NY Times:"Revit Architecture, the industry standard"

[Chazz]

Maybe eveyone knew or suspected this aready but it's different when the grey lady says it:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/11/business/11gehry.html?_r=1&ref=technology

This is a fascinating article but here is the money quote:

Architects routinely use modeling software, but the latest version of Digital Project would enable them to try extreme designs for skyscrapers. While acknowledging that the Gehry software is impressive, Carl Galioto of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, a firm that has designed many skyscrapers, says that it is hard to learn and three or four times as expensive as a conventional modeling program. Revit Architecture, the industry standard from Autodesk, is listed at $5,495 on Autodesk’s Web site.

[Chazz]

Steering back to the topic.....

To summarize:

1) I posted a link to an article I thought was interesting in its own right.
2) Said article included a declaration about industry standards that I found remarkable.
3) long argument about veracity of article's declaration and Graphisoft's viability. Tolkien is quoted broadly (and to good effect).
4) Argument deteriorates into personal sniping and semi-inebriated cat-calls. Another day on the forums.


I think I just wanted to add that when a leviathan like Autodesk is your competition and has become "the industry standard" in the eyse of some, then you, as a company need to start acting like an underdog. Graphisoft is about the worst underdog I have ever seen.

What are the characteristics of a great underdog? I can think of two:

1) Underdogs leverage open standards
2) Underdogs make software so fun to use, people can't help but want to use it and show others how to use it.


To which I say:
1) Archicad's whole GDL prison is a daily pain in the a s s because there is so little decent content and almost none of it free. There are so few converters or translators to other formats it makes you not want to spend a lot of time making things because you know you will not be able to take it with you.

2) ArchiCAD just no fun to use and (increasingly for me) a pain to teach other people to use. Everything is so convoluted and difficult and shrouded in complexity. Training becomes sort of a long exercise in apology.

But bitching is easy.

Who are were the great underdogs?

Maybe Macromedia (makers of Dreamweaver). Possibly @Last Software (makers of Sketchup). And the ultimate underdog, of course, is Apple.

[Aaron Bourgoin]

Gehry is an amazing architect. He's also a brilliant business manager. Or so the story goes.

Chazz, I thought the article was actually really weak. It really didn't ask any real questions and didn't address anything that could be construed as an audience. (what would the Joe the Plumber make of it? Or Carl Bass? Or the Secretary of Homeland Security?).

And if all there is left to do but deconstruct the journalistic merit of processing press-releases, then perhaps we're all ill-served by this kind of "news" story. Someone hears about the Dassault/Gehry Technologies thing, gets fascinated and then loks for a quote from some dude at ADESK. "Hey, we're done and its not even lunchtime yet."

The New York Times is susceptible to this kind of clap-trap reporting as well as anyone else. [Apple isn't an underdog at the NYT - they've got David Pogue and yes, Pogue's gotta eat, but....]

Perhaps one on how architects and engineers view Building Information Modeling and what, in turn, the Construction community thinks of their work.

Anecdotally, I hear that Gehry's recent addition to the Art Gallery of Ontario was not the success story that the Sushi Bar fish was. Lots and Lots of steel rejected for being the wrong size. Mammoth cost overruns. Big delays to the project schedule. [Sorry, I would love to have something solid to back this up with.]

One of Gehry's alumni, Randall Stout, is doing a blobby building here in Edmonton. Its taken an awfully long time for the swoopy steel to arrive and I wonder if this project s plagued with wrong-sized steel arriving on site as well. [note to self - you might be able to find out something about this one, so why don't you.]

A lot of the time, I really think this forum presents rather jejune opinions about the BIM issue. Maybe that's why we get so easily side tracked. I mean, when was the last time that anyone here asked a really meaty question about design and construction as a process? Or presented a chronology of an actual building project? Or got really down and dirty on the topic of interoperablity? ArchiCAD and Revit are both documentation engines. Not much else.

But there are some brilliant minds in this forum. Minds that sift through all sorts of stuff. I'd rather hear what they have to say, rather than all the trending and market watch. Let's pick it up people.

A BIM without the Information is just a BM. And we all know what that's worth.

[owen]

Aaron wrote:
...Revit suicide bombers

i know i shouldn't but i am ...

