WorldCAD Access

Stunning Machining

Mori Seiki’s Cutting Dream Contest Awards 2007 held a die and mold machining contest recently. In the mold machining section, the winner was Kawanami Ironworks (Kyoto, Japan) who machined a jacket out of aluminum. Take a look at this photo! The photo comes from the company whose WorkNC CAM/CAD software was used to create the winner: Sescoi. Mori Seiki is a manufacturer of multi-axis machining tools. (I don't normally run user stories, but this machining job is too pretty to not publicise further.) Read more →

Today's Competing Headlines

Don't bet on Gates' keynote predictions - Associated Press Predictions for Jobs' Macworld Keynote - Newsfactor The AP articles notes the following Gatesian introductions: -- 1995: Bob GUI (failed) -- 1999: Importance of XML (correct) -- 2000: Networked mobile devices (still getting there) -- 2001: XBox (success in units, failure in profits); TabletPCs (mediocre) -- 2002: Mira entertainment device (failed), and SPOT pens and watches (failed) -- 2003: Mira OEM (failed) Read more →

Installing Fedora 8, Part 4

The CD of Fedora 8 Live was burned; the install worked; graphical user interface displayed. (When the Live version starts up, you have to enter "Fedora" as the only login name.) It worked! (Unlike Gusty Gibbon.) And all the hardware worked without me needing to hunt down device drivers. (Unlike Windows 2000.) But not quite. Following the first boot, the Gnome user interface showed just the desktop with four icons -- My Fedora, My Computer, and such. No access to apps; no task bar. I could view files, but that was it. That was disappointing. The other item that failed... Read more →

Ban the Crease

Dennis O'Reilly of CNET's Worker's Edge starts of the new year with this announcement in Dual-boot Windows and Linux, step 1: Get Ubuntu: This is the year I kiss Windows good-bye. Well, maybe not entirely, but the writing is on the wall for Microsoft's flagship operating system, and all other desktop bloatware. He plans to install Ubantu on his computer, and the first entry talks about downloading latest version and then burning the ISO image on a CD. I trust he will have better luck than me. I suspect he has, because the column reads like it was pre-written in... Read more →

Installing Fedora 8, Part 3

The Fedora 8 ISO file I downloaded was supposed to contain a Live "spin." Spin is Red Hat Software's term for install variations of its Linux software. For insance, there is a spin for Linux developers, another for those who design electronics, and so on. I couldn't get the DVD to boot in Live mode, so I read the release notes. Not useful. They note that the download icludes a Live ISO image, but not how to access it. I took another look at the 3.3GB worth of data I downloaded from the Fedora Web site: Fedora-8-i386-DVD.iso -- 3.3GB Fedora-8-i386-rescuecd.iso... Read more →

CAM Mergers

Is 2008 the age of consolidation for the CAM market? Others more informed than myself have noted that there are too many CAM software developers, all them much smaller than most CAD companies. How small? This small: -- Cimatron is buying Gibbs & Associates for $5 million and 1.5 million shares. -- The combined companies annual revenues will be over $40million (Gibbs providing $12 million of that). -- This size of company places Cimatron in the top 10 among CAM software vendors. That's how small they are. But 2008 could change that. Cimatron chairman Rimon Ben Shaoul says, "...Cimatron is... Read more →

Installing Fedora 8, Part 2

Inserting the Fedora DVD into the Toshiba's CD/DVD drive, I rebooted the notebook computer, remembering to press F2 continuously until the Toshiba showed its boot menu. I pressed C to boot from the CD drive. Fedora's installation started up. I selected the "L" option to boot from local drive, which I assumed meant the CD drive -- but I also wondered if it meant the hard drive. I could hear the CD drive's head jerking back and forth, and then the same menu appeared. Hmm. I tried "L" again. Same thing. I noticed "Press [Tab] for boot options." Perhaps that... Read more →

Indexing in the Cloud

I dabble in Google applications, but not wholeheartedly. I am not keen on one company knowing much about me. I love Picasa, I profit from AdSense, and I use Google Mail occasionally. (I prefer Atlantis over Google Docs, Eudora over Google Mail, Yahoo News over Google News, and so on.) Last night it occurred to me that Google Mail does have a significant advantage in one area, which might become increasingly important: indexing. For example, re-installing software that I downloaded, and now I need to hunt down the license number that was sent by email. It's always been a painful... Read more →

Learning Autodesk Inventor 2008

In an earlier post, I reported that my latest print book was listed on Amazon.com, but not yet available to buy. That's now changed... The full-color, 304-page Learning Autodesk Inventor 2008: The 2D to 3D Transition Handbook paperback book can now be purcahsed for $46.70 (and free shipping!) Here's what you'll find inside: Part I: Inventor for AutoCAD Users 1. AutoCAD User, Meet Autodesk Inventor 2. Get Your Feet Wet with Inventor 3. Inventor & AutoCAD, Similarities & Differences Part II: 2D-to-3D Tutorials 4. Sketch to Part Tutorial 5. AutoCAD to Inventor Tutorial 6. Parts to Assemblies Tutorial Part III:... Read more →

Installing Fedora 8, Part 1

I read on slash.dot that Fedora 8 is pretty good, and even more advanced that Ubantu Linux. I decided to give it a try. The download was the biggest I've ever experienced: 3.3GB! I used Opera's built-in BitTorrent support to do the download. In typical BitTorrent fashion, it first reported an estimated download time of 19 days, but as other servers kicked in, I got my file in about six hours. The result is an ISO file. This is a CD imaging file, kind of like a ZIP file in that a single file contains all files and folder. Your... Read more →

"At 25, Tom Williams walked away from a lucrative career in Silicon Valley to find a way to put a deeper meaning into his life." ... reports Dirk Meissner of the Canadian Press in The Globe & Mail article, "Computer whiz kid turned charity king." (Here in Canada, "charity" does not include giving money to organizations not needing it, such as universities.) I think it is important to do both: work at a calling that you are good at, as well as contribute to society. One funds the other. It seems that Mr Williams found just that: But he couldn't... Read more →