ARCHICAD 20 Announced

[Laszlo Nagy]

See the official announcement here:

http://www.graphisoft.com/info/news/press_releases/archicad-20-a-fresh-look-at-bim.html

There are already a few clips that show what is new:

http://archicad.com/en/

[Laszlo Nagy]

Rogerdodge wrote:
I hope there is an option to keep the old user interface/icons I really don't like the look of the new ones.

No, there is no such option.
What you have to be aware of is that the interface had to be modernized. One of the big reason, besides it becoming kind of old for some time now (as voiced by several users on this very forum in the last several years), is the fact that today very high resolution displays (4K, 5K) exist and ARCHICAD (as many other applications) was never designed for such high resolutions. For example, all icons are now vector based (were image based in previous versions) so icon bitmap images can be generated from that vectorial source file (Scalable Vector Graphics, or SVG) for both normal (such as Full HD) and high resolution (such as 4K and 5K) displays.

[Anonymous]

After watching the new archicad upgrades and compare to the new vectorworks tools.

the new Marionette tool in vectorworks is the same as grasshopper but we have to paid to get grasshopper.

The surface division tool in vectorworks nice tool to design. Go see the new vectorworks http://www.vectorworks.net very interesting. Don't forget that archicad and vectorwork are hold from the same company Nemetschek

The archicad software was a head of other software before.

[Laszlo Nagy]

I am very familiar with Vectorworks and their recent new features.
I have also studies both Marionette and Rhino/Grasshopper and yes, it is true that you have to purchase Rhino (Grasshopper is free). However, there are a few things you need to know. First, Rhino does not have a subscription. New versions come out every 4-5 years and its cost is something like a 1000 euros. Upgrade price is about half that so after purchase you can expect to cost only 500 euros every 4-5 years.
Also, Rhino and Grasshopper are the clear leader in algorithmic design. Dynamo, Marionette are all trying to be like Grasshopper. Dynamo is quite good, but it is behind Grasshopper somewhat. Marionette is much more behind both. I think Marionette has some serious drawbacks. For example, there is no ability to instantly preview data coming out of Nodes. You have to enter debug mode, then click a wire to see what data is travelling on it. In both Dynamo and Grasshopper this is real-time. This is a huge time waster and I don't know what they could do to fix it, I don't know if it is possible to do because Marionette is integrated into Vectorworks.
Also, in Grasshopper and Dynamo you can adjust input values by a slider and see you model instantly updated. This is just not possible in Marionette.
There are several others, including the sheer number of Nodes available, but the point is that Grasshopper is much more capable than Marionette.
Also, let us not forget that Grasshopper is based on Rhino which has freeform modeling capabilities neither Revit nor Vectorworks can match. So with the Rhino/Grasshopper Connection ARCHICAD user will benefit from all the development efforts of the Rhino/Grasshopper developer team and the ARCHICAD team only needs to make sure that the Connection is the best and most capable possible. On the long run I think this is a sensible strategy, especially compared to the amount of development effort GRAPHISOFT would need to do to duplicate all these functionalities within ARCHICAD.

As far as other features: we could come up with features after features, but when you look at the big picture ARCHICAD is still a much more mature and sophisticated BIM solution than Vectorworks. If Vectorworks was not less capable it would cost as much as ARCHICAD, not much less.

[Anonymous]

My personal opinion about the interface change is:
I like it very much, it was not in my list of wishes, but beyond my like and my wishes, I think this was a great move market wise, cause is a reality that we the people are guided by what we see a lot, you can go to a unknown place and if you see two restaurant one with a very good and clean looking and another that looks very chip no good looking, you will very normally go to the clean one, regardless that the other one has the best food in the place, unless you are pushed to go to the chip one by another person that has been in both restaurant and know the food in both. So my point is that this will catch the attention of more people to try ARCHICAD, especially young designers.

