Most users online - yet another record!

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NormandC
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Most users online - yet another record!

Post by NormandC »

Hey guys,

I thought I would create a dedicated topic about this. :D Previously such info was mentioned in these two rather old topics:
https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=7058
https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic. ... 40#p161025

The record for most users online was broken yet again less than 24 hours ago! The last record was 3 weeks ago! :shock:

There were 287 users online at the same time on 04 March, 2017 14:17UTC!
FC_Forum_Most_Users_Online_20170304.png
FC_Forum_Most_Users_Online_20170304.png (7.4 KiB) Viewed 1862 times
The previous records (taken from the aforementioned topics) show the incredible progression of users (notice the intervals diminishing):

EDIT: Updated table as of April 3rd, 2017

Code: Select all

Users           Date
483             03 April, 2017 19:38UTC
404             20 March, 2017 04:04UTC
338             05 March, 2017 18:23UTC
287             04 March, 2017 14:17UTC
232             11 February, 2017 01:32UTC
190             25 December, 2016 0:20UTC
???             Possible missing data
111             06 June, 2015
 71             09 July, 2014
~50             Sometime in 2012
To forum admins: are such statistics logged and recoverable?

And I thought the 3D Printer hype was over :lol:

(Semi-serious question: what other reason is there for more people getting interested in FreeCAD? Freeware/freemium software is not lacking on Windows, there's even a cloud CAD program working on any browser. Could it be more people are being aware of FOSS?)
Last edited by NormandC on Tue Apr 04, 2017 12:48 am, edited 1 time in total.
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NormandC
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Re: Most users online - yet another record!

Post by NormandC »

@ bejant

Could you tell me based on your post here https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic. ... 58#p161106 what were the hours in UTC? It would be interesting to list and compare them. Thanks!
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bejant
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Re: Most users online - yet another record!

Post by bejant »

Back then I was 6 hours after UTC, so that post which was time stamped Mon Feb 20, 2017 10:37 pm happened Mon Feb 20, 2017 4:37 p.m. UTC.
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yorik
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Re: Most users online - yet another record!

Post by yorik »

NormandC wrote:To forum admins: are such statistics logged and recoverable?
No it doesn't look like. But we're kind of logging manually!
NormandC wrote:what other reason is there for more people getting interested in FreeCAD?
Autodesk subscription plan becoming more and more aggressive maybe? http://www.blog.cadnauseam.com/2017/03/ ... ke-part-1/
ickby
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Re: Most users online - yet another record!

Post by ickby »

I think one reason for people turning to freecad is onshape being popular and getting people used to cad only to frustrate them with their latest free plan change. No private documents seemed to have pushed away quite some users.
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NormandC
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Re: Most users online - yet another record!

Post by NormandC »

yorik wrote:Autodesk subscription plan becoming more and more aggressive maybe?
LOL I just spent the last half hour reading that blog's many posts. :?
ickby wrote:I think one reason for people turning to freecad is onshape being popular and getting people used to cad only to frustrate them with their latest free plan change.
Yeah, I've heard about that! It's not surprising really: how can such a business model even work? Where's the revenue? Last time I checked their website they had about 45 employees.
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sgrogan
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Re: Most users online - yet another record!

Post by sgrogan »

NormandC wrote:(Semi-serious question: what other reason is there for more people getting interested in FreeCAD? Freeware/freemium software is not lacking on Windows, there's even a cloud CAD program working on any browser. Could it be more people are being aware of FOSS?)
FreeCAD is better.
I became aware just before 0.14 release. 3D-printing, Path, Fem all help. The audience is growing, when they tell 2 friends who tell 2 friends etc.
Some small percentage of these new users contribute. FreeCAD gets even better. Exponential_growth
"fight the good fight"
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NormandC
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Re: Most users online - yet another record!

Post by NormandC »

Okay this is INSANE :lol:
FC_Forum_Most_Users_Online_20170305.png
FC_Forum_Most_Users_Online_20170305.png (7.62 KiB) Viewed 1776 times
Time was little more than 2 hours ago, so 18:23UTC.

Exponential indeed :shock:

P.S. Thanks bejant, will update the table later.
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easyw-fc
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Re: Most users online - yet another record!

Post by easyw-fc »

sgrogan wrote:The audience is growing
yorik wrote:Autodesk subscription plan becoming more and more aggressive maybe?
Recently Eagle has been acquired from AD and its license policy has changed too
autodesk-moves-eagle-to-subscription-only-pricing
Eagle is an ECAD sw very popular all around... At the same time KiCad has grown a lot and it is Open Source as FreeCAD is...
So many users are moving from Eagle to KiCad as it is seeing at KiCad info forum
KiCad has also the ability to use 3D objects inside... WRL at stable release and STEP at develop release...
Many electronic designers have the need to convert their PCB to a mechanical object, so to design its enclosure...
A bidirectional conversion between ECAD and MCAD was already available through KiCad StepUp
Recently KiCad has adopted a 3D library of models made with FreeCAD and CadQuery (KiCad and FreeCAD collaboration!)
At KiCad forum 3 of the Top topics in All time are about 3D mechanical integration...
kicad-topics.png
kicad-topics.png (90.06 KiB) Viewed 1767 times
So may be also a quite part of the driven traffic is coming from KiCad users :)
Maurice
Last edited by easyw-fc on Sun Mar 05, 2017 9:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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NormandC
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Re: Most users online - yet another record!

Post by NormandC »

Thanks for that interesting info Maurice. :)

Now that I think of it, FreeCAD may be the Field of Dreams of CAD software. (Betraying my age here :roll: )

"Build it and they will come" :D
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