It's that time of the year again

[O.Tan]

It's that time of the year again where I'll need to update my Fusion 360 subscription again, I got it from the MacAppStore version as local reseller is slow at responding (at the time of purchase), not used to sell for personal usage (their forms always have a company field in it) and asks too many questions. If AD would allow people purchase right from their website regardless where they are, that'll be perfect.

So last year I brought up a very active post "An honest plea to Fusion 360 Development team”, drawings is still not "production ready" but to be able to see constant improvements (some minor, some major) is a good sign, and just couple of days ago, Timera just posted an excellent report on what’s currently being worked on, next and upcoming. I know many people are crying out for Sheet Metal, but trust me that you'll be happier when AD releases a properly baked/ready SM workspace then what they did with Drawings (introduced earlier then CAM and SIM, yet is much behind in terms of progress then the other 2)

Also another project that seemed to miss it's release date is edit in place External References - Branching & Merging, I'm not sure what's the development status of that one but it does show the difficulty of developing softwares. In terms of stability, Fusion is getting better at that, it's certainly more stable then last year. In terms of new features, there's some things I liked but I'm still waiting for things like Hole Wizard, Bolted Connections, Joints with variable & non-linear travel rate, Joints for Chains related object, improvements to Fusion DM and Fusion Hybrid modelling (direct and history modelling environment living side by side and be able to use interchangeably with...).

And for those wondering, yes, I'll continue my Fusion subscription for another year. Kudos to those working at AD on their excellent customer support, transparency, and hard work!

[PhilProcarioJr]

@O.Tan

I convinced the forge I work for to purchase a seat of Fusion and for the work I am doing there I'm fairly happy with Fusion. The Dev team is working hard and listening so kudos to all of them for their efforts.

For my home business I'm still on the free license for startups and even though I don't make anywhere near $100,000 a year I was ready to take the plunge and buy a license until I saw Timera's post.

At home I am trying to push my laser work and right now doing laser work is painful with Fusion because of lack of functionality. I have to use way to many workarounds and jump through way to many hoops to get the job done. Fusion team pointed out to me that they have a lot of customers with a lot of needs and right now what the masses need isn't helping me or my home business.

For instance in sheet metal I need to do forms, nesting and cylindrical lofting..none of that will be in the sheet metal coming out soon.

For drawings I need to be able to make drawings that contain surfaces and export .dxf files "not .dwg or .pdf" of those drawings, not coming anytime soon.

I need more robust T-Spline tools, not coming anytime soon.

I need G2 continuity with surfaces, being worked on but not coming anytime soon.

I need 3d arcs in sketching.

I could go on but there is no point.

In short the Dev team is doing some fantastic work and I have the upmost respect for them, but I can't buy in to a software that just doesn't meet my needs. So as long as it is free for startups I will continue to use it and come the day I see at least some of the things I need to get my work done then I will take the plunge.

Cheers

[al.whatmough]

@Anonymous What laser are you using.  Do you have a specific workflow you are trying to accomplish?

Cheers,

Al

[prabakarm]

@O.Tan thanks for the kind words and continuing the subscription.  On branch and merge we have moved to a model of progressive rollout based on the mesh experience.  Basically we bring a cohort of users in a progressive way to get feedback, iterate and increase the cohort until we are ready to open it up for everyone.  I believe you should branch and merge enabled for you to play with.  If not let me know.

Prabakar.

[PhilProcarioJr]

@al.whatmough

I have a Full Spectrum Laser engraver/cutter. The workflow I need is a .dxf export from drawings. 

Say I have 40 parts laid out on a sheet each part has it's own sketch, sure I can export 40 sketches as 40 .dxf's, but it would also export all the construction geometry and one of the nice things about Fusion is you don't have to trim sketches to build your models. So all those little bits get exported to the dxf also. Plus I would have to open all 40 .dxf files and place them into one file to make changes to my sheets and to make one large .dxf file. 

Then to make matters more complicated is if I have to edit one part now I have to deal with all 40 .dxf files again for one change.

Same scenario but now I want all the parts at 1/2 scale...wouldn't it be easier to change the drawing to 1/2 scale and export it to .dxf rather then scaling 40 sketches and exporting each one?

Full Spectrum software allows you to use a .pdf but Fusion has no layers which I need to send to the laser, plus editing a .pdf is a nightmare workflow.

I never use .dwg, none of my software supports it and anytime I have used it there were so many version issues with other software.

This is just one simple example of problems I am up against. You can PM me to talk about this stuff or we can setup a call so we don't hijack @O.Tan thread.

[al.whatmough]

Sounds good, let's chat.

I would love to find out if can solve your needs with laser workflows in the software without needing to go to dxf files.

___________________________
Sent from mobile

Al Whatmough
CAM Product Manager
MOBILE +1 415 755-3087

[daniel_lyall]

@PhilProcarioJr

Phil if you are in a rush you can send the file to me with all the dxf in one sketch file with a pick of what you wont the outcome to be, I can run it through Vcarve pro and clean it up and send it back, it has layers.  (work for work)

[O.Tan]

Yeah, thank goodness they stop doing the whole SolidWorks to Fusion series, as Fusion right now is really lacking many features in comparison to SW and to spend time doing comparisons and trying to persuade seasoned SW users is a waste of time and resources.

