Interesting Article about CAD evolution on Mac

[TMA_80]

http://architosh.com/2013/01/viewpoint-the-evolution-of-cad-on-the-macintosh/

[Anonymous]

It seems more like an ad for Domus.cad

[Laszlo Nagy]

Funny, I had pretty much the same impression (that it is an ad).

[Dwight]

Everything is an ad.

[Erich]

Even Dwight's signature!

[Dwight]

A Public Service Ad.

[JaredBanks]

I thought the first half of the article was worthwhile, but then when it jumped from Radar CH to how amazing Domus.Cad was, I thought "um... I think they kind of glossed over things!"

I would enjoy reading more about the differing philosophies of Mac vs PC architectural software. I'm sure it's not that clear cut, but nonetheless the two nodes seem worth investigating.

If only Radar CH kept developing, who knows what it could do 30 years later!

[glenn_peters]

A few inaccuracies in this article…

I purchased the 128k Macintosh in the summer of 1984 and it only shipped with two programs — MacWrite and MacPaint. MacDraw did not debut until Fall 1984, and was a separate software purchase (I acquired it in November 1984).

IDD's MacDraft actually borrowed more from LisaDraw (on which MacDraw was also based) and it was released almost concurrent with MacDraw in late-1984. I started using it in 1985 as it provided more CAD features than MacDraw.

Microsoft Word actually debuted in 1983 as Multi-Tool Word for UNIX. Bill Gates announced it on stage for the Macintosh in early-1984 and it shipped in 1985.

AutoCAD debuted on the Macintosh with release 10.0 in 1989. Not sure about it being universally snubbed by Mac users, as all three firms I worked for during the late-1980s and early-1990s purchased and used AutoCAD for Mac (in addition to MiniCAD) to achieve seamless integration with engineering consultants and institutional clients who were already standardizing on Autodesk's .DWG format -- it saved the frustration of using early CAD-migration software that often failed to accurately translate all drawing elements between different file formats.

AutoCAD 12 was the last release for Mac OS (until AutoCAD 2012 LT a few years ago), and it did make numerous strides in implementing more Mac-like features/methods though it still remained at it's core the same AutoCAD that ran on multiple operating systems, including DOS, Windows, and UNIX. (Autodesk soon dropped support for all operating systems except Windows).

Finally, I agree with other posts that the article morphs into an apparent advertisement for Domus.Cad