[Thomas Holm]

Aaron wrote:
A BIM without the Information is just a BM. And we all know what that's worth.

[Bricklyne Clarence]

Aaron wrote:
..........
Clarence. given the context of the forum and its constituents, I thought it might be interesting to see what you have uder the hood, so to speak.

.........I'm starting to wonder of some of the newcoers are really frustrated ArchiCAD users or Revit suicide bombers.

ps signature workshop hint: AC12 is now up to Build 2437.

(*sigh*)

And I'm starting to wonder why it feels like I have to defend myself.

The copy of ArchiCAD on my laptop is updated to the Hotfix build 2325. As a general rule I never update to the latest hotfix until I'm certain all the issues it may rile up have been sorted out by Graphisoft. In this context, I normally resort to having the workstations at the office where I work be the guinea pigs since our IT guy keeps those ones (both PC and Mac; and all up to version 2437) up to date all the time; and also rolls back any buggy updates as necessary - I don't have that kind of time nor patience, nor am I being paid to do it.
I have the same general policy regarding Windows updates and the various Service Pack upgrades for my various software - software firms hardly ever get it right the first time and GS is no exception.

As for my would-be suspect identity, all you have to do is check my posting history to see for yourself, not only, how long I have been posting, but also the general tone and tenor of my posts (hint; I highly doubt you'll find much Revit love there).
And for the record (which you can once again confirm via the posting history function) I have been posting as far back as ArchiCAD version 8/8.1 - or for the last 10 or so years. Not really a newcomer and I can't imagine how many Revit suicide bombers have that much staying power, but guess logically they would have to exist.

Just because my total post count is low doesn't mean that I only recently started posting on the forum.

And finally, and again, regarding the signature issue; I have already stated that it seems (to me anyway) to be a silly way to have to identify oneself (presumably as friendly) if not for the purposes of assisting those who would be hoping to assist you when you're looking for technical help on the forum as is the conventional practice - something that I don't often do.
Simply because if I really was a Revit users trying to masquerade as an ArchiCAD user, then would it not just be as easy for me to create a fake signature as it would be for me to join the forum in the first place? So how would that help someone trying to suss me out?

Beyond all this I don't really know what else I can say to satisfy your curiosity but, that's it.

[Aaron Bourgoin]

Clarence,

For what its worth, I didn't devise the etiquette, I just try and go along with it.

You rock and your Sgnature is both pithy and fascinating. Not Bandwidth friendly due to its length, but...

Have a fantastic weekend.

[Djordje]

Chazz wrote:
OK so no one believes the Gray Lady (at least in Dubai and down under. Canada appears split, poetically so). What about google? or the 2 billion people who use it?

It's pretty clear: this raft is sinking.

Chazz ...

There is a world outside the US.

[Djordje]

Speaking about Dubai ...

The press has more power than we think. Recently, a half researched (if at all) article had a title of "construction materials fall 70%". The same day, we receive faxes from five clients of the same article, asking to revise our quotes 70% down.

The fact is, the price of ONE type of material has fallen 70%. If the dongles were 70% cheaper, would ArchiCAD be 70% cheaper?

The bottom line, especially in the times as they are, are the quality, productivity and usability. Yes, collaboration above all. The two only BIMs (I would add Tekla into the mix) are, as Aaron correctly said, documentation engines. And it is down to our investment of time and effort, not to the features of a particular software, whether they are used to their full power or not.

The flock needs a leader, self proclaimed or not. It is in the perspectives and the eye of the beholder. Looking from the US, Europe or the Middle East casts a very different picture of the same thing.

Somehow, I have never subscribed to "me too!" cries of the flock. Maybe the landscape is less populated and the wolves are just across the hill ... then, maybe that hill is an ocean away?

The future will tell.

[Anonymous]

Matthew wrote:
The other question is why so many people search for ArchiCAD on weekends when they could be doing something else?
The Revit curve may be quite normal for professional software. It may be that ArchiCAD is the anomaly.

Nope, it´s Revit that´s exceptional.

Still think my answer is the best.

“When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”
Sherlock Holmes, The Blanched Soldier

[Ignacio Azpiazu]

[Nice graph Krippahl.]

It must be that all the AutoCAD guys that have Revit sitting on a shelf make some attempt during office hours and just don't want to even hear the word after Friday 5 PM.