I'm not sure how big is the Fusion team, but I really hope AD management takes this program seriously and not treat it as some hobby program. I do have some concerns regarding their pricing model as I know it's accessible but I wonder if it'll actually cover the development and operating cost. Previously AD tried to have 2 tier, normal and ultimate (which I'm grandfathered into) and it does make sense in some ways but it ended up getting scrapped as it'll introduce issues like non-feature parity and etc. etc.

Though tbh, I feel that they could focus the ultimate features to mainly data management related as companies would want more control over their data when collaboration, e.g.: who has permission to delete files, who has permission to export design files, who sees what and etc.

So let say, the company has a machine shop, they wouldn't want the machine shop to have access to the whole assembly, only the parts to fabricated for example. Or that only the project manager is able to export the files, other users (designers, visualisation) is only able to import and not able to export.

[PhilProcarioJr]

@O.Tan

I have met a bunch of the team members and to me it seems Autodesk is taking Fusion very seriously. I have no doubt that over time, Fusion will be able to compete with Solidworks but it will be a while because coding all this stuff takes quite a bit of time and resources. 

Ultimate is on it's way to having it's own value some has already been done but there is more to come. I can't say much about it, but people will start to see the difference soon enough.

I'm not sure I like there being two versions though...but that isn't up to me...

[PhilProcarioJr]

@daniel_lyall

Thanks for the offer but I can layer all the dxf when I put them into one file. Like last night I had to put 1,327 .dxf's into one file...what a pain in the arse....not only that but rotate and nest them. Putting them into one file is the biggest problem....

[TMC.Engineering]

@al.whatmough

Just wanted to echo what @PhilProcarioJr mentioned on the laser front.  The workflow for the smallish CO2 lasers out there don't fit into fusion well.  I use a Spirit GLS laser and it uses a print driver to send jobs to the laser.  The print driver allows you to have different etch/cut parameters based on color for both raster and vector.  

My workflow is Parts >> fusion drawing >> PDF >> CorelDRAW >> fix drawing (most time here) >> send to laser.

The PDF does not always come over nicely

Of course there are other needs for the dxf besides laser work...  sharing prints with job shops, screen printing, vinyl cutting, marketing materials, manuals.  getting into other software in a friendly way is not a bad thing.

[al.whatmough]

Ok, there are two things here:

1) We should be able to go straight to the laser cutter.

2) Need to export DXF for other workflows.

In the mean time, we do have a WLP post that outputs a DXF

http://cam.autodesk.com/posts/?p=dxf

[TMC.Engineering]

@al.whatmough

Thanks for the link I will give it a go.

As far as going straight to the laser, I would be interested in helping if I can.  The Detroit AD office is very close to me, I can offer up my machine for testing if needed.

[PhilProcarioJr]

@al.whatmough

"1) We should be able to go straight to the laser cutter."

The only direct output my Laser can use is the print function that Fusion doesn't have. That's why I can't go straight to the laser.

"2) Need to export DXF for other workflows."

I will give this a shot this weekend, but correct me if I am wrong but won't I have to setup tool paths for this to work? If so that seems much more inefficient then a export from drawings to .dxf I understand this is meant as a work around to my problem I'm just forward thinking on this one.

I plan to give you a call this weekend what time is good for you?

[al.whatmough]

@PhilProcarioJr Yes, printing is the problem.

We did a slight work around on the front with a SVG post that will load in a web browser and you can then hit print.

[daniel_lyall]

@PhilProcarioJr yer you can't say to much but it's out there when ultimate is coming and some of what it will have after the November update. 2 more weeks or so

[Oceanconcepts]

I also could really use the ability to output DXF from a drawing, and/or to create a drawing from a sketch,  for an entirely different application.

When designing a physical printed circuit board to match an enclosure, I need to pass along the dimensions and locations of critical components to the engineer doing the PCB layout. I also need to define areas that- while they do not represent physical elements in the design, need to be defined precisely- such as regions with a maximum component height limit, keep-out areas, and preferred locations for components. These regions are easy to create in a sketch and thence to DXF, but I don't have a way to get directly to a drawing where I can annotate them. My workaround has been to build fake objects that will translate into a drawing. Ultimately I need a DXF which can be read by the PCB layout tools. Going either from a drawing to a DXF, or from a sketch to both DXF and drawing, would solve this bottleneck. 

And I second the kudos for the Fusion team. For quite a few years now I have been incredibly impressed with the dedication and creative thinking they have shown in this very challenging development. 

[daniel_lyall]

@PhilProcarioJr that post @al.whatmough posted works quite well, it does a better job of the .dxf than the import does, it's quite clean

[PhilProcarioJr]

@daniel_lyall

Correct me if I am wrong but you have to setup tool paths for that to work correct? Does it at least put each "tool" on it's own layer in the .dxf?

The problem I have with this is Fusions performance with over 1000 items in CAM, but I will give it a shot this weekend.

[al.whatmough]

@PhilProcarioJr we control the color of each cut type.