Presenting FreeCAD to industry engineers

[Kunda1]

Anyway, just putting it out there, in case there's been some more recent developments in the last few months that might be useful.

Some more topics of interest:

• Rebar Addon https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=22760 made by @amrit3701 for GSOC2017
• Flamingo Workbench https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=22711
• OpenSourceEcology WB (still in development) http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/OSEDev_Workbench
• OpenSourceEcology PVC Pipe Fitting Library (in development) http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/PVC_P ... gs_Library and https://github.com/rkrenzler/ose-piping-library
• FEM integration in to your civil engineering workbench: https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic. ... 20#p208536

[Danintheden]

I for one would definitely like to have a copy of your presentation, it sounds very interesting.

For me FreeCAD is a tool I know that I can continually use and market, I always like to see progress of the project and I get inspired by peoples efforts.

I prefer using 3D parametric parts to model components, and it is great to have the option to do a quick stress and displacement check to aid my understanding of a particular problem.
The 2D and 3D .stp and other file export methods make it reasonably accessible to incorporate into existing workflows.
It gave me the opportunity to give some technical services as a trainee without first requiring a licensed product to do some basic tasks.

It helps me to visualize my proposals, and I find it's much easier to discuss alternatives with colleagues over a 3d model than a report.
I have given demonstrations to hobbyists, entrepreneurs and managers with positive responses, however challenges to start introducing FreeCAD for production uses remain, you still get what you pay for, either by effort or by $$$'s and effort.

The Eskom FreeCAD roll-out presentation was combined with a python introductory workshop, the combination of these free multipurpose tools are already sufficient for many professionals requirements and may aid you in your presentation.

All the best for the presentation.

[yorik]

Good luck with the presentation Joel! I'd be interested in looking at your slides too afterwards.

It would be cool at some point to gather more ideas to help introduce FreeCAD into the corporate world... I for one would like to try to push that further.

[Joel_graff]

I apologize in advance for the length of this... It's something I've been thinking a lot about lately.

The Eskom FreeCAD roll-out presentation was combined with a python introductory workshop, the combination of these free multipurpose tools are already sufficient for many professionals requirements and may aid you in your presentation.

That's really useful. I don't know how many in my presentation care about FEM and CFD, but it's certainly relevant.

challenges to start introducing FreeCAD for production uses remain, you still get what you pay for, either by effort or by $$$'s and effort.

Right. And this is what I'm really trying to work through when I present open source in my profession. In my view, it's not really right to look at open source solutions and compare them feature-for-feature to their proprietary counterparts. Many FOSS projects themselves do not set out to mimic or exactly replace the proprietary solutions (e.g., LibreOffice doesn't want to be a FOSS MS Office. They want to do the things MS Office can't). Obviously, open source projects have to meet the same needs as their industry counterparts, but I think it's too easy to forget which needs reflect actual computing needs and which are really just expectations of "feature parity", even if it's not critical for the workflow.

So my goal is to present FOSS in it's own context. I don't want to sell it as "Hey, here's a free replacement for proprietary software 'X' ". That just sets up the conversation to focus on feature parity. Rather, I want to highlight what makes FOSS better than proprietary (which gets a bit ideological), and be clear that the goal isn't to replace proprietary solutions outright, but to work alongside and have a productive role in the software ecosystem that exists today.

We understand that in the FOSS world.

We know we have to play well with others. There's a reason why people roll their eyes when "Linux vs. Windows" flamewars start on a forum. It's the same reason that "Microsoft loves Linux" (apparently): both OS's meet the same computing needs, but they have (generally) orthogonal purposes and, likewise, strengths that the other can benefit from. Most of the Linux community just doesn't care about whether or not Linux dominates the desktop, from what I can tell. And they shouldn't.

Likewise, I don't think the goal in FreeCAD is to beat Autodesk, Bentley, or any other proprietary vendor at their own game. Focusing on that is just a distraction to what the FreeCAD community is trying to accomplish, and, from what I can tell, no one really cares about that around here, anyway . Of course, we have to inevitably compete against the established proprietary solutions out there, but to my mind, it seems most reasonable to show how FreeCAD can work alongside, and integrate with, existing proprietary workflows, rather than allow the conversation to focus on how it can (or if it can) replace them.

Anyway, it's just my thoughts on the topic. I don't mean to make the thread about this, per se. I'm really mostly interested in good examples of FreeCAD in production "in the wild".

[sgrogan]

There's a reason why people roll their eyes when "Linux vs. Windows" flamewars start on a forum.

From my experience this has lessened over the last decade or so. Most FOSS software now pretty well supports Windows. I think this is not a small deal. Not to long ago the answer for some FOSS software was "it should work on Windows, all you need to do is compile the package and all it's dependencies yourself"
EDIT: Also this https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=14276
Collaboration is easier with FOSS

[ekeeda1234]

Hello,

I have an opportunity to present various professional engineering topics to engineers here in Illinois. I belong to the Illinois Society of Professional Engineers (ISPE), and we rgularly give boot camps / webinars / etc with presentations on various engineering topics. The idea of doing a presentation on FreeCAD struck me, as it's a great opportunity to highlight on of the relatively few open source engineering applications out there which, in my opinion, is easily competitive with commercial applications.

I'm interested in developing a presentation that focuses on open source software and engineering and highlights the things that FreeCAD does well. I can poke through the numerous forum threads, but I don't really have a strong appreciation for the disciplines to which FreeCAD is most useful.

So, are there any thoughts or good threads that might help me? I don't know, at this point, if I'll present on FreeCAD, but I'm certainly inclined to do it, if I can.

Thanks,

Joel

last month i have made presentation on CAD and that was not up to the mark. I am also finding the forums that will help to write presentation on FreeCAD. Thanks a lot for the discussion!

[Joel_graff]

last month i have made presentation on CAD and that was not up to the mark. I am also finding the forums that will help to write presentation on FreeCAD. Thanks a lot for the discussion!

You're welcome! Making a good presentation requires a lot of different skill sets - it's not easy to do and I know I have my share of shortcomings, too.

If you would like a critique of your material or perhaps a review of your presentation, feel free to post here. None of us (so far as I know) are professional speakers, but we've all had to listen to them, so that makes us all experts on some level.

In any case, I know I'd be happy to provide feedback to someone who wanted it.

[mfasano]

Right. And this is what I'm really trying to work through when I present open source in my profession. In my view, it's not really right to look at open source solutions and compare them feature-for-feature to their proprietary counterparts. Many FOSS projects themselves do not set out to mimic or exactly replace the proprietary solutions (e.g., LibreOffice doesn't want to be a FOSS MS Office. They want to do the things MS Office can't). Obviously, open source projects have to meet the same needs as their industry counterparts, but I think it's too easy to forget which needs reflect actual computing needs and which are really just expectations of "feature parity", even if it's not critical for the workflow.

One way FreeCAD is different form most saftware is how deeply integrated the scripting laguage is to the core of the program. That may not be considered desirable unless it is open source.

Modelica is another FOSS software for engineers. There are also Matlab like programs Octave and Scilab.

[saso]

In the past months I have been doing a bit of a research in to the broader topic of engineering in general and the availability of open tools and data for some of the main branches of it... I made a list of some of the tools available, mostly as a reference for myself so I can come back to it to find things when I need them, it is still a work in progress but it can probably already be useful also to others, any feedback is also most welcome https://sasrc.com/engineering/