Author Topic: The Autodesk Eagle edition  (Read 194128 times)

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Offline PCB.Wiz

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #500 on: March 15, 2017, 12:09:45 am »
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2.1.3 Territory. Except as otherwise authorized in writing by Autodesk, the licenses granted in this Agreement are granted only for the Territory. Nothing in this Agreement permits Licensee (including, without limitation, Licensee’s Personnel, if any) to Install or Access the Licensed Materials outside of the Territory.

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37 “Territory” (a) means the country, countries or jurisdiction(s) specified in the License Identification, or (b) if there is no such License Identification, or no country or jurisdiction is specified in the License Identification, means the country in which Licensee acquires a license to the Autodesk Materials. If the License Identification specifies, or Licensee acquires the Autodesk Materials in, a member country of the European Union or the European Free Trade Association, Territory means all the countries of the European Union and the European Free Trade Association.

http://download.autodesk.com/us/FY17/Suites/LSA/en-US/lsa.html

What have they been smoking? I can't install it on a laptop and use it abroad?

Many of the larger USA corporates have some truly bizarre license agreements, which try to constrain your 'location'.
They really are so far out of touch with the mobility of many designers, they are stuck back in the 'Enterprise' sales model mindsets.
 

Offline PCB.Wiz

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #501 on: March 15, 2017, 12:11:27 am »
In my professional life, if that customer was me and it was holding up production work for over two weeks Autodesk wouldn't be talking to me, they wouldn't be talking to the Chief Executive, they'd be talking to the company's lawyers.
Yup, and you would be already using another package.

Note that, at the time of writing, Autodesk still haven't fixed this and the customers (multiple) concerned haven't been able to get a login to Eagle for over two weeks.
When things fail this badly, one really has to wonder about the corporate risk assessments.
A Chinese or Russian hacker can so easily knee-cap a USA corporate, that it is frankly laughable.

If I was an Autodesk stockholder, I'd asking at the next shareholder meeting, why they take such school-boy risks with stockholder value, by exposing the company goodwill to internet hacking ?
Any risk-averse fund manager would divest this stock.
« Last Edit: March 15, 2017, 12:16:50 am by PCB.Wiz »
 

Offline FrankBuss

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #502 on: March 15, 2017, 12:56:21 am »
If I was an Autodesk stockholder, I'd asking at the next shareholder meeting, why they take such school-boy risks with stockholder value, by exposing the company goodwill to internet hacking ?
Any risk-averse fund manager would divest this stock.

Eagle is a footnote in their financial report. Autodesk makes more than $2 billion profit per year and they bought CadSoft for $25 million, so about 1%. It could go down the drain and they won't care much about it, but just buy Altium next.
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Offline Cerebus

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #503 on: March 15, 2017, 03:28:46 am »
If I was an Autodesk stockholder, I'd asking at the next shareholder meeting, why they take such school-boy risks with stockholder value, by exposing the company goodwill to internet hacking ?
Any risk-averse fund manager would divest this stock.

Eagle is a footnote in their financial report. Autodesk makes more than $2 billion profit per year and they bought CadSoft for $25 million, so about 1%. It could go down the drain and they won't care much about it, but just buy Altium next.

Think more about reputational risk than strict financial liability. Company stocks can take a severe hit, out of proportion to any actual liabilities, when bad press appears. In almost every publicly quoted company, C suite executives spend most of their time worrying about stock prices, followed by their golf handicap and finally might devote some time to the actual business that they are in.
Anybody got a syringe I can use to squeeze the magic smoke back into this?
 

Offline kaz911

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #504 on: March 15, 2017, 02:25:19 pm »
If I was an Autodesk stockholder, I'd asking at the next shareholder meeting, why they take such school-boy risks with stockholder value, by exposing the company goodwill to internet hacking ?
Any risk-averse fund manager would divest this stock.

Eagle is a footnote in their financial report. Autodesk makes more than $2 billion profit per year and they bought CadSoft for $25 million, so about 1%. It could go down the drain and they won't care much about it, but just buy Altium next.

No AutoDesk has REVENUE of US$ 2bl +/- per year (best year so far 2.5bl) :)

Net income for FY2016 was minus 330ml. Net income last 4 quarters have been negative. 2015 had a sales growth - probably everybody buying permanent licenses - 2016 and 2017 sales are down.

