New personal license - Are simulations still free or do we have to pay for those

[lichtzeichenanlage]

Hi,

I've checked the new included features site but know I have more questions than before.

• The biggest one is: Are cloud based simulations still free for personal use or do we now have to pay for it. 
• Generative design might come (or is already???) to personal use, too. Same question here: Free or do we have to pay 125$ per "part" for it?
• E.g. Solidworks files are now excluded. This would exclude personal users from a bunch of grabcad designs. I can understand that you want to prevent abuse of the license, but this is kind of problematic. Any hint for a good open source software that can convert those files to e.g. STEP?

In the last days I got a Fusion showed me a message that AD had changed the license structure. Today I got a message, that I've to switch my license. Why? It's valid until May next year. 

Regards - Wilko

[TrippyLighting]

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@lichtzeichenanlage wrote:

• E.g. Solidworks files are now excluded. This would exclude personal users from a bunch of grabcad designs. I can understand that you want to prevent abuse of the license, but this is kind of problematic. Any hint for a good open source software that can convert those files to e.g. STEP?

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If you have an account on GrabCAD you can upload SW files to that account and then download in STEP format.

[lichtzeichenanlage]

Okay, that's a not to bad workaround. Thanks for the hint. 

[lichtzeichenanlage]

No comment / advise regarding the simulations?

[James.Youmatz]

Hi @lichtzeichenanlage ,

Any cloud credit consumption has to be paid for - so for instance GD, cloud render, etc. These are additional costs outside the license. Local simulations (limited to certain types of simulation - GD is cloud only), do not cost extra.

[lichtzeichenanlage]

@James.Youmatz : Thanks for the answer. So the Personal and the Startup license is not free anymore. That's a significant downgrade. Offering access to GD at the cost of 125$ per design is a joke. In this case you could simply just don't offer it for personal use. Same goes for simulations This would cost quickly a couple of bugs (what is often to high in relation to the costs of the e.g. printed part) and even worse you can only buy credits in chunks of 100$. 

[TrippyLighting]

Generative design has never been free for anyone as far as I know.

However, it's also not been available to hobby or startup users either.

Now it is. Just not for free.

[lichtzeichenanlage]

GD might not be the best example because it's the extreme. But even having simple things like shape optimization (which I used to generate modifiers for my slicer to get stronger parts)  are now history for private use, because the costs just doesn't make sense anymore. Simple example: This would cost me less than 1$ to print, but I've to pay 5$ for the simulation. I create the design in two sizes, so it's 10$. This just doesn't makes sense anymore. In addition I've to pay 100$ upfront. Makes it even worse. And this is not the end of the story. We now have to pay the full price of a service without getting support for it. Doesn't feels right. 

You know I'm a big fan of Fusion 360, but right now I'm not feeling, that I can recommend it to users that easily anymore. Because IMHO this is only the beginning of the downward trend. This all feels a bit like what onshape did, just with better marketing 😉

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@TrippyLighting wrote:

Generative design has never been free for anyone as far as I know.

However, it's also not been available to hobby or startup users either.

Now it is. Just not for free.

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[TrippyLighting]

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@lichtzeichenanlage wrote:

You know I'm a big fan of Fusion 360, but right now I'm not feeling, that I can recommend it to users that easily anymore. Because IMHO this is only the beginning of the downward trend. This all feels a bit like what onshape did, just with better marketing 😉

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I would not necessarily call it a downward trend, but I can certainly sympathize with any recommendation not necessarily being unconditional anymore. It's just gotten a bit more complicated!

I have to admit that I haven't looked into thee newer license terms. With an early-adopter subscription I rarely needed to, or so I thought. Time to check that out!

In general these are good conversations to have!

Inconvenient and sometimes confrontational but unavoidable!

I am going to invite @brianrepp to this conversation as we just had an EE online session that also covered some generative design aspects. The high price point has come up before and for many hobbyists Fusion 360 is a huge enabler, allowing them things to do that otherwise would be impossible.

If shape optimization now also is so expensive then how would a hobbyist who, just like anyone else,  first has to learn how to operate the tool before this tutorial can be made. How much would it cost now to just learn in order to make this video ?

Food for thought and hopefully continued discussion and learning on both sides!

[lichtzeichenanlage]

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@TrippyLighting wrote:

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I would not necessarily call it a downward trend, but I can certainly sympathize with any recommendation not necessarily being unconditional anymore. It's just gotten a bit more complicated!

