Sick and tired of bugs in SW

[jack3108]

Having over 22 years of design on 5 different CAD systems under my belt I am getting sick and tired of bugs in SW.

The latest - just opened a dwg that was previously saved a couple of months ago under SW 2004.

Now one of the views is totally messed up. Neither CTRL-Q, nor rebuilt helps.

 

[jack3108]

Not only the view of the whole machine is messed up - the LAYERs on othe views are gone. That is, the LAYERS exist in the layer bar, but they are gone from the dwg.

And this is not first time I see this kind of behaviour.

The SW DWG is total mess.

 

[CorBlimeyLimey]

I have over 30 years of design on 7 different CAD systems under my belt & so far SW is the best. I have to admit that I have not used SW05 yet though.
If you have a specific problem, list all the relevant details here & other forum members will try to help.
If you want to bitch & complain ... call SolidWorks or your VAR.

 

[SBaugh]

Just because you can't bring it back doesn't make it a bug. Contact your VAR, maybe something has changed in SW05 (Not a bug) and SW has a fix for it.

Try opening it on another machine... maybe it's your machine.

I have a customer right now that can't open a STEP file, but I am able to open it without question?

I found the problem. The problem was a corrupt Template. So the problem wasn't SW but rather a bad template. Things like that happen. So before you say it's a bug get it checked out with your VAR.

Regards,

Scott Baugh, CSWP
3DVision Technologies

http://www.3dvisiontech.com

http://www.scottjbaugh.com

faq731-376
faq559-716 - SW Fora Users

 

[ctopher]

I agree there are bugs, but far from other CAD systems I have worked on ... especially Bravo & ACAD. SolidWorks support is far superior than the others also, IMO.

 

[jack3108]

Nothing against you, nice guys, I REEEEEALLY appreciate all your help ....

Just venting my frustration - what's the use of re-designed, "cool", "sexy" icons in SW 2005 ?? They should have spent their time on fixing the bugs - not on "sexy" icons.

The crop view is all ...... - up, the LAYERS are gone, so are the line thicknesses and style - instead PHANTOM layer, line PHANTOM, hicknes LIGHT, I get everything on layer none with everything standard.

On another dwg, when I tried to put dims between edge and hole on BROKEN view, the dims went heywire - I sent this to VAR, admitted it was a bug ....

 

[Heckler]

I would have to suggest a testing period before upgrading all E-Data to a new release. This would shed some light on known bugs or qurks in the software that do not fall in line with what's accpetable to you design process. I use to work for the Dept. of Transportation in CAD Development and we put in countless hours of beta testing and debugging. It's my opinion to error on the conservative side before migrating E-data to the next release. I know it's hard to resist because the marking folks certainly do a good job on hyping the enhancements before the new release. Anyway, just some thoughts and I do understand your frustrations.

Best Regards,

Heckler

"Never underestimate the power of very stupid people in large groups" John Kenneth Galbraith

 

[engAlright]

At risk of starting a "Rant" thread...

IMO Solidworks is the best 3D CAD package out there for combined ease of use, functionality and $$$. Use it, love it, wouldn't change it for anything else yada, yada yada.

HOWEVER - it seems that all the improvements on new releases (or at least the ones we hear about) are geared towards being "sexy" rather than addressing some core concerns with stability and performance. Personally I don't care WHAT the icons look like if it means the program is going to crash only once a week instead of once every 2 days.

I recall being at last years SW world and during one of the presentations a list of the top 10 most frequent complaints about Solidworks from the very first edition of Solidworks was compared to a list of the top 10 complaints about Solidworks 2003. Something like 7 of the complaints were the same, things like "improve stability" and "improve large assembly performance". And what did they talk about in the preview of Solidworks 2005? Things like being able to project out an ISO view and the power-trim option in sketches.

Maybe that's just the nature of the software business - as you add functionality the program gets more complex so it becomes more and more difficult to keep it stable and fast.

Rant concluded.

 

[jack3108]

It's not just crashes and bugs per se ...

How do I explain to my boss the fact that the older printed dwg he has in his office is O.K., but the dwg I printed right now, without any changes, is fouled up ??

 

[kroth]

Hi:

Comment only:

Typical behavior - something good is finally created, then it succeeds and everyone is ecstatic that it finally exists, then it gets improved and promptly screwed up.

They did that to my favorite database program, at start rock hard simplicity and reliability (exactly what a database needs) - now in release 8.0 magnificant capability, it will do anything and everything -- but I wouldn't trust it with my data.

However, nothing said against solid and sustainable progress - only against incidental and gratuitous egomania.

Hopefully SW Corporation will re-assign its hotshot software developers routinely to their sales team to prevent them from wreaking their ambitions on a (probably) good product (or maybe a 6 month stint is enough to shrink their ego back to normal).

 

[Theophilus]

I love it.

I've found some quirks in 05 concerning some of the more cutting edge sweeps or other features that were--let's say--not quite stable in previous releases. I would almost expect that since I've pushed SW in the past with so many work-arounds to get something it perhaps was not quite made to do.

For instance, I built the horn on my web site in SW 2003. If I perform a Ctrl-Q rebuilt, it crashes my main handle sweep. Bummer. Lots of guide curves and elliptical tangency for the profile--asking for some trouble in that feature anyway. I can rebuild it slightly differently in SW 2005 if I really want to, or I can let it be. If I need to return to that project, I'll rebuild it, but for now it's safely archived on a separate hard drive and on CDs.

