Re: SW 2008 Review by Deskeng.com

Someday we may see reviews by people that actually use the software.
This isn't one of them. When I read through the posts and when I work
at helping people with SW usage, it is rarely a case of bad user
interface that gets in the way. Performance, bugs and technique are
far more important. Performance is SW responsibility as are bugs and
technique is based on Software documentation either by SW or the user
community.

TOP

Quoted with comments:

The new heads-up user interface allows the user to concentrate on the
part and assembly, rather than finding menus, toolbars and such to
define geometry. Features are dynamically edited, in real time, with
fully dynamic previews of the end result of the modification, rather
than showing the part in a rolled-back state.

When you start up SolidWorks 2008, the first thing that will hit you
is the extensive overhaul of the user interface (UI). The new UI is in
the style of Microsoft Office 2007, although not exactly the same.

[I don't have Office 2007. I probably won't have Office 2007 for
several years. I have never seen Office 2007. So right away the author
has lost me. Mayby I should go surf the web and see what Office 2007
is supposed to be in order to understand what he is talking about. The
Office that I have now is OK by me and I see no reason to get a newer
version.

Now if the UI is "extensively overhauled" that can only mean one
thing. Seasoned users will have to relearn how to use SolidWorks. And
this will take time away from design.

When he says "features are edited real time" I get chills up and down
my spine because this sounds to me like a recipe for another major
hardware upgrade just to keep performance up to a level I find
acceptable.]TOP

What you gain is a method of interaction that hides away much of the
clutter that is inevitable in such systems, but makes the whole system
very task specific. So, in the Command Manager you now have single
toolbar stripes for Sketching, Features, Assemblies, Drawings, etc.
The PropertyManager, through which you access the Feature Tree as well
as operation parameters and inputs, is automatically hidden on the
left of the screen.

[This sounds like SolidEdge, which for those that have never used it,
has a user interface that hides functionality away until the time is
right (task specific Ribbon Bar). Unfortunately, hiding things makes
them hard to find and forces users to follow the software's work flow
instead of their own.

There are hotkeys in SW already to hide and show the feature manager.
The current SW has problems with the Property manager obscuring the
Feature manager. This sounds to me like they made the problem worse.

Finally, I don't have a problem with clutter. I use the command
manager now in 2007. Why fix what isn't broke and concentrate on
fixing what is broke?] TOP

Alongside this, there has been a rethinking of how you interact with
data onscreen - this manifests itself in many areas, as we'll
discover, but in general terms, there is a lot more interaction
directly with the model. This extends to presentation of options and
commands at the cursor, rather than resorting to menus or toolbars.
For example, toolbars pop up at the cursor as they do in Office 2007,
and hitting the S key brings up a fully customizable and context-
sensitive strip of commands.

[Is is customizable enough to allow reverting back to a 2007 user
interface in a manner similar to XP which allows reverting to "classic
Windows" in order to get better performance.] TOP

DimXpert brings together a new set of tools that get you to a fully
dimensioned part model in a fraction of the time - all of which
conform to ASME Y14.41 standards for 3D documentation methods.

[Now this is an interesting statement. It says that the tools conform
to ASME Y14.41. It doesn't say that it can produce drawings that
conform to this standard. If the set of tools isn't complete then you
won't be able to actually produce a drawing to this standard. This is
one area that I have traditionaly had problems with SW giving some of
the tools but not all of the tools necessary to complete the job.] TOP

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