Like if the software calculates bend radii that will break things, isn't that a bug? What's the explanation for that even happening? Is it just that the formula involved means that you can't always get a "right" answer, so the software will be like "well, this is the best we can do, figure out the rest"?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_computer-aided...
Virtually all of them are proprietary. They are too expensive to move away from, and every one of them has flaws that firms workaround and build there workflows on. Retraining, proprietary file formats and the disruption of migrating an essential part of most businesses is prohibitive.
Frankly, IMO the CAD marketplace is an example of how closed source really bites an industry. Funnily enough, most engineers - who would never accept inaccurate tolerances on items like screws or bolts - seem to accept this is the way it is and despite the stories we read here let the situation continue.
I'm frankly amazed there aren't more failures in infrastructure from bugs in CAD software. That's more a testament to the fact that engineers are engineers though - when they realise there are problems, they dig in, figure out where the problem is and find a solution, and in the case of CAD software I really think they build or design their way around the problems.
Overall, CAD software is, despite all the flaws of being coded source, still pretty amazing and vendors do fix issues eventually. We can do so many more things in society because of it, but as we evolve as a society it becomes apparent there are limitations. Eventually CAD software vendors will be disrupted, but we're a long way from that point right now!
Sometimes autocorrect messes up things I type. It's not really a bug per-se, more just a side-effect of how things like autocorrect work, right? But sometimes Chrome crashes, and that's a bug...
The OP seems to say that the bend radius thing is more of the first case than the second, and I'm wondering how true that is. I'm not really sure of the science behind it (maybe it's an impossible constraints problem).
At least with OSS you can look at the code behind the program to work out how it calculates things like the bend radius.
I'm no engineer, so I had to look it up (Wikipedia was no help whatsoever on this occasion) but I located this page which gives the formula and an explanation:
"Calculating the correct flat pattern layout is crucial to getting a good quality finished part from your press brake. Yet, many CAD and CNC programmers have no idea how to calculate the required values. Years ago, the real experts created cheat sheets and tacked them to the wall. They only taught the new apprentice how to apply the results shown on the cheat sheet, not how to calculate the numbers. Well, now those experts have retired and it's time for a new generation to learn the right way to do the calculate the correct flat pattern layout."
http://www.sheetmetalguy.com/bend-allowance.htm
Now admittedly the guy does put the responsibility on the operator, but it appears CAD packages can indeed calculate this for you. So long as the right info was input into the program, the formula should be programmed correctly and the operator should be able to have confidence in the results!
"Should" is the operative term. I can tell you with that having hand checked the automated results of several CAD packages at developing sheet metal flat patterns and finding unexplained variability and errors too many times to count that if you want confidence in the dimensional accuracy of a sheet metal part, you need to develop it by hand. Especially for anything over 5mm in sheet thickness. As far as I'm concerned you really can't engage in sheet metal design without being able to manually verify the development results, so in a sense it is up to the designer regardless of the capabilities of the CAD software.
To be fair, I'm picking on one of the hardest physical manufacturing processes to actually get right - even CNC brake presses have a great amount of variance in calibration (e.g. the amount of bend allowance you need to make for various sheet thicknesses...) across different suppliers, materials, etc to produce physically identical parts. The valuable lesson for a fresh designer is don't trust your 3d representation of the part, don't trust the manufacturer specs on ANYTHING and always prototype. I'm guessing this is why people tolerate it - the world with 3d CAD is still a vastly nicer place to be an engineer than otherwise, so we just rationalise away the shitty parts as a reasonable price to pay.
Yeah, I know. In my experience, engineers are normally immensely pragmatic people. My dad was an engineer, so I have a lot of respect for the profession. It would just be nice if CAD would be more open.
Not so sure we're that far off. Nobody really has much incentive to innovate in this space because it's so niche. If you're a believer in the version of the future where 3D printers are as commonplace as 2D printers are today, then this may all change.
Suddenly, 3D modelling skills are today's word processing skills (either for work or for fun), and there are a whole bunch of people working on coming up with innovative CAD solutions for the masses.
http://www.pwc.com/gx/en/industries/technology/publications/...
Siemens makes CAD packages. Dassault too. Autodesk does nothing but CAD packages. All in the top 20 of "software companies by revenue". PTC is number 42 and Bentley is 70 again CAD packages. It might be a niche, but it's pretty expensive niche then. Pure CAD companies Autodesk, PTC and Bentley made 2,5 billion dollars of revenue in 2014.
I think there is scope for some disruption from small companies willing to use STEP as the internal data model for their software but just working on small parts of the picture.
Well, it's not like all companies fixes their bugs or care about them. If, as the parent says, all CAD packages have such issue, what you gonna do?
Mostly I can fix the LibreOffice bug and make the document render correctly (unless it physically corrupts the document when saving), once physical material gets an error it's often impossible to fix.