Rumor has it...

[amspire]

Does Eagle have a reliable Altium importer? If it doesn't, it may be a good reason to want some ex-Altium programmers.

[rx8pilot]

Does Eagle have a reliable Altium importer? If it doesn't, it may be a good reason to want some ex-Altium programmers.

No, but Altium and Circuit Studio have excellent Eagle importers.

[technolomaniac]

In fact I dont disagree that subscription is a means to create a predictable revenue stream.  It is also not a new concept.  You just paid it as maintenance or you paid for the upgrade when you decided it was time to move up.  The difference here is that there is no upfront cost and the upgrade decision is set aside because we're always developing the tools (on the hook to do real work) and you're always able to get the latest.  Pay the 10K up front and then maintenance if you like, but this is a better deal. 

WRT to virtual machines and maintaining legacy files and such, I am well aware of the concept (recall EAGLE runs on Windows, Linux and Mac and to test all 3 operating systems and distros is not an easy exercise).  That said, I would never subject my customer's or my company's files to the prospect that "well, we'll just keep this virtual machine running and that will mean we have access to our data and we're able to edit it." That's at best irresponsible and at worst negligent. 

Anytime I think something needs to be around for a while, I would expect to bring it forward and update it to work in the latest version of whatever SW is our company standard, anytime it requires an edit (otherwise I maintain technical debt and risk lock out).  Fine if all I'm doing is sending legacy Gerber files from Doc. Control to a mfg but I will not create new "product of record" (even versions) in old software.  That's a recipe for disaster and makes our ability to maintain it all the more difficult.  This is the same with source code as it is for HW designs.  And it is dangerous.

Call it a straw man argument but the point I was making was that there is far less of this going on than people like to admit, when caught up in the subscription debate behind the veil of an online forum.  All I would only ask that you really think about this, in an honest way, rather than saying "when I need to open a 20 year old file and change a DIP package to an SOIC I use a 20 year old piece of SW on a virtual machine which wasnt a concept 20 years ago..." Sorry man, I'm calling "BS" on this.  And if you do this, I would implore you - from someone who has been around this industry for longer than that - please dont do this.  I have seen more designs fail this way and fail hard in mfg when someone thought "oh, we'll just open this up with "legacy SW xyz on Windows 3.1 and it should work just fine".  I guess if you're the only engineer and this is a hobby.  But in 20+ years supporting customers, I've seen more than my share of major customers spend hundreds of thousands of dollars making mistakes like this...It's generally blamed on the "new guy" but it happens at every level. (Protip:  repour your polygons...please)

And to the point that OS plays a part in the ability of SW to run as does the company from whom you bought that SW's willingness to support you if/when they decide to, and your ability to import legacy data and your ability to read the file format in a normal, human readable way; I stand by my statements.  EAGLE makes this pretty darn easy and I'd ask you to ask yourself (if you're not using an open source alternative)...try reading the file format and then answer the question: who owns your data?  The whole concept of a Vault seems to say "dont come in here...this is off limits".  Now I wouldnt be offended if you stopped reading this and printed out every design you ever built to PDF just in case.  And backed up your gerbers.  We "used" to do this and mature companies have this concept in a strong way...it's called document control.

I also stand by subscription because here is the unassailable truth -- EAGLE has grown as a result of subscription, thereby enabling more people to use the software at a lower cost of entry.  And this growth is reflected both in the developed world (where many of you appear to be posting from) but perhaps more importantly, in developing economies where people have less up front capital to work with.  We have also made the premium license available to students & schools (for free), increased the capabilities of the Standard edition and made zero effort to either lock-in your data OR reduce or limit features in the free hobbyist version. 

But alas, I've made this argument here, many times before.  Still, for everyone else's benefit, please find a company that makes so much available to students and teachers and startups for free...Try it.  Find another company brave enough to sell the sort of mechanical tools we do for $300 / yr.  Or an ECAD license with support and updates and reall development by industry veterans for $100 / yr.
 
