A new home for SketchUp
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Ah, for example my old friend Lightscape -- look what Autodesk did to it... I'm of the opinion Google's benign neglect may have been preferable to some active discombobulation. We shall see in due time where Trimble's acquisition falls on the scale.
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No more evil than Apple, Adobe or MS. All 4 are pretty much the same imho (the big players). AutoDesk has done better with recent products. 123D suite, AutoCAD WS (web/iOS/Droid), SketchBook mobile and so on. I think they need to look at LT's price again with recent free LT clones in the wild. Hard to pay for LT when DraftSight is free (unsupported).
But yes, they do their job.@valerostudio said:
I knew I would stir the pot with that Autodesk comment.
Do I love Autodesk, no.
Are they pure evil, kinda.
But all I am saying is that I would rather trust the future of SketchUp in the hands of a company that deals with this kind of software. I don't know Trimble from a hole in the wall. I have never ever heard of them mentioned on this forum or any other site for that matter. From the looks of their website, I fear for what SketchUp will become. I trust AutoCAD and 3D Studio and Photoshop to do its thing day in and day out without fear that in 2014 the software is no longer available or gets turned into a land surveying program. That's all.
I just want my little old SketchUp friend to be safe and unharmed.
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@bjanzen said:
On to my third major buyout of SketchUp by Trimble. You're entitled to your opinion, and I'm entitled to ignore your opinion based on my personal experiences.
What's happened in all three cases, and part of what attracted me to this kind of company, was that some outsider finds some technology that another company owns (my current employer), but does not provide the proper value to that technology. The outsider realizes that this is a bargain, and just like picking up a pound puppy, they provide a little love and care, the technology grows up to be a REALLY NICE dog, er, technology.
I have no reason to believe Trimble will do good
or do evil 
with Sketchup.I do not know the company other than they do great stuff in the GIS spectrum. I would love to believe they acquired SU for the reason you quoted "some outsider finds some technology that another company owns, but does not provide the proper value to that technology". And perhaps that may prove true.
But my experience says otherwise, that when a company buys into technology that is outside their frame of reference, there is an ulterior motive.
I do hope I am wrong on this acquisition.
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I, for one, welcome our new overlords.
From an ArchViz perspective I think many of us here seem to have forgotten the frustrations of Google's ownership. We'll never really know how much control Google had over SU's development but since Google's acquisition, has not each release been fairly underwhelming? Some nice tools have been added: solids, dynamic components,...I'm sure there must be others, but over the last several years I don't remember ever seeing an update and being really excited to try out a new feature.
The Warehouse has been nice and I hope it continues in some form, but it too has hardly developed since it's inception although it has a lot of room for improvement.
Google used SU to build there Google Earth empire and pushed its development to that end. But that was THEIR goal, and it rarely aligned with many of ours.
I know little of Trimble but the speculation I'm seeing suggests they purchased SU for somewhere between $50-$90 million. That's a pretty significant investment so you have to assume they have some plans to develop it further. I also hear they are somewhat involved in BIM which is something I see a lot of requests for around here.
-Brodie
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Another good perspective from the CAD industry press. I'm sure Roopinder would appreciate it if you guys read his post and gave him your thoughts on the deal.
john
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@jbacus said:
Another good perspective from the CAD industry press. I'm sure Roopinder would appreciate it if you guys read his post and gave him your thoughts on the deal.
john
.Ha, "the AEC cOmmunity might not have jumped on SketchUp to create the built world"...
How far 'inside' is the CADInsider that this is a belief?
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from a few of these articles, I get the sense that the warehouse is the "face" of Sketchup to the uninitiated. Of course
@unknownuser said:the DIYers sure jumped on it to make whatever whirligig, gizmos, low-riders, furniture, or whatever crazy contraption that was in their head
Really, if all you look at is the warehouse, you'll get a rather slanted view of Sketchup and it's capabilities. In my neck of the woods, most architects I know have used Sketchup. I think the AEC adoption is quite high. I do have to agree Autodesk would have been wise to buy it, from a market standpoint.
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@jbacus said:
Another good perspective from the CAD industry press. I'm sure Roopinder would appreciate it if you guys read his post and gave him your thoughts on the deal.
john
."I had to make a factory layout. Let’s see, should I make each machine in 123D, even if was free and easy to use (supposedly)? Or should I use models from the SketchUp library. I found Bridgeports, lathes, drill presses, tables, even a water jet cutter in the SketchUp library. In less than one hour, I had a reasonable attempt at a factory layout. In fact, every tool and machine I needed was there. How deep was this library? Out of curiosity, I looked for Adirondack chairs. There were dozens of Adirondack chair designs, for God’s sake."
He clearly has a higher opinion of the 3DW than most of Sketchucation.
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@johnsenior1973 said:
He clearly has a higher opinion of the 3DW than most of Sketchucation.