2017 data is as far as I can tell from non-audited accounts based on the 4 quarterly reports. So that is why I used the audited 2016 results even if the 2017 is more or less available.

http://quotes.wsj.com/ADSK/financials/annual/income-statement

I'm not saying AutoDesk is in a bad state - but based on their financial performance and their subscription model - if we get another market crash - some of the first stocks I'll short will be Adobe and AutoDesk as they will loose a lot of revenue fast due to their subscription models.
 

Offline Deridex

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #505 on: March 15, 2017, 04:42:09 pm »
Eagle always had 2 major advantages in my sight:
- It just worked. Always.
- It was quite cheap

Sadly it seems like Autodesk removed both advantages. Reading about the 8.02 version on the autodesk forums was scary.
If Autodesk gets the stability back, offers buy licences and improves eagles abilities in a huge way, then i might take a look at it again.
But so far i don't see anyy reason at all to upgrade to a actual version. :-//

Also i feel realy sorry for Jorge Garcia. He is the one that has to try to calm down all the people that are quite angry, because of the changes.
 

Offline Cerebus

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #506 on: March 15, 2017, 04:49:57 pm »
I'm not saying AutoDesk is in a bad state - but based on their financial performance and their subscription model - if we get another market crash - some of the first stocks I'll short will be Adobe and AutoDesk as they will loose a lot of revenue fast due to their subscription models.

This is the thing I don't understand about all these people moving exclusively to subscription style models. I understand that they want a recurring revenue source. What I don't understand is their willingness to make themselves sensitive to short term economic conditions. Unlike selling software outright, where the marginal cost of sales can approach zero, a subscription model requires you to keep spending on the additional services that back-end these subscriptions as long as you have *any* outstanding subscribers and even if you're achieving zero sales.

When you budget for new outright sales you always have a knowledge that they are uncertain, that it is possible that you'll have a really bad month, and you make plans accordingly. If, on the other hand, you have a recurring revenue stream you tend to rely on it, and don't plan for the eventuality that 30% of it might disappear from next month's budget.

Any software rental that can be stopped and started at will by customers will be one of the first things to go when customers feel the need to 'tighten their purse strings' in the face of an economic downturn. I can mentally hear an accountant saying "Can we do without X for three months?" and if the answer sounds anything like 'yes' cutting funding for that for the next three months. Note that this is very different from annual maintenance fees which, because of their longer cycle, give you more time to spot a trend and respond to it. It's one thing to say "we might find ourselves a bit short in three months" and another entirely to say "1/3 of our customers disappeared this month".

So yes, I think that you're right that the next time we see any sharp, general, economic downturn that we may see some notable failures from companies that have opted to go wholesale for subscription style software services.

Anybody got a syringe I can use to squeeze the magic smoke back into this?
 
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Offline ebastler

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #507 on: March 15, 2017, 05:08:37 pm »
[...] if we get another market crash - some of the first stocks I'll short will be Adobe and AutoDesk as they will loose a lot of revenue fast due to their subscription models.

That one I don't understand. If they were still selling permanent licenses, they would take a disproportionate hit if the economy turns bad -- because many of their customers will postpone buying the next upgrade, or investing in an entirely new software platform, when money is tight.

Subscription income should actually make them more resilient in this respect: Customers will have to continue paying their subscription fees if they want to stay productive. Subscription fees are operating expenses, not investments, and hence more likely to remain steady. Good for Autodesk (and presumably one of their reasons for the transition to subscriptions...)

Or did I misunderstand your point here?
 

Offline MagicSmoker

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #508 on: March 15, 2017, 05:09:50 pm »
This is the thing I don't understand about all these people moving exclusively to subscription style models. I understand that they want a recurring revenue source. What I don't understand is their willingness to make themselves sensitive to short term economic conditions. Unlike selling software outright, where the marginal cost of sales can approach zero, a subscription model requires you to keep spending on the additional services that back-end these subscriptions as long as you have *any* outstanding subscribers and even if you're achieving zero sales. ...

This is a very intriguing point! It might explain, for example, how Autodesk managed to bring in over $2B in revenue last year yet still failed to make a profit!
 

