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Gone Over to The Dark Side - And Hate It

M

Mindripper

New member
Iran Pro/Engineer from 1997 to 2001: it was hard to learn anduser-hostile, but very powerful. Then I discovered SolidWorks, andusedit for six years. I loved it, and still do: I love it so much, I bought my own license in 1999. But recently I took a job with a company at substantially higher pay, where I am running Pro/E again.


I had heard that Pro/E was substantially improved since I had last used it, and a new GUI had been added that was much like SolidWorks. I have discovered, much to my chagrin, that Pro/E still sucks when compared to SolidWorks.


The new GUI is crummy, and all the functions are just as user-hostile. There have been some minor improvements to the core functionality, but not enough to make it a pleasure to use. The 'new GUI' is only partially implemented, and a variety of input lines pop up unpredictably in different places on the screen. It's still a Unix application running in Windows emulation mode: surely they could have recompiled the code by now. Drawings have always been a weak point in Pro/E, and no improvement AT ALL has been made in this area. Help is (still) horrible. Right-click is useless on all but (curiously) the most complex commands, and the middle mouse button is almost unused. They have added a new 'Intent Manager' that only makes the sketcher harder to use, as it always seems to make the wrong assumptions. The folks at PTC just don't get it. The Pro/E forum here at MCADCentralappears to bemonitored by their support people in India: at least they've figured out this is a point of last resort for their users, since the embedded help functionality is so useless.


TO ANYONE CONTEMPLATING SWITCHING TO PRO/E: DON'T DO IT!!!!!!!! Pass the word: I wish I been warned before making this choice. I can only hope That I can save other SolidWorks users from such an unfortunate fate.


I still run SolidWorks at home using my personal license, not just for the money but also because I love running it. I dread using Pro/E, even with years of experience on it. I lament my decision: please pity me, and do not repeat my mistake.


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I have been using SolidWorks since 1999. In 2004 I changed jobs and had to use ProE wildfire. For the first 3 days I felt completely useless as I was a whizz on SolidWorks but could do nothing on ProE. Finally things started to click and I now get on brilliantly with ProE. I now use ProE in my main job but run ProE and SolidWorks side by side in my design business. Both are excellent packages and both have their down sides.


A couple of organic chaped parts that I have modelled in ProE, I don't believe I could possibly model them in SolidWorks.ProE has an excellent surfaces section and when things are looking to be too complex I would also jump to ProE.


Stick with ProE as despite the complex user interface and crap help, there are many features which are quite mind blowing.


That's my pennys woth for the day.
 
I always thought Wildfire was a step in the right direction for Pro/E users when it comes to GUI but it still fails in comparison with SW and UG for that matter. SW is real easy to use and therefore more productive.


Don't fall to the dark side...


Steve
 
I go where the money is... lol. UG, SOLIDWORKS, PROE, CATIA... All good money makers. All different types of disciplines.


Currently, im on Solidworks, 2008 is nice.


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I'll stick with Pro/E (and SolidWorks), just like Michael3030. I have long since learned that I'm just a high-priced whore. Besides, what this john is paying me definitely makes it worth my while. I just wish he wasn't so big on the back-door action.
 
ttraser- tell me SW 2008 has flexible parts. That's the one thing i miss the most from proE, along with Routed Systems!
 
Midripper is so right.....Being able to use the 2 programs has earned me a very nice amount of pocket money. Both programs have their faults but I can forgive them when the cheques arrive
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I agree, michale3130, knowing more than one CAD package is a good thing. Each time our company switches packages, I come out ahead. I know, or claim to know, UG, Pro/E and now Solidworks and they all have their faults.


Steve
 
I think that Pro/E gives the user much more control over what they are doing and want to do. And I have had more trouble creating drawings in Solidworks than I ever would have expected. I thought it was supposed to be easier to use than Pro/E ...that's what everyone said, but it takes a lot longer to do things and does not let me have enough control.


And is there any equivalent in Solidworks to Reroute in Pro/E?


Edited by: carrieives
 
I make more in sw because it takes longer ;) hi everyone just joking. I use both and let the customer tell me which one to use.