Downward trend might be to harsh. Calling the license unbalanced might be a better way to say it. My current observation shows, that following things couldn't be solved locally (but this was only a quick check). 

GD, Structural Buckling, Nonlinear Static Stress, Event Simulation, Shape Optimization, Rendering Animations (Turntable, Motion Study)

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@TrippyLighting wrote:

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In general these are good conversations to have!

Inconvenient and sometimes confrontational but unavoidable!

Sure. I'm open to it and AD knows that I deliver input if they ask for it (and even if they don't ask ;-))

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@TrippyLighting wrote:

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I am going to invite @brianrepp to this conversation as we just had an EE online session that also covered some generative design aspects. The high price point has come up before and for many hobbyists Fusion 360 is a huge enabler, allowing them things to do that otherwise would be impossible.

Sounds good. But again: GD is the very extreme example (even if I would like to learn more about it)

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@TrippyLighting wrote:

If shape optimization now also is so expensive then how would a hobbyist who, just like anyone else,  first has to learn how to operate the tool before this tutorial can be made. How much would it cost now to just learn in order to make this video ?

Food for thought and hopefully continued discussion and learning on both sides!

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That's exactly the video that pulled me into using simulations a bit more. I guess Stefan wouldn't have made this video at all, if his audience couldn't really use this feature (unless money doesn't matters). 

[James.Youmatz]

Hi guys,

I just wanted to clear up 1 miscommunication. @lichtzeichenanlage  - the cost you are referring to of a monthly cloud credit cost is for MFG extensions only. This is 125 cloud credits per month to enable the MFG extensions.

With features like Shape Opt, this is a simulation study type that is ONLY available to solve via the cloud. In this situation - you are right, it does cost cloud credits (5 per solve with Shape Opt, GD is 25 due to it being a higher price point). This is the same cost per solve that a commercial user would use to leverage these studies. The only clarification I want to make is there is NOT an additional monthly charge in addition to the per solve charge. It is ONLY the cloud credit cost per solve that you as a personal user has to pay for. 

Thanks,

[lichtzeichenanlage]

Never thought this is a monthly cost. Calling this "ONLY the cloud credit cost" clearly shows, that you don't get the point. I can understand that a company says (or yells) "ONLY" to this cost, because they either just handover the cost to one client or they produce many many of those parts so the costs are pretty small. Private (and perhaps untrained persons like me in opposite to Stefan) have a) to learn the tool (and have to pay for it) and b) in relation to the part costs it just doesn't makes sense at all. Adding 5$ to a part that costs 1$? This makes simulations compete useless for me.  

[brianrepp]

@lichtzeichenanlage - I understand some of your points, and without a doubt, generative design is not something that's going to make sense for everyone.

The part that you touched on that I think resonates with many of us is how to help people explore and learn how to use and apply generative design, without a significant cost associated with that learning curve.  We don't have a great answer for that today, but I'm hopeful we can in the future.

[lichtzeichenanlage]

Any news on this topic?

[brianrepp]

@lichtzeichenanlage - discussions on the long-term solution will take time, but in another week or so I hope to be able to share some other good news.

[lichtzeichenanlage]

Okay. Just didn't want to let the thread die.

[TheCADWhisperer]

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@brianrepp wrote:

  We don't have a great answer for that today, but I'm hopeful we can in the future.

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@brianrepp 

This doesn't solve the issue for everyone - but how about education institutions (or defined small group within the institution) that present a research proposal for acceptance/denial?

[brianrepp]

@TheCADWhisperer - the EDU side of things, as you know, is slightly even more complicated 🙂.  Not sure if you're planning on attending AU LV this year, but if you are, and you're going to the EE breakfast, maybe stop by our F360 table and we can talk?

[brianrepp]

@lichtzeichenanlage  - it's not a permanent solution to the discussion above, but it's a pretty great opportunity.  Through the end of the year, there is free unlimited access to generative design solves and downloads.  More details here:  http://autodesk.com/free-generative-design

[lichtzeichenanlage]

@brianrepp : Having the new licenses in mind, that's really generous from Autodesk and a great thing for all, that have changed the license right now. I haven't done it yet, because it's valid until start of May or so and I like to keep access to simulations as long as possible. 

Thanks for sharing this and I appreciate that Autodesk tries to find solutions to the license topics.