with shackles like Autodesk does.

There is not one good thing I can say about any part of Autodesk Inventor HSM anymore. That also extends to the Autodesk corporation as a whole. My perpetual license expires this Dec 15th and Autodesk can kiss my rear end now and in the future. I am never coming back. Greedy mercenary hostile investors both from the outside and from the inside in the form of Andrew Anagnost have set Autodesk up with only one purpose in life. Loot and plunder and do everything they can to make escape impossible for any who foolishly enter therein.

Personally I think you must be crazy to either stay or walk in through the front door of the Trap Spiders Autodesk Tunnel.

Autodesk Inventor HSM and HSMWorks Customers Unhappy/ Leaving?

Today for the heck of it I wandered to the HSM forums. What got me going there was to see if there was a new update. While looking I see the count down clock to Dec 15 when Autodesk loses me as a customer and I wonder how many others are leaving too. While at the forums I go to the machining section and there are very few posts. Is it my imagination or is it true?

Easy enough to check and lets go back to 1-16 and go month by month.
1-16 29 posts
2-16 29
3-16 54
4-16 37
5-16 41
6-16 38
7-16 21
8-16 45
9-16 20
10-16 14
11-16 12
12-16 8
1-17 14
2-17 6
3-17 8
4-17 11
5-17 13
6-17 4
7-17 7
8-17 9
9-17 4

To me this is the single most glaring bit of proof Autodesk can’t run from nor hide from regarding it’s dismal failure in the pursuit of subscription only slaves. I am an actual current paid until 12-15-17 user and I went from big time fan of Inventor HSM 9-16 to purely angry today over being betrayed by greedy corporate morons who can only count projected income as important and customer satisfaction as irrelevant. If this precipitous drop off of posts means what I think it means, and remember I am using myself and my reactions and feelings about all this as a way of measurement, tons of us are leaving and just plain don’t care what these idiots do anymore. No I don’t mean the HSM developers and staff. They are victims too and I see some are leaving now.

How else can these numbers be interpreted as anything other than colossal failure and powerful evidence of coming doom for the plans of the almighty Baked Beans Anagnost Autodesk Plantation?

Celebrate Autodesk’s Success

Congratulations go out to Autodesk this week. As the premier cutting edge software company blazes a new pathway to the future of all CAD and CAM software we make time to bask with them in their success. The cutting edge of maintenance free customer oriented profusely updated and daily improved programs under their auspices are a pinnacle that no other software company can equal or indeed even dream of getting close to. Autodesk is, I think it fair to say, the most advanced and forward-looking software author in the world right now with en ever-growing market base of tremendously happy and excited customers who can accredit with justification their successes being based on Autodesk products and genius. (See I can distort reality with the best of the PR department reality distortion mechanics. Hire me Autodesk and I can even help you :D)  In light of the inspired and competent management that created this paragon of industry excellence and cloud innovation we celebrate with them nine successive down quarters in a row. No other CAD CAM Animation software outfit even comes close to this level of investor or customer satisfaction and they owe it all to their brilliant make slaves of customers strategy. Join with me as we wish them continued success and hope for a speedy journey forward into ten and eleven or more quarters in a row.

Congratulations Autodesk, you have prevailed where no other company dares to go and your idea of getting rid of loyal voluntary customers as the burden to industry they truly are speaks of foresight that towers above the rest.

Solid Edge University 2017 Huntsville 9-12-17

OK folks you all know I think very highly of Solid Edge. It has been my modeler of choice now since ST1. Can I ask just where does the time go? Anyway if you are in the Huntsville area and would like to know more about SE ST10 you need to go. Of all the meetings being held nation wide this is the only one that will be in SE’s headquarters with many of those who have actually had a hand in coding what you use present. If you use Autodesk Inventor I would urge you to attend and see how it could be as compared to where you are right now. I have had both programs in hand for a few years now and would never inflict Inventor on myself as my principle modeler. You owe it to yourself to see how things are done in SE since time is money and efficiency is time and SE is WAY efficient over Inventors best day. In any case here is the info and the price is right to so check it out and contact Andrea.

PS, As you Autodesk types know Inventor et al is heading into huge price increases by 2019 and subscription only and in time an effort to force all to the cloud. Fusion360 which is the darling of Autodesk and what they have in many ways pinned their future to requires you to go online for allinitial saves and to save all edits too. You need to seriously contemplate your life raft or just where you intend to do design work today and tomorrow. SE has been basically the same price for me for ten years now and as far as I know there are no gouge you plans afoot. They also offer permanent seats as well as rental so unlike Autodesk they want you as a customer because it is mutually beneficial for this to happen. Autodesk just wants you as an ATM.

Hello Dave,
Due to customer requests, we have just opened up a limited number of free passes to these events. Contact me to secure your pass before we run out. Don’t miss this opportunity to learn from the best and brightest Solid Edge Experts:

Attending technical sessions to increase your Solid Edge knowledge
Seeing firsthand, the latest enhancements to ST 10
Meeting the Solid Edge extended team, and networking with your peers
Learn best-practices in design, simulation, data management, and 3D printing.

The events include continental breakfast and lunch. Attendees will also receive a free voucher to take the Solid Edge Certification exam ($99 value).

Tuesday, September 12, 2017 – Huntsville, AL
Thursday, September 14, 2017 – Atlanta, GA

There will also be prize drawings at each location. Prizes include 3DConnexion SpaceMouse Pro and Solid Edge wireless headsets.
Regards,

Andrea Hall
Customer Relationship Manager
ahall@saratechinc.com
Saratech
http://www.saratechinc.com