advice on selecting new PCB design package

I think the real problem here is trust. According to the revision number, you made a minor change and all of a sudden it started working.

1.20 -> 1.23 is a small number. If you had changed to 2.00 then people would have expected a large number of changes. That with a free downloadable version to trial would allow those people who were bitten badly by the first version to try and see what its like.

The basic problem is this isn't a one horse race. MS had no real competition when they screwed the Windows 2.x release, but even still, there was comment that any version of Windows wont mention 02 in later releases. With CAD packages, a customer who is burnt badly is unlikely to come back. That is why you must be very sure you have a stable version before releasing. If not, you will be excluded until their preference company also does something stupid (like over price themselves)

My two cents + GST

Simon

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Simon Peacock
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It's alive and well now known as EZRoute2000. If interested please look at

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Bill Jenkins, user / supporter of all versions since 1987

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bjenkins

software. Bill

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bjenkins

software. Bill

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bjenkins

Hi,

For me the biggest hurdle to switch to a different CAD package is what do I do with all the stuff I have generated over the years. Hence for me the number one feature I look at before spending any further time evaluating a new CAD package, is it's import export filters. If one can import old work, then one can be productive much quicker. The export feature allows one to gradually switch over and/or still use some features that is not yet available in the new CAD system. When writing the import/export filters, one would also quickly pick up the features which are missing in gEDA. Most PCB and Schematic CAD packages has got an ASCII file format available which should be quite easy to generate and to parse. One of my biggest gripes with most of the commercial packages are that they do their utmost to not support other file formats, so that one are forced to keep using their product

- not becuase it is the best, but because one has invested so much effort in creating things in their format over the years. In the mechanical CAD world, there are at least a few file formats which seems to be universally supported. (DXF, IGES, STEP etc) Being able to export CAD information in a nice VECTOR format which can be imported into documentation is also highly desireble. Proper implimations of EMF, WMF, SVF, EPS, CMX , ODG and PDF export filters would make it possible to get the CAD drawings into most word processors at a high quality without to much effort. Being able to export one's work makes it much easier to risk the use of a new package on a job. If it doesn't work out, then one can export the files and continue on int the old CAD package. It also helps when the customer wants the files in a specific CAD package format.

Regards Anton Erasmus

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Anton Erasmus

gEDA's native file formats are all ASCII, and documented.

We're very light on the converters though. Mostly we convert to/from netlists.

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DJ Delorie

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