Autodesk buys Eagle

[mikeselectricstuff]

http://www.stockmarketwire.com/article/5367432/Premier-Farnell-sells-Cadsoft-business.html

[rx8pilot]

Wow. wow. wow. wow.  The last 'major' upgrade was such a joke. I feel like its past the point of putting lipstick on a pig - it will need a very fundamental change to re-join modern PCB layout challenges.

Sent from my horrible mobile....

[janoc]

Well, if Autodesk bought them, then forget about anything that was somehow good on Eagle. It will likely become Windows only and an expensive slow piece of junk - as pretty much all software Autodesk has acquired over the years (Maya, 3D Studio, ...)

[PCB.Wiz]

Autodesk buys Eagle

Wow, that will cause many ripples.

When the Big CAD Corporates  get involved, we can usually expect
* Spin rather than substance
* Bean counters having more say on what is done
* More time between big fixes
* lower end offering having more caveats and fish-hooks, as they are there to drive commercial business, remember.


This will also greatly worry Altium and Mentor, as Autodesk is no minnow, and has a lot of seats, with some overlap in users.

I'd expect this to boost KiCad's popularity.

There is code about to port Eagle Designs to KiCad - IIRC one version uses the Eagle script, so must have Eagle installed, the other runs as Python.

[rx8pilot]

Maya was never cheap.

They can't make Eagle worse either. It is barely passable and the passage of time is not making it any better. Not sure what they may do with OS options, but Windows is not the end of the world. I have come to the conclusion that having WinXP,, Win7, Win10, OSX, and Linux on my home and business network is the way to go. Every OS has its issues limitations and lack of support in certain areas. Windows, at the end of the day is the most versatile business choice. Linux is still a specialized nerd OS that you can't just throw at a department as the only option. OSX is expensive and Apple is too controlling. Most engineering and manufacturing software is not coded for OSX although they are great personal machines especially for creative work. If I had to choose just one - I would pinch my nose and choose Windows (but only because I would go out of business choosing the others). Autodesk knows they need to choose their battles and if the conversation reveals that only an insignificant amount of business will be lost if they only code for Windows - that is what they will do.

[IanJ]

Hi all,

As an AutoCAD user, and an Eagle user I am actually looking forward to this......!
I'm stuck at Eagle 6.6 Pro anyways because the licensing upgrade path is expensive from where I am at. I've got nothing to lose!

I guess we'll see what happens now!

Ian.

[Kjelt]

wow unexpected!
Is Premier Farnell in bad weather or something?

[Eternauta]

Hi,

Farnell was bought some days ago from Daetwyler (howner of Distrelec, another component distributor). Now they sold Eagle, likely to make cache.
Autodesk should have funds to develop Eagle and remain on the ecad market.

Regards

[tszaboo]

If anything this is good news. Eagle is unusable as it is. I hope they decide to ditch everything except the name, and re-write it from starch. BTW, no-one cares about linux. Autodesk software is at least decent.

[chris_leyson]

I think in general this is good news, Autodesk have some very good 3D modeling software, Autodesk Inventor for example. After having to toggle between Orcad PCB then a 3D cad package to check clearances then back to Orcad and so on, Orcad's 3D capabilities are non existent. Well I can generate a step file from a layout but I still have to use an external 3D cad package to get the step mapping for each component just right. If I wanted to layout two or three or more stacked PCBs or a flexi-rigid assembly made from multiple boards then Orcad PCB is not really the right tool for the job. It will be interesting to see how much 3D capability Autodesk put into the final product if any, if it ended up as 2D like Autocad then it will probably be disappointing.

[poorchava]

Eagle is crap. Autodesk have some nice options when it comes to free versions for non-commercial use. Provided non-commercial use you can get full version of Autocad 2016 for example. Or full version of Fusion360, which despite being cloud-based is usable (cliud EULA is surprisingle non-abusive). IMO this is good news

[nctnico]

I think in general this is good news, Autodesk have some very good 3D modeling software, Autodesk Inventor for example. After having to toggle between Orcad PCB then a 3D cad package to check clearances then back to Orcad and so on, Orcad's 3D capabilities are non existent.

Are you talking about Orcad Layout PCB or Allegro? Orcad Layout has no 3D capabilities indeed but Allegro should have.

[free_electron]

re-write it from starch.

i think the starch version will easily outperform the regular programming language used ...