About the change it means, I saw some nice features already, like the new quick option palette and accessing the favorites from the tool easily (and I'm sure there is more practical changes). Obviously this will bring changes that we need to get used to and I think this is good. I remember when I first met ARCHICAD (ver 10) I was a regular Autocad user, it was frustrating for me at the beginning because I had an Autodesk philosophy mind set, I almost give up on that time, but the potential I saw in ARCHICAD keeps me trying until I finally get the feel of it, and now I look back to that process and instead of a frustrating process I see a personal growing process and I'm not regret.

Changes are needed to grow and to keep walking forward.

By me, congratulation Graphisoft for the new interface.

[Anonymous]

laszlonagy wrote:
Yes, there are several new NURBS-related commands in GDL that any GDL developer can use. A short list of just the new NURBS-related command names:

• NURBSCURVE2D
  NURBSCURVE3D
  NURBSSURFACE
  NURBSVERT
  NURBSEDGE
  NURBSTRIM
  NURNBSTRIMSINGULAR
  NURBSFACE
  NURBSLUMP
  NURBSBODY

Great!! this is getting better.

[Bricklyne Clarence]

laszlonagy wrote:

Rogerdodge wrote:
I hope there is an option to keep the old user interface/icons I really don't like the look of the new ones.

No, there is no such option.
What you have to be aware of is that the interface had to be modernized. One of the big reason, besides it becoming kind of old for some time now (as voiced by several users on this very forum in the last several years), is the fact that today very high resolution displays (4K, 5K) exist and ARCHICAD (as many other applications) was never designed for such high resolutions. For example, all icons are now vector based (were image based in previous versions) so icon bitmap images can be generated from that vectorial source file (Scalable Vector Graphics, or SVG) for both normal (such as Full HD) and high resolution (such as 4K and 5K) displays.

Do we at least have the option of using a multi-monitor set up with more than one monitor?

That is one interface/workflow update that is long over due (given the technology with Graphics cards and how most of us work these days) and which would actually be useful for most people out of the box in visual-centric profession such as ours.

These are the areas I wish Graphisoft would spend their development efforts in.

[Laszlo Nagy]

Bricklyne wrote:
Do we at least have the option of using a multi-monitor set up with more than one monitor?

That is one interface/workflow update that is long over due (given the technology with Graphics cards and how most of us work these days) and which would actually be useful for most people out of the box in visual-centric profession such as ours.

These are the areas I wish Graphisoft would spend their development efforts in.

I am not aware of any new development that happened in this area (multi-monitor setup and use) in ARCHICAD 20.

[Anonymous]

Hi Laszlo:

Thanks for all the info! I personally like the simplified interface and icons.
On a 5k iMac, I'm finding the old icons to be pretty small for my old eyes.
I know the new icons will be clearer, but will they be larger or even scalable?

thanks!

[Bricklyne Clarence]

laszlonagy wrote:

Bricklyne wrote:
Do we at least have the option of using a multi-monitor set up with more than one monitor?

That is one interface/workflow update that is long over due (given the technology with Graphics cards and how most of us work these days) and which would actually be useful for most people out of the box in visual-centric profession such as ours.

These are the areas I wish Graphisoft would spend their development efforts in.

I am not aware of any new development that happened in this area (multi-monitor setup and use) in ARCHICAD 20.

I didn't think so.

Still, it's always best to ask.

[Anonymous]

laszlonagy wrote:

Rogerdodge wrote:
I hope there is an option to keep the old user interface/icons I really don't like the look of the new ones.

No, there is no such option.
What you have to be aware of is that the interface had to be modernized. One of the big reason, besides it becoming kind of old for some time now (as voiced by several users on this very forum in the last several years), is the fact that today very high resolution displays (4K, 5K) exist and ARCHICAD (as many other applications) was never designed for such high resolutions. For example, all icons are now vector based (were image based in previous versions) so icon bitmap images can be generated from that vectorial source file (Scalable Vector Graphics, or SVG) for both normal (such as Full HD) and high resolution (such as 4K and 5K) displays.

Think it was about time the GUI was updated. The icons were just getting smaller every time the graphics cards and monitors are getting better.
Changing to lower resolution worked but does look very crisp. Hopefully the vector based will with scalability.