Because it isnt Altium and it isnt Solidworks and it isnt Mentor and it isnt Cadence.  Oh well.  I fear at least some of you on this board were lost on that one point that, well, I dont believe is a point.  Which is my point.  But I admit, it makes for great internet fodder. 

Best regards,

Matt

[james_s]

All these comparisons that try to spin subscription as some kind of benefit to the customer always compare the cost to someone upgrading to every new version that comes out, which is something almost nobody does. It would be nice if companies would at least admit the obvious truth, that as maturing software gives people less and less compelling reason to upgrade frequently, subscription is a method of extracting more money from the customer by effectively forcing them to keep upgrading continuously. In exchange for that, the user gets the nuisance of constant updates that constantly change things around and introduce new bugs. There is virtually no benefit to the customer, it is only a cash cow. If anything there is even less motivation to actually improve the product, you don't have to entice anyone to go out and plunk down money for a whole new version, you only need to make just enough improvements to keep people from dumping it and going through the effort of learning an alternate product.

I frequently use software packages for 10 years or more without upgrading, I totally get that isn't providing much money to companies making these products but that isn't my problem, I'm not a charity. I'm just glad that free open source software is finally reaching the point where I can use it for almost everything.

[rx8pilot]

As for the subscription..... I have mixed feelings. I needed the updates for Solidworks and Mastercam but since I have been off maintenance too long - I nearly have to buy them again. Total cost about $18,000 plus about $3,000/year in maintenance.

Or, I could transition to Fusion 360 which is both subscription AND cloud-based data along with Eagle which was $600/year. It took a LOT to convince me to bail out of Solidworks where I have 20 years of experience and Mastercam 10 years of experience. Fusion 360 is really nice - very capable. Eagle still sucks donkey balls on a good day, but they have begun integration with Fusion 360 (bi-directional sync). This feature is a HUGE thing for me since I design mechanics and electronics for very tightly integrated projects.

As much as I did not want the subscription and cloud stuff - the economics are very good in my world. I may be willing to deal with the stupid horrible nature of Eagle just for the sync capability with Fusion.

[technolomaniac]

Thanks for trying it and glad you like Fusion!  I promise we are working hard on making the user experience better!  And I would welcome the chance to riff with you on what you like / hate to make sure we know the issues and fix what's most important to you.  UI/UX and the items I mentioned in my earlier post are all planned for this year.  Best regards, Matt

[rx8pilot]

Thanks Matt, I would be happy to run through my list of most important issues.

Most of it is very practical.

Short and misplld from my mobile......

[AlanS]

Look guys - I'm not even a gifted amateur - but at my price point Eagle was it. Until the takeover not much happened - but things seem to be changing for the better. Whilst I don't like subscription models generally, for me it makes sense to go up and down the subscription fee range as I need the service. I don't do this every day - or every quarter.

The free product serviced my early attempts - but I had to go up to the next level because when I went to a more complicated circuit some 120 odd components were displayed increasing distances south of my placement area - making it hard for me to get an adequate overview.

Integration with Fusion is going to be wonderful and there seems to be an aggression or focus to get real progress both in the development and support teams.

To date my experience with the support guys has been outstanding.

By the way, I made my first PCBs on an A0 drafting board using Letraset, doughnuts and lots of curves. Eagle is easier.

[technolomaniac]

Awesome.  DM me and we can get a thread going the forums to discuss.  I am super keen to learn from your experience and the experience of others using the tools.  We have a lot to do but I want to prioritize things appropriately.  best regards, matt

[ikrase]

I tolerate Fusion 360 because of their free license for entities making less than 100K.

Unfortunately, FreeCad seems to still be a mess.

Subscription models are no solution -what if the company fails, or discontinues the product as seems to be becoming more common?

Then you're in the same position only you can't use a ancient VM archive.

Subscriptions are also terrible for people who could budget the fixed cost of a long term license.