[chris_leyson]

Are you talking about Orcad Layout PCB or Allegro? Orcad Layout has no 3D capabilities indeed but Allegro should have

Hi nctinico, I'm using Orcad PCB Designer Professional, Cadence SPB 16.6, not the old Orcad 9 or 10. Wasn't aware the Cadance Allegro offered any extra 3D functionality.
Chris

[Sbampato12]

I'm a user of Eagle, as user of Inventor (and sometimes AutoCAD). I really like Autodesk products, and I like Eagle (I'm not in industrial business) it served me well the last years.

I think I'm like this news. Let's see what will happens...

[tszaboo]

re-write it from starch.

i think the starch version will easily outperform the regular programming language used ...

from scratch...  duh.

[bombledmonk]

re-write it from starch.

i think the starch version will easily outperform the regular programming language used ...

Do you think it will be a stand alone program?

[HighVoltage]

I made my first PCB's in AutoCAD (Version 2.3 DOS) step by step by hand in the early 1980s, when there was no PCB software available.
May be this is a good thing, I am still using AutoCAD from time to time.
 

[rx8pilot]

• I would hope they goto a subscription model at least as an option.
• DRASTICALLY improve the process of building a new library part.
• DRASTICALLY improve manual routing - push/shove, change trace width from point to point, and about 1000 other things
• DRASTICALLY improve the geometry creation and control of PCB, holes, and other physical restrictions

Eagle is fine for hobby work, but it kills me in a professional environment where it sits side by side with high-end software.

[SimonR]

I made my first PCB's in AutoCAD (Version 2.3 DOS) step by step by hand in the early 1980s, when there was no PCB software available.
May be this is a good thing, I am still using AutoCAD from time to time.

You mean there was no cheap PCB software available. We used cadstar on a PC-AT in 1985, befor that you needed a workstation

[LabSpokane]

Well, if Autodesk bought them, then forget about anything that was somehow good on Eagle. It will likely become Windows only and an expensive slow piece of junk - as pretty much all software Autodesk has acquired over the years (Maya, 3D Studio, ...)

AutoCad has been on the Mac for years. I have LT and Fusion 360 on there right now. I use Eagle and this is by far the best news I've heard about Eagle's future. If the backend of Eagle can be easily disentangled from the UI, things should improve greatly. There will, of course, be bumps in the road but still a much better situation.

[LabSpokane]

• I would hope they goto a subscription model at least as an option.
• DRASTICALLY improve the process of building a new library part.
• DRASTICALLY improve manual routing - push/shove, change trace width from point to point, and about 1000 other things
• DRASTICALLY improve the geometry creation and control of PCB, holes, and other physical restrictions

Eagle is fine for hobby work, but it kills me in a professional environment where it sits side by side with high-end software.

It will go to a subscription model. AFAIK, all new auto desk licenses are subscription. And that's a good thing because it stabilizes funds/budgeting for development.

[mikeselectricstuff]

• I would hope they goto a subscription model at least as an option.
• DRASTICALLY improve the process of building a new library part.
• DRASTICALLY improve manual routing - push/shove, change trace width from point to point, and about 1000 other things
• DRASTICALLY improve the geometry creation and control of PCB, holes, and other physical restrictions

Eagle is fine for hobby work, but it kills me in a professional environment where it sits side by side with high-end software.

It will go to a subscription model. AFAIK, all new auto desk licenses are subscription. And that's a good thing because it stabilizes funds/budgeting for development.

But it's a potential disaster for long-term maintainability.

[IanJ]

I made my first PCB's in AutoCAD (Version 2.3 DOS) step by step by hand in the early 1980s, when there was no PCB software available.
May be this is a good thing, I am still using AutoCAD from time to time.

You mean there was no cheap PCB software available. We used cadstar on a PC-AT in 1985, befor that you needed a workstation

I used Wintek's sMARTwORK for DOS. I think it came out in '85. I think it was about 1000UKP.

Ian.

[SimonR]

• I would hope they goto a subscription model at least as an option.
• DRASTICALLY improve the process of building a new library part.
• DRASTICALLY improve manual routing - push/shove, change trace width from point to point, and about 1000 other things
• DRASTICALLY improve the geometry creation and control of PCB, holes, and other physical restrictions

Eagle is fine for hobby work, but it kills me in a professional environment where it sits side by side with high-end software.

It will go to a subscription model. AFAIK, all new auto desk licenses are subscription. And that's a good thing because it stabilizes funds/budgeting for development.

But it's a potential disaster for long-term maintainability.

I agree  it's a potential disaster for long-term maintainability.
whether subscriptions are good or not is irrelevant. Its the potential of continuous updates that is potentially bad. Or even worse forced continuous updates. Have you tried converting a complex doc file to docx? word always gets it wrong in some way that needs manual correction. You have to have the option to run an old version for old designs, so you better hope any new subscription model allows that.