With progress comes growing pains. The sweep feature has been strengthened in later versions, so I won't complain that my older sweep failed in this instance. All future sweeps will have the capacity of greater fortitude and options of greater complexity.

Jeff Mowry
Industrial Designhaus, LLC

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

 

[sirmick]

Its sort of goofy and I think bad practice, for one version of a software to rebuild a model or drawing differently from another version of software.

Basically, it means you really can't trust the software as you upgrade if loft and sweeps change from version to version. It would be different if SW actually said in their product manual that upgrading will change your parts or files.

 

[SWscience]

One more thing jack I prefer to say.
Our company make some models in sw to use them in some FEM fields, for example we made an engine block model which growed up exponentially in size up to 180 MB just for a part model !!!
It's wonderful that this model has a rebuild time about 21 minutes on a powerful workstation, and now consider that if sw regenerate this model with too many errors periodically , what should I tell to my boss ?!
It has errors or not ? Really I dont know !
We had same type of errors before on many models, one regenerated with errors on a machine and with no errors on another ! one regenerated with errors on a user login and with no errors on another user login and ...
Now in drawings , oooooof ... We have some big drawings about 200~250 MB , you have to praise the god if sw open one drawing correctly next time you've saved it, and so on you know better than me.
But I don't know with these huge number of bugs , why they don't have enough attention to fix them and just release the newer versions.
Best regards.

 

[SBaugh]

You could build a part in SW03 and there could be a bug in your process and on top of that the part should fail but it allows you to proceed. Whne you bring it into the next version SW it fails. Is that bug? Would you know if it was or wasn't if I had not set up this scenario for you?

Heckler - Join the Beta testing team. Get on Early Visibilty for SP's. If you want it tested then you can partcipate in the testing yourself. Then you can have first hand knowledge of what's going on. If you choose not to (IMHO) then don't complain. That is what the Beta testing is there for. I think if you search this type of thread up. This was discusses extensievly already when SW05 came out in beta.

Regards,

Scott Baugh, CSWP
3DVision Technologies

http://www.3dvisiontech.com

http://www.scottjbaugh.com

faq731-376
faq559-716 - SW Fora Users

 

[ewh]

Scott
Wouldn't it be considered a bug if the part should have failed but didn't?

 

[Heckler]

Scott - not complaining....just adding my two cents worth. I did do beta testing for the 2004 release. The point I was trying to make and I'm sure you see this more than I do. Is that some companies (I use that not pointing at anyone) just release a new revision to their user pool without doing testing themselves. They do not put together a road map to see how this new release will affect productivity....I'm sure we have all experienced this since we use windows. All the variables have to be assigned "risk" so not to be caught dead in the water in the middle of a product development cycle....and since time to market is critical this could kill a project. That's the point I'm trying to make. I did this type of development work for a road way design software package with great sucess because we followed strict guidelines.

Best Regards,

Heckler

"Never underestimate the power of very stupid people in large groups" John Kenneth Galbraith

 

[engAlright]

IMO - the beta testing will never reveal all, or even most, of the problems with Solidworks or any other software because they tell you straight off in the beta testing to not use beta software on production parts.

Most of us don't have the luxury of spending 1 to 2 weeks working on a 3000 part assembly (like we would for production use) if that assembly might meet an untimely end. Also - the software sometimes changes so dramatically between the beta and the full release that it's difficult to be sure that what DID work in the beta will still work in the full.

The ONLY way to truly iron out the bugs is to use the software in production, which is why some places only update every 2 or more releases, and why in general it's not a good idea to update until at least the first SP comes out.

But, getting back on topic...

Documents changing between releases is unfortunately a fact of life as the software improves so we all just have to live with it and hope that eventually the program will one day be "good enough" and no more improvements are needed.

 

[cninneman]

I have read so many posts of people being unhappy with 2005, some have gotten to be downright rude about it. I really haven't been able to see where most of it is coming from, personaly. We, as a company, are just getting started with SolidWorks, so I realize that maybe I'm just not yet pushing the software hard enough to find the same problems. Yes I run into little bugs and quirks here and there, but nothing that's keeping me from doing my work. Also, I find 2005 just as easy to use as it was 8 years ago.

I first learned on SolidWorks 96, worked with it up untill 2001 Plus, then I was let go from the company I worked for. I was away from SW for about 2.5 years, and have recently been able to convince the new company I work for, to switch to 3D design. I've jumped right back into this game, whithout having to fight it much, to me that says something for the software. I know I'm kind of getting off topic here, so I'll quit with this. Try going back to Autocad for a couple of years, I bet you'll be begging to have SolidWorks and it's quirks, back on your desktop.


Later
Chris

 

[Theophilus]

True. I used to use a T-square and triangles when I started. Then ACAD. Now SW. Guess my favorite.

I really don't think we can say the SW people are a bunch of slackers when they have the best option. The more complex the software, the greater the likelihood of some glitches. (The same goes for any high-performance product. How does a top-fuel dragster engine compare with the engine of a Ford Taurus? Come on!)

Jeff Mowry
Industrial Designhaus, LLC

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

 

[ctopher]

I agree with cninneman. I personaly would quit this profession rather than go back to ACAD. I like Pro-E, UG and Catia, but SW is the best bang for the buck. Sure there are bugs like every software, but the more experience you get, the more effecient the software will run ... less crashes. IMO