From my point of view, these companies should count their blessing s that they are not forced to re-release discontinued versions under the GNU GPL. This rent-extraction is just not ethical without providing real value in either updates or support -and even then one might prefer to pay for support al la carte.

[EEVblog]

Most of the development team was NOT focused on FPGA. 

Correct, but that was the "vision" of the tool, the hardware group (that I was in), and the future of the company.
The future was programmable logic, it was "modular" based design, then it was the IoT etc.
How many people are using those Altium features now?

Why do you think the board gave Nick the boot?
It wasn't because the company was doing great, the company and share price was in the toilet.

Go back and read the forums at the time, hardly anyone wanted the FPGA stuff, or the modular stuff, or the IoT, they just wanted to design their damn boards. To PCB designers it seemed as though all Altium cared about was this stuff.

So please dont rewrite history. 

I'm not, it's a fact.
Are you going to deny the (in)famous "Turning the world of electronics design upside down" campaign when they made the PCB design tool optional extra? All the basic package came with was FPGA and schematic. Altium was the laughing stock of the industry.
Are you going to deny that the company deliberately bundled the FPGA stuff with the basic PCB tool, even though hardly anyone used the FPGA tool?
Are you going to deny the final ridiculous move to China to be part of the IoT future?
Are you going to deny the company making the ridiculous acquisition of Morfik for 15% of the company stock? (that was ultimately Nick's downfall, unknown to him)
All this was part of the "vision".
Go read the forums over the years and you'll see what hard core users thought.
But granted, the "vision" also included everything integrated int the one tool. Genuinely useful stuff like 3D and MCAD integration etc.

This is not accurate and unfair to the guys that built all of the other capabilities that made it easy to displace PADS / OrCAD / Allegro / DX / Expedition.

No offence intended to the programmers involved in any of it, even the FPGA stuff, the FPGA stuff was actually very neat.
Of course Altium continued to slowly develop some other good core focused stuff, but that's beside the point.
Go read the yearly company reports and shareholder presentations and you'll see the clear focus.
It all failed, totally.
FPGA failed.
Hardware failed.
IoT failed.
Modular design? Basically failed as intended, although you can argue that some useful stuff came from it that some people use.

  Again, I fed my family on those features and knew first hand where we started at the beginning of the sales process, what customers responded to, and felt perhaps more directly than anyone here the effects of where we ended up at the end of the competitive bake-off.   -MB

Tell us how many customers actually used the FPGA tools in real world design?

[EEVblog]

So, for me, I would never employ anyone who worked at Altium (except Dave), either in their sales department or in their coding department. I have found that they are either untruthful or poor with their coding skills.

Every single coder I knew at Altium was top notch.
Often it's not up to the individual coder in how things work out unfortunately.

[rachaelp]

This rent-extraction is just not ethical without providing real value in either updates or support

Have you looked at how many updates and how many features have been added by Autodesk since they released v8?

https://www.element14.com/community/community/cadsoft_eagle/blog/2018/01/23/eagle-year-end-review-2017

For me this starts getting interesting around 8.3.0 with the introduction of the Fusion360 integration, then 8.4.0 gives us SPICE integration and Live DRC, 8.5.0 brings Push & Shove routing...

In addition to the items listed in the link above, 8.6.0 brought a new CAM processor with better outputs which support the latest Gerber standards and generate much more efficient Gerber files (no more long export times with lots of complex polygon fills) and also a manufacturing flyoff which gives a great preview of how the PCB will look (only 2D at the moment), lots of useful stats about the board and the ability to export images/DXF files.

Have you ever tried getting technical support for EAGLE?

The support team are excellent and are always very responsive, and since v8 any bugs which are reported are usually found and fixed very quickly. I've not had such a positive support experience with any other software supplier (especially ECAD vendors) ever.

