On 07/24/2018 02:14 AM, Chris Albertson wrote:
That is not going to happen for two reasons 1) the deal is not introductory, It is licensed so that it is free for those doing less then $50,000 of work per year Those doing more have to pay for it
I was unable to find the Fusion360 license agreement on the AutoDesk site. Apparently, it's only available for viewing and clicking "I accept" as part of the installation process. However, I'd be very surprised if there wasn't a clause stating that AutoDesk reserves the right to alter or amend the agreement at any time. That's standard in these click-through software license agreements that nobody reads. The agreements are very one sided. The manufacturer owns the software. They can and will do anything they choose.
Example: I seem to recall that Fusion360 was originally free for students and anyone doing less than $100,000 worth of work per year. Now you say it's $50,000. Will it be $25,000 next year? Will the free introductory offer go away entirely? If AutoDesk decides that they're losing more money in licensing revenue than they're gaining in future revenue by adding to their installed base via the free introductory offer, then they will discontinue the free introductory offer. Yes, even if they swore they wouldn't and signed in blood.
2) it can save the files in any of about a dozen industry standard file formats so it is really easy to move your projects both in and out of Fusion. On the roadmap is to directly open and save to other file formats.
I recall the AutoCAD DWG file format becoming increasingly proprietary and deliberately obfuscated after other CAD manufacturers started importing DWG files to help people move away from AutoCAD. That's to be expected. AutoDesk didn't want to make it easy for their customers to leave for a different CAD program that was easier and much less expensive. Then there was the resulting industry push to create an open CAD format, the DXF. AutoDesk was the 800 pound CAD gorilla, so they had a lot of say in how the DXF format was developed. Big surprise. It wasn't the universal CAD format that users wanted. There were different incompatible versions of the DXF. Most CAD companies other than AutoDesk tried to standardize on one version of DXF but AutoDesk always seemed to have a different version of DXF, rendering that standard of limited use. When you have a de facto monopoly, standard non-proprietary file formats are not your friend. Marketing issues such as this make me appreciate open source so much more. Open source developers love well documented standards.
Fusion360 is currently among the least expensive 3D parametric CAD programs, so it makes sense that they support open standards now when they're still working to pull users back from the other 3D CAD programs that yanked the market out from under AutoDesk. In a year or two... not so much. Been there and got the T shirt. Not my first CAD marketing rodeo.
I'm fan of open source software but....
In the first year of Fusion360, I inquired on the Fusion360 forum about Fusion360 for Linux. I certainly wasn't asking for an open source version. I was asking if they'd have a version for Linux, given that they had Windows and Mac versions. I assumed that they were using cross platform software development tools and while it wouldn't be as simple as cross compiling for Linux, it would be a lot easier than a complete rewrite. I was told by the AutoDesk representative in the Fusion360 forum that there would never be a Linux version because people who use Linux won't pay for software. The response was right up there with Microsoft's comment that open source software is cancer. I tried to explain that I paid $1250 plus annual licensing fees for the professional version of Eagle electronic CAD software, largely BECAUSE there as a stable native Linux version. Apparently, I'm an aberration, because Linux users are all hippie freeloaders. :-/
I'm not hating on Fusion360. It's very nice software that's growing and improving rapidly. I think it's much more user friendly than AutoCAD was, given the relative nature of CAD, then and now. Many people have been able to take advantage of the free introductory offer to learn CAD and do a lot of useful work and that's a very good thing. The cost is reasonable for companies leasing it annually. I just wanted to make sure that people realized that AutoDesk is in business to make money and they're not running a charity to give away nice CAD software to everyone. TANSTAAFL. Solidworks et al ate AutoDesk's lunch and drank their milkshake because AutoDesk rested on their laurels. Being the monopoly CAD company made them lazy. Now they're working to earn back market share they lost when other CAD companies like Solidworks did a better job of meeting the customer's needs. Competition is a good thing. The end users benefit from competition. There wouldn't be an excellent Fusion360 if competition didn't force AutoDesk to create it or eventually wither away.
I couldn't agree more with your suggestion to first determine what your CAD/CAM needs are before trying to decide on specific CAD/CAM products. I tried to allude to that as well. What we need to accomplish will dictate the best tools for the job, and there is a lot of variation in what we all need in a tool chain that ultimately generates G code.
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