I'm not saying the warehouse itself is crap, just a large volume of models in it are. Do you not agree that it takes some sorting before one finds usable models of any particular thing. See this related thread
Andy
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@andybot said:
@johnsenior1973 said:
He clearly has a higher opinion of the 3DW than most of Sketchucation.
I'm not saying the warehouse itself is crap, just a large volume of models in it are. Do you not agree that it takes some sorting before one finds usable models of any particular thing. See this related thread
Andy
I think that there are hundreds of thousands of models that are crap. But I think that it's relatively easy to sift through and quickly find fantastic models that are easily usable.
Personally, I think that there is a snobbishness towards the 3DW that is similar to the snobbishness towards SU. I would instantly ignore anyone who referred to SU as a toy, but I think that SUers who refer to 3DW as a "repository of crap" are just as ignorant.
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@unknownuser said:
I would instantly ignore anyone who referred to SU as a toy, but I think that SUers who refer to 3DW as a "repository of crap" are just as ignorant.
Okay! potato potaato.
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@johnsenior1973 said:
I think that there are hundreds of thousands of models that are crap. But I think that it's relatively easy to sift through and quickly find fantastic models that are easily usable.
OK, so you agree.
But sometimes those fantastic models are just not there. That's why there's formfonts
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@mike lucey said:
I doubt very much there was ever a chance that this could have happened. To 'buy' something, it has to be made available to one in the first place at a consideration!
Mike, EVERYTHING is for sale!!!
I can tell you a stack of stories of knocking on people's doors to ask if they want to sell out to a developer and it almost always starts with "NO!". A few weeks later the surveyors are on site!
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Richard,
I think the full saying is, Everything is for sale, for the right price! The tail makes a big difference.
From what I read and I have been reading an awful lot about this happening over the past few days, Google don't seem to have ever been in the asset selling game, they buy and it looks like when the purchase no longer fits into their plan its shelved to gather dust rather than re-sold, possibly giving competitors an edge. Makes sense if a company can afford to do it.
Take Bump Top for example bought and shelved by Google. I first saw it on TED, Anand Agarawala demos Bump Top on TED http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&ved=0CEgQtwIwBA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ted.com%2Ftalks%2Fanand_agarawala_demos_his_bumptop_desktop.html&ei=JNCgT4K2IMOx0AXw4OiCCA&usg=AFQjCNFIqBQ-L8d8YB4VT2aw_aXJbh6olw&sig2=CtnpNMo6eRgw8sPLlzllOw
I was fortunate to be an early adopter and purchased a Pro license and have been using it for a couple of year now. BTW, its also got the 'fun factor' a rare thing in utility software.
Then there's the well know fact that you can't buy Killarney! How Can You Buy Killarney
http://www.kovideo.net/how-can-you-buy-killarney-lyrics-josef-locke-446579.html If you want to take a break and listen to Joe sing it, http://youtu.be/fO_p-4f9YUA Although the way this country is going at the moment, it would not surprise me if Killarney was sold to pay the Bond Holders!Back on track. Its been reported that this is the first time Google have actually sold an asset. Maybe the 'times they are a changing!' but I doubt it. Join the dots and see the picture!
Mike
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@andybot said:
I do have to agree Autodesk would have been wise to buy it, from a market standpoint.
But given the sentiments aired around here they would have to factor in a shrinking user base for the anyone-but-autodesk software users which would devalue the purchase. Maybe that's why their buyouts fail?
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If that is the case, then the only thing that makes sense is that Trimble has something Google wants badly -- which means this deal is really about something else, and SketchUp was thrown in to make the deal go through.
Best,
Jason. -
Time will tell
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Good read John, thanks for posting. I think the author is making a bad comparison though. SU is not a parametric 3D program and probably never will be. It seems that 123D, being based on Inventor, is geared to a different audience. Its file export formats point to this as well. One can do "part" design on SU but there might be a better tool for that need. I would also not look to 123D to model a house facade. Sure I can drive that nail in with the side of a wrench but why would I want too?
@jbacus said:
Another good perspective from the CAD industry press. I'm sure Roopinder would appreciate it if you guys read his post and gave him your thoughts on the deal.
john
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@unknownuser said:
SU is not a parametric 3D program and probably never will be.
It's partially parametric. You can change edge length from the Entity window, arc segments - there is Dynamic Components - there are plugins that generates parametric geometry (I made a utah teapot plugin with parametric properties - I'm working on Bezier Surface where meshes are parametrically controlled with bezier curves and modifiers.)
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@thomthom said:
@unknownuser said:
SU is not a parametric 3D program and probably never will be.
It's partially parametric. You can change edge length from the Entity window, arc segments - there is Dynamic Components - there are plugins that generates parametric geometry (I made a utah teapot plugin with parametric properties - I'm working on Bezier Surface where meshes are parametrically controlled with bezier curves and modifiers.)
Thomthom Have you seen this thing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmFnq4_MkaY
Very inspiring.
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