Best Regards,

Rachael

[EEVblog]

To say that if you didnt support the FPGA workflow at Altium you were shown the door is untrue

That's not what I was saying.
I'm saying that if you didn't support the companies (i.e. Nick Martin's) "vision" or marketing or product focus you were given a dressing down.
I know, because I was hired to, and I quote my job description "give my professional engineering opinion" on the tool. I did, and got hammered for it, as did others I know, I lived it too. I learned pretty quick you had to tow the line and not question the direction of the company. Most people who had issues with the company and/or product direction were usually too afraid to say anything outside of the lunch room or privacy of their own cubicle. I saw the look on people's faces when they came back from a dressing down from the CEO because they spoke up.

Altium is by no means unique in the industry when it comes to this, in fact it's very common. Nothing to see here folks, move along now...

[MarkL]

In fact I dont disagree that subscription is a means to create a predictable revenue stream.  It is also not a new concept.  You just paid it as maintenance or you paid for the upgrade when you decided it was time to move up.  The difference here is that there is no upfront cost and the upgrade decision is set aside because we're always developing the tools (on the hook to do real work) and you're always able to get the latest.  Pay the 10K up front and then maintenance if you like, but this is a better deal.

I do like.  Maybe more like $5k given the current state of eagle.  I'm willing to pay a premium.  But the hitch is you don't get to turn it off when I decide to stop paying maintenance. 

The "decision is set aside" doesn't mean a burden has been relieved.  It just means the choice is different.  The decision is now it's your way or the highway.

I find Autodesk's view that they know THE best financial and business model for everyone to be very arrogant.

[daqq]

I also stand by subscription because here is the unassailable truth -- EAGLE has grown as a result of subscription, thereby enabling more people to use the software at a lower cost of entry.

So, instead of paying X $ once I get to pay several times X $ over the course of many years? Awesome!

Find another company brave enough to sell the sort of mechanical tools we do for $300 / yr.  Or an ECAD license with support and updates and reall development by industry veterans for $100 / yr.

My main problem with this is not the concept of a subscription. Sure, there are people who are OK with it, and people who'd rather use MS Pain(t) for their PCBs. It's not my cup of tea, but some people might be OK with it.

The main dick move here is changing the model. Had Eagle just started out as a subscription service I would not have routed a fair amount of PCBs using it and taught it to kids on a robotics course and advised people to use it on forums and.... I just would not have invested time into it, I would just have avoided it altogether. There are people who'd be OK with the new model, good for them, the people who'd not be OK with that would simply ignore it and NOT INVEST THEIR TIME INTO LEARNING IT AND USING IT.

Now however I have a serious investment of time (the time spent learning and the projects in which I have used it) for a software that I can't see a future that works for me. Thanks Autodesk!

[nctnico]

Are you still using the same SW 10 years later on a later operating system?  That raises questions about whether the SW will generate the same outputs from the data sources given the change in OS / OS-specific libraries.  Are you archiving the OS as well?  And what about the HW?

Key word: virtual machines. VMs are also easy to backup so you can keep a legacy system alive until there are no more (emulated) x86 processors available. And yes, the legacy software will still generate the same output. No worries.
Upgrading old files to new versions is stupid because it requires lots of checking, introduces chances of errors and most importantly of all: it costs money which isn't necessarily recovered.

I frequently use software packages for 10 years or more without upgrading, I totally get that isn't providing much money to companies making these products but that isn't my problem, I'm not a charity.

Same here!

[rx8pilot]

Your Eagle files are still in tact if you stop paying for the subscription. They can be read into other pieces of software.

In terms of cost, the subscription fee is far cheaper than any of the big boy tools. Eagle is also a lot less software..... for now. They are clearly putting considerable effort into development trying to escape the DIY/hobbyist genre.

