I am a Carlson supporter and think they have the best cad program out there but what is the deal with Carlson putting out so called major updates every year now . Its not like you get some major improvement every time they put one out. I do not like this practice as a user.
It's probably more of an issue with managing product updates.
The more product updates that are out there, the more of a nightmare it becomes for support staff.
I was a developer (staff systems specialist - something like an E-8 or 9 in military parlance) at a major s/w company years ago - Unisys. For a time we realeased product updates every month and sometimes sooner if something major was discovered. During a meeting with our various support and distribution staff around the world, the question was asked to them what they wanted to see from us - the developers. The number answer was fewer releases believe it or not. Some said just patch releases every 6 months and some said they just wanted one big release once year.
Just some thoughts.
E
Sounds like they're taking the Autodesk route.
Too bad.
:coffee:
David
From what I saw at the ESRI conference in a Carlson session there have been some really serious additions to the new release. It is much more GIS friendly handling attributes/attribute values and exporting into other formats.
I hope you are wrong RFB
I have always been 100% against that subscription based business model.
The last s/w company I was at had a subscription based plan for providing support to customers. It was nightmare for us and the customer(s) to keep track of what plan they had (if any). Before I could answer a question or address an issue, I had to verify their serial, product, support level and contact name. If they sent a simple email and didn't provide all that up front, we had to go back and forth several times before I would/could address the issue - even if it was one I was well aware about already. It might have even been an issue I fixed myself and built the release for!
WE built ActiveX/COM objects there and that was a nightmare all by itself. Not only did we have to know our own code and products, but we also had to know all the possible languages other programmers out there might be using to talk to our controls. Some languages out there simply do not play nice with ActiveX controls no matter what they say.
Sorry for ramblings.
E.
Carlson Is putting out 2011 products- Speaking of Which
Carlson gave a small demonstration of their GPS unit and data collector in Hyannis a few weeks ago. John O'Brien and Todd Carlson were on hand to show us the new setup. 8 of us showed up for the demonstration.
After an introduction tot he equipment we took it for a test drive around the hotel.
It was very easy for me since I am used to the SurvCE2 data collection and controller software.
The
GPS unit itself was small and light weight. The 2 meter staff and data collector were easily managed. One small sacrifice was the cabling between the antenna and the data collector. I like the blue tooth connection no my unit but i have used the smaller sokkia with a cabled data collector and I appreciate the light weight of the units.
The unit worked as expected, got a good lock using an RTK fix on the local network (not so local on Cape Cod, really, but..) and then we gathered some data emphasizing the ease of collection.
Nice unit, market priced, and Novatel innards!!
The Carlson that we are using at the college runs as an add-on to AutoCAD. I don't know nothing about nothing, but the way AutoDesk messes with AutoCAD on a yearly basis now to justify (&^%$ you for the annual infusion of cash, Carlson might have to upgrade yearly now just to keep the program working with ACAD.
that to Andy
Someone's product on top of someone else's product, I'm against that model of product development as well. Now you have 2 points of potential failure instead of a single point.
Just like I always analogize to plumbing: the more joints you have in a line the more points of failure you have.
Sorry to ramble on more....
E.
Andy hit the nail on the head. It's driven by Autodesk's annual release cycle. The good thing is that the DWG format only changes about every 3 years, so you can still stay "current" with the DWG format without upgrading the Carlson features. For instance, 2007 DWG format was used in 2007-2009, so someone with 2007 could open 2009 drawings. If you don't see any new Carlson bells and whistles that you must have, don't upgrade. When you start getting 2010 DWG format files from others, it may be time to upgrade.
Also, if you skip a release, Carlson doesn't punish you the way Autodesk does to "get current". It's only 10% of retail to stay current every year and then basically another 5% for every year you're out of date. For Carlson Survey, it's an additional $75 if you fall another year behind.
For Civil 3D, it's $1,000-$1,200 (I think) to keep it up every year. If you fall off for 3 years, you buy it new. They have specials and such to help out, but that's the general scheme of things. That's the reason many people keep current on Civil 3D whether or not they install it every year. Otherwise, it just hurts so bad... 😉
Jennifer
