Tag Archives: Dear Autodesk

Autodesk forums return – what do you think?

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Congratulations to the tech team behind the Autodesk forum software for getting the redesigned forums back up well ahead of schedule!

The new forums look very different. My first impression is that it is a standard-issue Autodesk “progression” – it looks prettier but doesn’t work nearly as well. Huge swathes of screen space are wasted for graphic impact (no, I don’t mean the long-dead Autodesk attempt at PowerPoint). Big fonts, huge header, even bigger footer, lots of pretty white space. Yet what is there contains less useful information. On a 1920 x 1200 monitor, I can only see four threads within a forum before I need to start scrolling:

What I can’t see is if there have been any new posts since my last visit. To do that, I have to enter each thread and do a lot of scrolling (again, because of the highly inefficient information-to-screen-space ratio) to get to the end, then try to remember whether or not I had already read the last few posts. I can’t even just hit [End] because that gives me this:

How efficient is that? Signal to noise ratio: 0%. Compared with the old forum where I could see the headers for a whole bunch of threads and scan the number-of-new-posts column in a second or so, I now have many minutes of clicking, scrolling and frustration ahead of me. Like I have nothing better to do. Every click counts, remember.

Typical Autodesk. Marketing appeal over user efficiency, every time. All sizzle, no steak.

What do you think? Have your say here, on the Community Feedback forum, and/or even on dear Autodesk.

What to do while the forums are down, dear Autodesk?

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In common with most online services, the Autodesk forums are down for maintenance from time to time. That will be happening this weekend:

Announcement: The forums will be unavailable starting 1 p.m. on Friday, April 6 (Pacific time) while we implement the forum redesign. We will be back online at 9 a.m. on Monday, April 9, or sooner.

I really wish Autodesk would act like a company with an international focus and use universally understood time standards for its announcements. Allow me to translate for those people outside North America for whom “Pacific time” means nothing.

Pacific Time (UTC-7) UTC
Off line: 1 PM, 6 April 8 PM (20:00), 6 April
On line (latest): 9 AM, 9 April 4 PM (16:00), 9 April

So, what to do if you have something you want to say when the forums are down? R.K. McSwain has already made some suggestions: CADTutor, AUGI and The Swamp. I have one further suggestion:

dear Autodesk

This new forum is an experiment of mine, aimed at providing a place where people can provide feedback to Autodesk with minimal restrictions. I made an attempt at setting up dear Autodesk nearly a decade ago but the technology (Pligg) I used was not up to handling the vast amount of spam and hacker attempts it attracted, so I closed it in early 2009.

Now I’m trying again using a different format and different technology (a conventional MyBB forum).

Disclaimers:

  • The site is, of course, not owned or operated by Autodesk, a fact which is made clear on the site in several places
  • This experiment might also fail, for the same or different reasons
  • The technology I’m using is new to me and it might break due to my lack of experience with it or reasons beyond my control
  • A couple of days ago, attempts to register were generating database errors; this appears to be fixed now, but it may recur
  • There is no guarantee that Autodesk people will read the forums (although some did last time)
  • There is no guarantee that Autodesk will act on any of the feedback, suggestions or wishes made on the site (or anywhere else)

Last time I tried this, I didn’t let on that I was behind it. This may have been a mistake, but I did this because I didn’t want the site to be seen as mine. The idea was to allow a community to develop which could freely express itself, not one which was led or prompted by any individual, myself included.

This time I’m doing things differently in several ways, and one of those ways is to be completely transparent about who’s behind it. I still don’t want it to be “my site”, though. I’d like it to be a community’s home. If you are interested in trying to help form that community, please register on the site. The front page has instructions.

If you run into trouble registering or using the site and can’t communicate that via the site itself, feel free to let me know here.

Right now, the site is a blank canvas. Paint away.

Autodesk discussion group alternatives

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As I’m typing this, the Autodesk discussion groups are down for maintenance again. Let’s hope that when they come back up, some of the problems are fixed.

In the meantime, if you’re an AutoCAD user and have something to ask or say, where can you go? Here are a few suggestions.

  • I like the AUGI forums. It’s an even more modern, more graphical and less space-efficient web interface than the new Autodesk one, but there’s a good community there and, hey, the search feature works. Mike Perry and colleagues run a tight ship, so please read the rules and be good.
  • If you have something to tell Autodesk and want practically no restrictions in the way you say it, submit a new message on dear Autodesk, or vote for the existing messages you like. It’s looking a bit bare and empty at the moment, so go fill it up.
  • As a Cadalyst person, it would be remiss of me to avoid mentioning the Cadalyst forums.
  • The Swamp is biased heavily toward CAD programming, so if you have a LISP question then head there, but it also hosts general CAD discussion. In this community, you are expected to be courteous and professional.
  • Old-timers like myself will remember that the CompuServe ACAD forum’s Take 5 section was carried over into the AutoCAD discussion groups. It was kept going for a few years before Autodesk felt it was getting out of hand and killed it. That community refused to be killed, and actually still flourishes for newsgroup (NNTP) users at the t5 dot dynip dot com server.
  • R. K. McSwain suggests the CADTutor forums.

If you wish to point out any other sites I’ve missed, please let me know and if they’re relevant I’ll edit this post to include them.

While I was typing this, the Autodesk discussion groups came back up, but who knows how long that’s going to last?

Also while typing this I also received a phone call from a helpful Indian gentleman at Subscription Support (which was working fine as of yesterday). He asked for details about the broken search (it doesn’t find anything posted prior to the update), confirmed that it’s broken, and promised to inform the relevant department. That’s a much better response than the email I mentioned in my last post.

I like Adobe a lot more now

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If you haven’t found the Dear Adobe gripe site yet, have a look. Some of the comments are moronic, most are strongly worded, some are sarcastic, and some are just precious. How has Adobe reacted to being publicly blasted like this? Very well. Read what John Nack, Adobe’s Photoshop Principal Product Manager, has to say about it on his blog. Also, see how he has responded to many of the comments on his blog posting. Good stuff!

How would the good people at Autodesk react to dearautodesk.com? Would they ignore it? Would they pretend that the existing “constructive feedback only” mechanisms are adequate to allow their customers to get their points across? Would they send in a pack of lawyers, attempt to close it down and live with the inevitable consequences? Or would they, like Adobe, cooperate with the site owners and use it as a valuable resource?