Fusion is a solid, professional tool that easily competes with Solidworks, Mastercam, 3rd party rendering, 3rd party version control, and more..... but for a fraction of the long term cost. Now that we see a glimpse of integration of Eagle with Fusion 360 - its moving up. At the moment with my legacy software, rendering is a separate piece of software.... import/export/fees. Data management for the giant pile of files.... your on your own. Simulation in Solidworks? That costs a lot more money.

Fusion can read all of my legacy Solidworks data and bring it in as a solid. I lose history, but Fusion can still easily modify the models. Not nearly as bad as I expected.

The learning curve is steep and for the next few months I will be overlapping Solidworks and Fusion 360.

Short and misplld from my mobile......

[Quarlo Klobrigney]

I'm trying to migrate from an XP to 7 machine (kicking & screaming) I have many 7 machines but some tools only worked in XP. Now that they have "matured" I can get into the modern age completely. My problem is this, nobody answers the phone in Florida. Nobody. The "expert" via chat at Autodesk Pakistan say they cannot find my info after 20 minutes of back and forth babble. The license server no longer works for the secret codes given by email to authorize Eagle v7.
Fubar and screw Autodesk for anything especially THE CLOUD. I'm done with their bullshit.
Anybody have ideas about the v7 license on the 7 machine. Tried everything...

[james_s]

Every single coder I knew at Altium was top notch.
Often it's not up to the individual coder in how things work out unfortunately.

I've been involved with a number of companies/products with dubious reputations, and in nearly every case the individual contributors (engineers, coders, etc) were mostly excellent. You can have the best team on the planet and the product can still be crap if that's the direction management chooses to take it. At just about any medium to large size company, the product is a reflection of the management behind it. Incompetent engineers can make a bad product worse but a bad product does not indicate incompetence of the engineers.  It's very common for a team to not have the resources they need to do it right, or for constant re-orgs to shuffle people around so that a great deal of time is spending ramping up or re-learning what somebody else had been doing.

[rachaelp]

My problem is this, nobody answers the phone in Florida. Nobody. The "expert" via chat at Autodesk Pakistan say they cannot find my info after 20 minutes of back and forth babble. The license server no longer works for the secret codes given by email to authorize Eagle v7.
Fubar and screw Autodesk for anything especially THE CLOUD. I'm done with their bullshit.
Anybody have ideas about the v7 license on the 7 machine. Tried everything...

Whenever I install my old v7 license it works fine. There is a license key file which you need plus a 10 character activation code to go with it. If you've lost either of these you'll need to get them sent again. If you post up on the official Autodesk EAGLE forum asking for help getting your license sorted out one of the support people will no doubt contact you directly. Jorge and Ed are very responsive and should get you sorted out.

The Autodesk EAGLE forum can be found here: https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/eagle-forum/bd-p/3500

Best Regards,

Rachael

[KE5FX]

The main dick move here is changing the model.

IMHO, the dick move was lying about changing the model.  In itself, changing the model was just icing on the cake.

Once trust is gone, it's hard to restore.  Everyone who feels tempted to buy into all of the hot air and promises coming from Autodesk representatives would do well to remember how this started.

[DerekG]

Your Eagle files are still in tact if you stop paying for the subscription. They can be read into other pieces of software.

The good news is that DipTrace has import filters for both EAGLE schematics & EAGLE PCBs.

The special offer (including links) for Eagle users is discussed in the thread below:

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/diptrace/diptrace-special-offer-for-eagle-users/

ADDED:

The Altium Circuit Studio special offer for Eagle users is discussed in the thread below:

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/circuit-studio/half-price-circuit-studio/

And a direct link to the offer is:

http://www.altium.com/eagle-switch/circuitstudio/#page1

[technolomaniac]

Nobody lied dude.  Read the post.  Jeez.

[rx8pilot]

IMHO, the dick move was lying about changing the model.  In itself, changing the model was just icing on the cake.

Once trust is gone, it's hard to restore.  Everyone who feels tempted to buy into all of the hot air and promises coming from Autodesk representatives would do well to remember how this started.

Did I miss the lie? What was the lie?