Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!dali.cs.montana.edu!milton!news
From: owen@raven.phys.washington.edu (Russell Owen)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.apps
Subject: Re: CADD
Summary: Generic, Vellum, Claris and Pegasys
Message-ID: <1991Apr30.204410.688@milton.u.washington.edu>
Date: 30 Apr 91 20:44:10 GMT
References: <1991Apr30.105216.1721@eagle.lerc.nasa.gov>
Sender: news@milton.u.washington.edu (News)
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Organization: University of Washington
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In article <1991Apr30.105216.1721@eagle.lerc.nasa.gov> fszeman@oz.lerc.nasa.gov
(Pat Zeman) writes:
>
>   I'm looking for any information on very basic, inexpensive
>drafting (not drawing) programs.  I use MacDraft 1.2 because
>it has the basic tools and in it's day cost about $100.  It's
>showing its age with repeated system upgrades.  Now version 
>2.1 and other fancy programs are $200-$600.
>
>   Any comments on Generic CADD Level 1 ($83). Is there anything
>else to look at?

I looked at Generic CAD when it first came out, but it offered little beyond
MacDraw. Maybe they've finally put in some functionality in level 1,
but I doubt it. If they offer higher levels, check those out.

A friend uses Generic CAD level 3 (or maybe higher) on an IBM and it is very
powerful -- it even does 3-D. Unfortunately it's about as clumsy as you'd
expect an IBM application to be.

We use Vellum, which is very powerful and is spectacularly easy to use.
The tools are well chosen, and there is a "smart cursor" which IS smart and
incredibly useful. Vellum beats any CAD program I've seen anywhere by a mile.
Unfortunately, it's expensive (reasonable to universities, though). By the
way, having mentioned IBMs above, let me add that Vellum is now available
for the IBM.

Some cheaper choices...

Claris CAD is reasonably powerful and easy to use. It's the only program
besides Vellum that I know of with a smart cursor of any kind. Unfortunately,
the rest of the interface has a "function/method/modifier paradigm" (or some
such nonsense). Claris is proud of it, but we found it clumsy, annoying,
and MUCH less intuitive than Vellum's elegant simple interface.

Pegasys was the third program we looked at which we liked. It is a good basic
CAD program, and we almost bought it, but it isn't as easy to use as Vellum,
and the demo crashed too often for comfort. They claimed to have fixed the
problem, and they may well have -- if you are interested, get the demo first
and try it out.

-- Russell
owen@raven.phys.washington.edu