By Keith Denton
Vice President, Software Development & Business Development
In my last post, I reminisced about the journey of PC-based CAD from its earliest days to present day. We’ve traveled far, to be sure, but we are still very much on the journey and there are many more things to see and do. Our old concerns back in the day about getting the lines, arcs, circles, and text to the plotter have given way to new ones, such as:
- Virtualization
- Cloudification
- Information modeling
- Democratization of data via information portals
- Project/facility life cycle planning and information management
- Facility sustainability
- Energy consumption
As our technology has gotten better, the “worry bar” has just gotten higher. I once asked the construction VP of a well-known engineering & construction company what he expected from our systems and its users in his company. “More and sooner,” was his response. Getting accurate, accessible, leverageable information to project teams and facility owners in a timely manner is our new “plotter headache.”
So where does the humble DWG fit into this virtualized world of connected databases? Does it have a role and, if so, is it diminishing? I would say that it fits in quite well and its role will continue to be very important for quite some time to come if for no other reason than this: the engineering and architectural drawing will always be the primary method by which creators communicate to builders. (Did he just say “Always”? Yes, I think he did.)
Humans have been creating some form of architectural drawings since at least before 2200 B.C., and history books are full of very detailed engineering drawings from the ancient Greek era to Da Vinci’s designs. The modern form of architectural and engineering drawings began to evolve with the Renaissance; mostly what has changed since then is the evolution of better tools providing more precision and faster production.
In all that time, however, the basic need to communicate size, scale, orientation, location, material amounts, method of assembly, and finish detail has not diminished whatsoever, although the modes and media have increased. All that information needs a means of documentation: a drawing.
Drawings must be created, saved, and stored in some manner, regardless of the level of embedded or linked intelligence it may have. The accompanying intelligence and data has to retain some association to the drawing from which it is derived, for both accuracy and context.
Data-centric design tools like the Intergraph SmartPlant Enterprise suite provide data richness and detailed graphics applicable for very large-scale and highly distributed workforces and integrates well with very extensive enterprise-level project and material controls systems for planning and logistics. Still, a tremendous number of drawings are derived and generated from that source of rich data.
The CADWorx suite, on the other hand, supplies powerful and productive engineering applications for various types and sizes of projects, but often the production of the 3D models and 2D drawings is done first and much of the data comes afterward as a by-product of that design work.
Both suites support the fundamentals of design. Both suites produce the necessary drawings to support project execution. They just come at it from different directions.
Essential output from both, though, is the drawing, and modern computing hardware and software development methods enable us to store and/or associate more information in DWG files than ever before. It’s not going anywhere anytime soon.
How do we know? Take Intergraph PDS (Plant Design System), for example. A CAD file-based system, its underlying design file format originated in the mid-1970s as the Intergraph Graphic Design System (IGDS) file. Now, in 2017, 43 years after its inception, there are still thousands of PDS seats used on hundreds of projects worldwide! That file format has surely shown some staying power.
Even better, with Intergraph providing CADWorx on the DWG format, users can leverage evolving modern data exchange standards like Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) used to support Building Information Modeling (BIM) initiatives, and make its data more available for more purposes than ever before, regardless of size, scale, or complexity of a particular project.
Couple CADWorx with some project IT management savvy and a cleanly executed project split technique, and it is fully capable of the data richness, excellent performance, and data integration via BIM standards or other integration approaches. Need more data? Then take advantage of the live database connection to MS SQL Server, and hit another gear.
Yes, the good news is that the future is bright and the road ahead looks well-suited for CADWorx users to rely on a DWG format that is as solid and robust than ever. The better news is that you can still go with what you know, and that is the best option of all.
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