Moving on from R20 - Which Release do you recommend?

[dr_gallup]

We are finally going to move up from R20. We have just 4 seats of ProE and don't use Intralink. I have all the releases up to and including WF. My inclination at the moment is to skip 2000i & i2 and go to 2001 (on Windows 2000). WF seems not quite ready for prime time.



I saw one poll that showed the majority of users are still at R20, is this due to lack of maintenance, hardware issues or software issues? We pay maintenance but until recently were stuck at R20 due to some old Unix hardware.

 

[swcalvert]

For what it's worth, I say go ahead and move to Wildfire. PTC is making the commitment with WF and their resources will go towards that.



I'm just curious here, and since you're not unsing Intralink, without any internal mechanism for controlling revisions in Pro/E, how do you open assemblies with the correct rev of the components?



Steve C

 

[dougr]

Will PTC sell anything other than Misfire ??

 

[swcalvert]

If they were a company that wanted to make money, I wouldn't sell anything but Wildfire. You can't keep maintaining all these old versions and expect to make money in the long run.



Steve C

 

[Guest]

>> Will PTC sell anything other than Misfire ??



You can download PTC Products, including Pro/E Wildfire, 2001, and 2000i² at their website:



http://www.ptc.com/cgi/cs/apps/SftUpd/SftUpdProd.pl



You can also download many of their other products such as Intralink, Windchill, Routed Systems Designer, Pro/Desktop, & Pro/Mechanica.

 

[dr_gallup]

I have all the CD's, multiple date codes of most of them so it is not an issue of availability. PTC normally supports 3 releases back. They know people can not instantly switch to the latest release just because it is available. I usually stay one production release behind just to avoid all the bugs. Now I'm several behind and am wondering about the advisability of jumping over 2 or 3 releases.



Swcalvert: Per revision control, we only keep the current revision of anything, part, assembly or drawing. If there is any change that makes the new parts non-interchangeable with the old then it gets a new drawing and part number. I keep postscript files of old drawing revisions just to aid in reconstructing the paper trail if something gets screwed up.

 

[Speling]

My suggestion is 2001. Not WF. If you have opportunity to use temporary licence to try, use it, because you will best know what you want



Speling

 

[Nose Bleed]

For the money you're going to have to dish out, I'd go with Wildfire (even though I'm a 2001 user).



As swcalvert suggested - I don't see PTC moving backwards anymore. They've had quite a stir-up from past sins of maintaining old software. They may be withdrawing their support quicker on 2001 than they have on past releases.



- just my own little theory -

 

[peterkobal]

Wildfire 210 or 290 (NOT 250!!!).

 

[defcon888]

When I was working at Lawrence Livermore Labs, we tried to use 2001i2 and it was a disaster. I think they abandoned the whole upgrade and went to WF....I am not there so I don't know. I would go with 2001 and mess with that for a bit. Then when you feel comfortable, move to WF.

 

[bhayden]

I'd have to agree with Nose Bleed. I'm still using 2001 but if I were going to go through the pain of an upgrade would suggest you jump right into WF. One of the big complaints about upgrades is that PTC moves the menu commands all over the place. You're going to be faced with this if you go to 2001 or WF so might as well minimize future pain by only making the switch once.



Also the help files with WF are light years ahead of prior releases which will make the change over easier.



Most importantly, You'll be debugging the code before I have to use it :+)



Bernie Hayden

XKL LLC



PS. As long as you're making the big change I'd give serious consideration to implementing Intralink. I find it an indispensible data management tool. I'm told that 3.3 integrates very well with WF and that family table issues have been greatly improved. We will be moving up to V3.3 as soon as our sysad breaks free a big enough chunk of his time.

 

[dr_gallup]

There is no money issue as far as which version of Pro/E to go to. We have paid maintenance and I already have all the CD's (not every date code but a nice selection, my stack of Pro/E CD's is about 12 inches high). 2001 seems to be pretty stable so I am leaning toward it. WF is too new and we don't have state of the art hardware.



Implementing intralink is not an option as that does cost $ and looks to be a big job. I am sure it would be useful, particularly since Pro/E has gone to a binary file format. Does anybody know the last release that still gave you the option between ascii and binary file formats? I use the windows FIND tool to search for assemblies that use certain parts or to search for drawings that use certain models. I also occasionally resort to editing ascii Pro/E assembly or drawing files if the name of a part was changed on disk. Not recommended by PTC but it works. Poor mans PDM.

 

[bhayden]

> Implementing intralink is not an option as that does

> cost $ and looks to be a big job.



I've heard PTC has some bizare practices that work against companies like yours that have been duly paying maintenence for many years but I find it hard to believe that you don't now have an Intralink Licence.



As far as I can tell all past licenses have been converted to the equivalent WF package. For example we bought the Foundation II package which translates in to WF Foundation Advantage. You should have a Single Site Intralink licence. I believe that's now bundled with even the lowest priced package available.



I'd agree that implementing Intralink seems a bit daunting at first. Once you get your feet wet it's really not all that bad. I took the Intralink for Administrators class from PTC to get up to speed. That's not a bad way to go if you have the multi site license but they spend a great deal of the class (~30-40%) dealing with features that aren't available with the single site license. For single site I'd look into a different training option.



While there would be an investment in training I bet the pay off would be huge and almost immediately evident.



As far as stability of WF vs. 2001 I'd say it's about equal. There are a few more graphics cards that are fully supported with 2001 but the new hardware will lean heavily toward WF and future releases. Besides, almost all cards work resonably well if you turn off Open GL. If you're more comfortable staying with a Unix environment WF offers the option of Linux support. Bottom line is that there are bugs in both 2001 and WF but it's far more likely they'll be addressed in WF and future releases than 2001.



-Bernie-

 

[extreme]

For what its worth, stay were you are till Wildfire 2.0 comes out, which is later this year.



With changing from R20 to any other version, you are going to take a hit in all the UI changes. Might as well wait till 2.0 where all the menu manager menus are going to be gone (suppose to be).

 

[miked]

Extreme

Where did you here that 2.0 would be out later this year?

I would be suprised if it was before June.

Mike

 

[proed]

The PTC plan is to release Wildfire 2.0 in the 1st quarter of 2004.



That's about the time we'll be moving to Wildfire - I wonder if it's worth waiting till 2.0 is out? I hear that AutoBuildZ is integrated into 2.0.

 

[bhayden]

> The PTC plan is to release Wildfire 2.0 in the 1st quarter > of 2004.



It seems PTC's software release dates are driven primarily by a need to produce publicity and revenue. I've no doubt they'll package whatever they have and foist in on us as a new release.



> I hear that AutoBuildZ is integrated into 2.0.



Sound like I've got a bad attitude? That's because I've spent the last three days downloading and installing the lastest and greatest releases of WtF and AutoBuildZ that are supposed to work together. Hasn't anyone at PTC heard of software patches? What's with the 2+ hr downloads to change builds??



I've gotten as far as defining an extrusion profile and depth and then WtF simple exits. Sometimes it exits before getting even that far. Just now it exited all on it's own while I was typing this!



I renege on my previous advise to move straight to Wildfire. PTC is in a death spiral in which they are franticly attempting to differentiate their product but are only serving to multiple the number of bugs without addressing any of the known issues with 2001. Once you work with WtF for a while it's painfully evident that all it is is Windoze dressing over the old code.



Bottom line, watch PTCs bottom line and don't move past release 2001 until (unless?) they become profitable again.



Bernie Hayden

XKL LLC



wild.fire \'wi(*)l(d)-.fi(*)r\ n 1 : a sweeping and destructive conflagration