Offline XFDDesign

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #509 on: March 15, 2017, 08:46:24 pm »
Yawn...

I still dislike Autodesk's move to the subscription model as much as I disliked it when it was announced. And yes, I also fully intend to stick with my permanent 7.x license, and have a close look at the alternatives.

But it seems that we have been going round in circles for weeks in this thread, without adding anything new to the discussion. Is this just to make sure that the thread stays at the top of the Eagle forum, so sporadic visitors don't overlook it and become aware of Autodesk's appaling move? Maybe one of the moderators could make this thread sticky and pin it to the top of the list, to save us the bother of permanent repetitions?  ;)

Or maybe this is our self-help and support group, and we still need to talk to cope with the pain...  :P

I think (i.e. my opinion is) that this keeps going because we're getting to watch a multi-car pileup in progress. From the outset, this was a bad idea. Some corporate tool who speaks only in buzzwords and non-objective platitudes pushed an idea that was incompatible with the market the acquisition was placed in. So like watching a tsunami from atop a mountain as it approaches, then crashes into, a village, we're getting to watch the fall out be exactly what we said it would be. I think most of the Eagle users have come up with their solution to moving forward, so now we're just watching the fallout.
 

Offline james_s

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #510 on: March 15, 2017, 09:48:32 pm »
Yeah, there's the trainwreck aspect, and people in general, myself included like to complain about stuff. Feels good to complain about the world, even if it's something I can't do anything about. Engineers are good at complaining.
 

Offline kaz911

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #511 on: March 16, 2017, 08:12:08 am »
[...] if we get another market crash - some of the first stocks I'll short will be Adobe and AutoDesk as they will loose a lot of revenue fast due to their subscription models.

That one I don't understand. If they were still selling permanent licenses, they would take a disproportionate hit if the economy turns bad -- because many of their customers will postpone buying the next upgrade, or investing in an entirely new software platform, when money is tight.

Subscription income should actually make them more resilient in this respect: Customers will have to continue paying their subscription fees if they want to stay productive. Subscription fees are operating expenses, not investments, and hence more likely to remain steady. Good for Autodesk (and presumably one of their reasons for the transition to subscriptions...)

Or did I misunderstand your point here?

No - before if you had a license that expired - it would cost you dearly to "come back" in the upgrade/maintenance fold. So if you stopped updating at v2012 - to update to v2015 you would have to pay extra for the time missed. Now you just stop - and when you want to restart - you just subscribe again. So it is a no-brainer to stop subscriptions. Any financial departments will focus on expensive subscriptions in a downturn. If only downside is " loss of access " at end of period - that is the first place they will insist on saving. A big company might now cut all subscriptions - but maybe take 75% offline for a while.
 

Offline flukester

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #512 on: March 16, 2017, 01:38:51 pm »
I just received an email from Autodesk about EAGLE 8.1.

Apparently, they added Obstacle Avoidance to the routing tool. They have a little video to demonstrate.

In the email, there is also a promo code to get 50% off the Premium Subscription price, because I am a *legacy EAGLE customer*.. (I own one of the "Maker" license they were offering for a while).

It's good that they try to improve the product but like many others who have posted here, this is probably not enough to get me to Subscribe.. Perhaps if and when they fully integrate with Fusion 360, we'll see..


Antoine
 

Offline Cerebus

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #513 on: March 16, 2017, 06:22:03 pm »
A further twist. The beta of Diptrace 3.1 was out a few days ago. They have added Eagle XML import.
Anybody got a syringe I can use to squeeze the magic smoke back into this?
 

Offline timb

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #514 on: March 16, 2017, 06:35:43 pm »
A further twist. The beta of Diptrace 3.1 was out a few days ago. They have added Eagle XML import.

So, it can natively import an Eagle file now? Good! I always found it quite a pain that you actually had to install Eagle and run a ULP to export to DipTrace.

I didn't realize the beta was out, will have to pick it up tonight!
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic; e.g., Cheez Whiz, Hot Dogs and RF.
 

Offline latigid on

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #515 on: March 16, 2017, 07:26:43 pm »
The sad thing, especially for the developers, is that we're still talking about the unworkable subscription model over the new software features.