What is the relationship with CATIA to SW?


Edited by: design-engine
 
Solidworks is only good for the really easy stuff...like a pen, simple beam (as long as there are no flexible components attached...The best, and only good thing about solidworks is that it looks good...

I'd much rather deal with Pro's GUI then have to shake my head at all the features solidwaste doesn't have, and all the things its missing that pro has.

SW vs PRO is like mac vs pc...or the new office vs the old office (not the show, microsoft office)
 
I've used both, but I find that while Pro|E's UI is definitely 'user-hostile' (a great description), the geometry engine kicks butt. In SW, every time I blink features are failing. I can build a multi-part, top down design assy all driven by one skeleton part in Pro|E, a couple dozen parts, total feature count will into the hundreds and modify an early feature in the skeleton and watch the entire assembly update. In SW, one part with a dozen featuers will fail if I try the same thing.

Maybe I just don't understand 'best practices' with SW, but I find it's lack of geometry stability surprising. I guess easy to use is a bonus when you have to keep doing it over and over.
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I hate these SW vs Proe debates but I just can't agree when you guys say SW sucks.


I haverarely found the geometry to be unstable Doug. from your posts I know you have loads of CAD experience so I don't understand why you have found it to be unstable. I've heard this from people before but most of the time it is bad practice!!! Please don't take offence at that!!!
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I'm completely open to the fact that I may be using practices that are robust ways to build in Pro|E but not good for SW. I just don't know how to determine better practices.

Is there a good document somewhere that details the SW no-no's and best practices? I'd love to see it.

Oh, and I agree, there is usually little gained by these debates. I wouldn't say that SW sucks, only that in my experience what ever is gained in ease of use is lost in less robust models.
 
In Solidworks, a recommended best practice is to use sketches for all your references rather than edges. The sketches are more stable. This sounds great except you have to have Solidworks not hide the sketches and get it to pick the sketch rather than the edge that lines up with the sketch. That may help with the stability. I found it harder to do than picking edges, so went back to picking edges.

Compare the patterning ability of Pro/E and Solidworks. I am doing some conceptual workin Pro/E because I can pattern my sketches (yes, I know that Solidworks has sketch patterns, but that puts the pattern in the sketch. It gets to clumsy for what I am doing). When I get done with the concept, I'll go back to Solidworks to creeate the model since that's what the CAD package is for this project.

Carrie
ProE WF3, Solidworks 2007
 
I agree with Carrie on the patterns within the sketches and I never use them. They end up being more hassle than they're worth. I haven't had any issues with picking edges though, in fact I've found that to be more stable or easier to control than in ProE.


Don't know of any documents Doug, all self taught here based on my learnings from SDRC at uni. A huge chunk of our SDRC course was based on sketch constraints and getting that all right and learning what parametric modelling was all about. Adopting the same practices to help me learn SW worked.
 
One of the big stability things in Pro|E is to constrain your sketches to model surfaces not model edges. Edges are inheritances less stable, at least in Pro|E. You can cut, trim, extend, etc a surface in Pro|E and it retains the same internal id, but any change to an edge results in a new id. In SW, you cannot constrain sketches to surfaces, but I don't know f the internal id's of SW entities work the same as Pro|E.

Building off of the oldest reference is something that I try to do in Pro|E, which is the principal at work in building from the sketch of the prior feature rather than the prior feature itself. That's something for me to be mindful of in the future, thanks. It doesn't help that SW hides the sketches, making them hard to select later. Also, the 2D sketch is frequently not oriented properly to constrain the next feature you want to create.
 
That was one of the big lessons I learnt, to use the surfaces instead of the edges. I now realise that was an area that had been causing me problems.


Also I do what you had said and relate to the oldest references. I would try to set up a skeleton struture when possible and use that to relate to.


The 2D sketch orientation doesn't bother me that much as by using shift and the arrow keys it's easy enough to reorientate the views though then hoizontal and vertical end up the wrong way when constraining.


I would love to marry half of Solidworks sketch features with half of ProEs features to make sketcher perfect. They both have things that annoy me.
 
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