Category Archives: Linux

Why every AutoCAD CAD Manager should have a copy of BricsCAD – part 5, LISP

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This is the fifth post in this series where I explain why this statement holds true:

As a CAD Manager looking after AutoCAD users, or a power user looking after yourself, it’s worth your while to have a copy of BricsCAD handy.

This post is about BricsCAD being better than AutoCAD at the one thing that made AutoCAD win the race against its competitors back in the 80s – LISP. That is, AutoLISP (added fully to AutoCAD in Version 2.18) and Visual LISP (fully integrated with AutoCAD 2000).

If you’re a good AutoCAD CAD Manager, you’ll already know the reasons LISP is an extremely important tool, so I won’t cover them here. I may explain those reasons in a later post, but that would distract us from the main point. Why is having a copy of BricsCAD useful to a CAD Manager?

  • BLADE. I’ve covered the BricsCAD LISP Advanced Development Environment in various posts already, and I intend to go into greater detail in future posts. There are enough advantages over VLIDE to warrant an entire series of posts. This is simply the biggest advance for CAD LISP in 20 years; if you’re doing any reasonably complex development in LISP and you’re not BLADE, you’re wasting time and money.
  • Performance. Because BricsCAD’s LISP engine is much more modern than AutoCAD’s, the performance is much greater. In my experience, it’s about three times as fast. Some function calls are as much as 30 times as fast. If you have a user who’s complaining that your routine is taking an age to process in AutoCAD, try it in BricsCAD instead. I once saved a user half an hour in processing time for one polyline by using BricsCAD. Another aspect that will benefit you when programming and testing is BricsCAD’s generally superior performance. Got nothing running and want to get programming in the next 5 seconds? Fire up BricsCAD. Want to do a complex process on a big drawing that makes AutoCAD run out of RAM? Try it in BricsCAD.
  • Licensing. While you’re developing in BricsCAD, you’re not using up an expensive AutoCAD license. You’re using a cheaper (or even free, while you’re evaluating it) BricsCAD license. Also, it’s a perpetual license so if you ever stop paying, you can keep developing as long as you like. Oh, and it’s not going to flake out on you on those days where Autodesk’s subscription licensing server has a meltdown.
  • Extra functionality. BricsCAD’s LISP has the AutoLISP and Visual LISP functions and then some. Some of the DOSLib functions are available without even needing DOSLib, but if you need the full set of DOSLib functions they can be loaded, as per AutoCAD. A range of extended functions are available with the vle- prefix, and the LISP Developer Support Package documents these and provides the source code so you can also use them in AutoCAD.
  • Platform independence. AutoCAD for Mac has severely restricted LISP capabilities, making it unsuitable for use in a professional, efficient custom environment. BricsCAD for Mac and BricsCAD for Linux both provide practically identical functionality to the Windows version. Yes, BricsCAD for Mac really is significantly more AutoCAD-compatible than AutoCAD for Mac.

I do my LISP development in BricsCAD these days, and can attest that it’s well worth the investment in time to get the hang of BLADE.

It will cost you a few minutes to download and install of an evaluation BricsCAD and check out the LISP situation for yourself.

Edit: it’s not just LISP. See James Maeding’s comment below about .NET, too.

BricsCAD Shape for Mac

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BricsCAD Shape, the free DWG-based 3D direct modeling application from Bricsys, has now been released for macOS (formerly OS X). See my previous post on Shape for details of what it’s all about.

This is the same, just on a different OS. That’s because unlike Autodesk’s versions of its DWG products, the Bricsys versions are not cynically watered down for Apple users. Those users can now do full 3D conceptual modeling as part of a workflow that leads to full BIM (or simply view and edit DWG files if you’re not that ambitious), and without paying for the privilege.

It’s a proper free perpetual licence without usage restrictions, not a demo. You can’t get a perpetual license of DWG-editing software from Autodesk for any money, so by any measure Shape is a bargain.

The Bricsys blog post can be found here. The download page is here.

A Linux version of Shape is expected later.

Executive summary of Deelip’s AutoCAD for Mac interview

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Deelip has just published an extensive interview with several Autodesk people about AutoCAD for the Mac. Deelip had a good set of questions and I suggest you read the whole thing, but if it’s all too tl;dr for you, then here is the lazy reader’s version of what Autodesk had to say:

  • The AutoCAD code was split up into 3 sections: the core CAD engine (platform-independent), the Windows-specific (MFC) parts and the Mac-specific (Cocoa) ones.
  • AutoCAD for Mac is incomplete. Choosing which features to leave out was done with the aid of CIP (oh, dear) and Beta feedback. (Hang on a minute, I thought CIP said most people were using the Ribbon…)
  • No comment on when or if AutoCAD for Mac functionality will catch up with its Windows counterpart.
  • No comment on the stability or performance of the Mac version.
  • Buying Visual Tau wasn’t a complete waste of money.
  • If Mac users want Windows-level functionality, they should use Bootcamp.
  • The Mac version is intended to expand the AutoCAD market to those Mac users who are frustrated by Bootcamp or who find it too hard.
  • Some mind-blowing spin was attempted in a valiant but vain attempt to explain away the Ribbon = productivity, Mac <> Ribbon marketing problem. You will really have to read it for yourself, as I can’t do it justice here. But “just because 2+2=4 doesn’t mean 4-2=2” will give you some idea of what to expect.
  • The Mac version is the same price as the Windows version, despite being incomplete, because Mac users won’t know or care about the missing stuff.
  • There are no plans for a Linux port, or any other platforms.
  • Autodesk will wait and see how AutoCAD for Mac does before porting any of the vertical products. (Very sensible).
  • Autodesk closed off the AutoCAD for Mac Beta program on announcement day because it wouldn’t have been able to cope with the mass of feedback from new users.
  • Autodesk will not allow dual use (Windows + Mac) licenses. If you want to have both products available to you, you will need to buy the software twice.
  • You can cross-grade AutoCAD from Windows to Mac for a nominal fee, or for nothing extra if you upgrade at the same time. (Although at 50% of the retail price of a whole new license, such an upgrade hardly represents a bargain).
  • Autodesk really doesn’t have any idea what is going to happen in the Mac CAD marketplace. (Refreshingly honest).
  • Little comment on why AutoCAD WS is called AutoCAD, other than iOs users not expecting their apps to do much anyway, plus it’s “part of the AutoCAD family.”
  • WS doesn’t stand for anything.

Automated anti-telemarketer script – brilliant!

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Annoyed by telemarketers? Too polite to abuse them or just hang up? Can’t be bothered wasting their time in person? Then you need AstyCrapper. If you’re using the open-source Asterisk PBX, it will crap on for ages on your behalf. It works by detecting responses from the telemarketer and silence gaps and responding with a series of recorded samples. It’s pretty convincing!

OK, maybe that doesn’t apply to you, but you can still have a good laugh at the example calls.

AutoCAD for Linux – another bad idea

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I often see calls for Autodesk to support AutoCAD on Linux. Just like AutoCAD for the Mac, while I can sympathise with the users of that OS, I think a native port of AutoCAD for Linux would be a bad idea. Again, I think it would be bad for everybody: Autodesk, AutoCAD for Windows users, and most of all, AutoCAD for Linux users.

Why? First of all, for most of the same reasons I gave for the Mac port. Autodesk hasn’t just failed in the past with AutoCAD for the Mac, it has failed with AutoCAD for Unix, too. I remember Autodesk being very enthusiastic about the Sparc port in particular (AIX, too). I know personally of customers who were caught up in that enthusiasm and invested heavily in a Unix environment, only to bitterly regret it a few years later when Autodesk abandoned them. Would this happen again? Probably.

Second, the numbers just don’t add up. Current PC OS market share is running something like this:

Windows 88%
Mac OS 10%
Linux 1%

While the Windows share is currently falling (thanks, Vista) and the others are steadily rising, there’s a long way to go before Linux has the numbers to make the investment worthwhile. In any case, it is likely that most Mac or Linux users of AutoCAD wouldn’t be new customers, simply existing users using a different OS. Not much of a cash cow, is it?

I dislike the Windows monopoly and support the open source movement, so I would love it if Autodesk could just snap its fingers and provide all its software on whatever platforms the users want. Mac? Sure. Linux? Great, why not? The reality is that it’s not that easy. It’s expensive to do and expensive to go on supporting in the long term. Unfortunately, it just doesn’t make commercial sense, and wishing it did will not make it so.

AutoCAD on Linux – Video

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Lots of people get excited at the prospect of AutoCAD running under Linux. I’m not one of those people, but for those of you that are, here’s a video from a Linux enthusiast that shows AutoCAD running in an environment that’s doing all kinds of cool geeky stuff. It’s not mine and it’s from October 2006:

YouTube Link

Cool if you like that kind of thing, that is. I think the effects would drive me mad after a short period of dorkoid enthusiasm, but of course being Linux it would all be under complete user control.

Before you get too excited, I should point out that this is AutoCAD 2000, that is, software from last century. It’s running on Ubuntu Dapper with XGL installed and it required the copying of DLLs around from a Windows installation. It’s not supported (of course), and there’s no way of seeing what the real-world drafting performance and reliability is like. It’s a cool fun exercise for somebody with far more nerdish street cred than myself, but it’s not an environment I would use to earn a living.