Imagine if the announcement was: EAGLE 8.1 with obstacle avoidance and follow-me router, full version $1299, upgrade from v7.x: $500, upgrade from v6.x: $850.

Especially for v6 users, I think a lot would go for this route. Could AD be convinced otherwise?  :horse:
 

Online MarkL

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #516 on: March 16, 2017, 07:30:23 pm »
A further twist. The beta of Diptrace 3.1 was out a few days ago. They have added Eagle XML import.

Wow!  Someone who actually cares about the Eagle customer base!

I'll definitely be checking out DipTrace.
 

Offline ebastler

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #517 on: March 16, 2017, 08:53:07 pm »
Imagine if the announcement was: EAGLE 8.1 with obstacle avoidance and follow-me router, full version $1299, upgrade from v7.x: $500, upgrade from v6.x: $850.

You aren't asking a lot, aren't you?  ;)
Just give me the permanent license model back, Autodesk, and give me a bunch of significant new features, and I'll be alright.  8)
 

Offline macegr

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #518 on: March 16, 2017, 09:00:20 pm »
Could someone even attempt to describe to me how obstacle avoidance is any different from the follow-me router in single-ended mode, as demonstrated in this video from 2011?


Did they really just change the name, perhaps tweak 5% of the behavior, and call it a new feature? It's not even push-and-shove!!!

What the actual eff.
 

Offline GlowingGhoul

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #519 on: March 16, 2017, 10:45:17 pm »

Did they really just change the name, perhaps tweak 5% of the behavior, and call it a new feature? It's not even push-and-shove!!!

What the actual eff.


:-DD
 

Offline macegr

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #520 on: March 17, 2017, 12:19:55 am »
In the "sneak peak" two weeks ago Matt said it was not an upgraded Follow Me but was developed from scratch. But if it does virtually the same thing with maybe a 5% tweak in improved behavior, does it really matter what happened behind the scenes? Do customers ever see that or care beyond how it works? More evidence that what happens internally within their company is more important than customer experience.
 

Offline ahbushnell

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #521 on: March 17, 2017, 12:34:04 am »
I have worked on multiple projects that the network we used had to be air gaped from the internet.  That would preclude using Eagle now.

 
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Offline PCB.Wiz

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #522 on: March 17, 2017, 04:28:16 am »
I have worked on multiple projects that the network we used had to be air gaped from the internet.  That would preclude using Eagle now.

Indeed, & I would say such cases are increasing, not decreasing.
Every week there are more reports of  leaks and attacks....
 

Offline gildasd

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #523 on: March 17, 2017, 07:48:46 am »
I have worked on multiple projects that the network we used had to be air gaped from the internet.  That would preclude using Eagle now.
Same thing here, air gapping isthe only viable option for smaller companies.
I'm electronically illiterate
 

Offline jgarc063

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Re: The Autodesk Eagle edition
« Reply #524 on: March 17, 2017, 09:55:53 pm »
Could someone even attempt to describe to me how obstacle avoidance is any different from the follow-me router in single-ended mode, as demonstrated in this video from 2011?


Did they really just change the name, perhaps tweak 5% of the behavior, and call it a new feature? It's not even push-and-shove!!!

What the actual eff.

Hi Macegr,

It's actually very different, you would have to try it for yourself to see the difference. But here's the explanation.

Obstacle avoidance sets the ground floor to build push and shove so this is a milestone on the way to push and shove. The follow-me router is basically the autorouter being run on a single airwire either from one end or from both ends of the airwire. Depending on your mouse position the Autorouter will come up with a route which may include any number of transitions or bends, you can't predict what the follow-me router will produce in relation to your mouse position.

The Obstacle avoidance mode works differently, as long as you don't encounter an obstacle you are just manually routing like normal with full control. Once you encounter an obstacle, EAGLE will immediately walk around it, following your mouse cursor. This affords more predictability and hence greater control while routing. With the Follow-Me Router you are merely giving EAGLE two points and letting EAGLE figure out how it wants to get there, with this mode your dictating to EAGLE how it gets from point A to point B and it's smart enough to walk around barriers.

I understand the confusion from the videos since you can't see the mouse clicks, but try it out and you'll see it's nothing like the Follow me router.

I hope this is helpful.

Let me know if there's anything else I can do for you.

Best Regards,
Jorge Garcia
 
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