BricsCAD?

[Liamnacuac]

This may be the wrong forum, but has anyone checked out BricksCAD?

[Wanderer]

This may be the wrong forum, but has anyone checked out BricsCAD?

This is the correct forum, but, I don't know how many of our users have experience with it. A quick search of existing conversations shows that there are a couple of enthusiastic users.

If you're considering a change, maybe pop over to their forum and search for AutoCAD, and see what the people who have made the switch feel about it?

[CAtDiva]

I have a friend that uses it all the time and finds it satisfactory.

(Note: part of his choice is a rebellion against both MS & Adesk, particularly as he lives in Ireland where the costs are higher.)

[BlackBox]

Shoot - I live in the U.S., and Autodesk's prices continue to be higher, for less and less productivity increase.

I do not know what the future holds, however, Autodesk's move to subscription-only model is unacceptable, so we've already started the hunt for their replacement. I'm currently in favor of, and evaluating BricsCAD.

Some of the reasons are:

• It's very similar to the UI my CAD users prefer from previous versions of AutoCAD (my Surveyor still RDP into his old WinXPx86 workstation to use AutoCAD 2000+Eagle Point daily)
  
• Owen Werngerd is (or at least was, last I knew in 2015) working with BCAD to enhance their API
  
• I'm an authorized developer for BCAD, despite primarily focusing on Autodesk to-date.
  
• They're hungry for our business, unlike Autodesk, and have been proactive about resolving some initial concerns about leaving Autodesk cold-turkey.
  
• Their Civil Design suite isn't as mature as Civil 3D (which is my primary tool each day), but there's lots of room to grow, they're more receptive to requests/feedback, and they've inherently not made as many mistakes as Civil 3D (by not being so dead-set from early mistakes that get carried onto the next release).

There is a market for rental software, but it is not what my employer wants to depend on to make our income. Unless Autodesk allows for the reinstatement of perpetual licenses (in addition to subscription?), their days are literally numbered.

[rkmcswain]

[*]Owen Werngerd is (or at least was, last I knew in 2015) working with BCAD to enhance their API

Dotsoft also offers many of their products for BricsCAD.

Unless Autodesk allows for the reinstatement of perpetual licenses (in addition to subscription?), their days are literally numbered.

(a) We both know that is not going to happen (perpetual licenses).
(b) I presume you mean that their days as a vendor to you and your company are numbered.

[dgorsman]

Unless Autodesk allows for the reinstatement of perpetual licenses (in addition to subscription?), their days are literally numbered.

Yeah, but is it financially sustainable for them to have users which purchase the product, without support (or dropping after a year), and run for a decade or so without any payments? Is it possible for them to still provide updates like Win 8/8.1/10 support, 4k/UHD display support, new features, etc. without that ongoing income? I mean, yeah its nice to get that stuff but there is a cost to those activities and the money has to come from somewhere.

[Liamnacuac]

LOL The Irish always have a good amount of rebellion in them ; o ) Is Erinach mi.

[Ed Jobe]

The biggest problem with going to one of the Intellicad products is that they can't do everything AutoCAD does. So you have to decide if you can live without those features. Its the same as deciding between AutoCAD and LT. Get a trial and see if it works for you.

[cadtag]

well, that's true, (even though BricsCAD and Graebert products are not built with Intellicad, your point is still valid)

but to be fair, even the free Draftsight program has a real capability create usable multi-line features, something Adesk hasn't bothered to finish or fix in the last couple of decades...... So whether an alternative Acad workalike fits a user's needs is something they will have to try themselves to find out.

[Ed Jobe]

I found Draftsight to be very useable. Plus, unlike LT, it runs lisp. However, its set of lisp functions is limited to what Draftsight can do.