Wednesday, April 23, 2008

Go Habs Go


Go Habs Go! So the next series is between Montreal and Philadelphia. I think the last time they met in the playoffs was in 1987 and the Flyers won. Let's hope the Canadiens fare better this time.


Go Habs Go! Donc la prochaine série est entre Montréal et Philadelphie. Je pense que la dernière fois qu'ils se sont recontrer dans le éliminatoires était en 1987 et les Flyers ont gagnés. Espérons que les Canadiens gagne cette fois-ci.

WAN problems with DWG 2007 / Problèmes de WAN avec DWG 2007

Here is an article from the April 2008 issue of Cadalyst Magazine. It seems to confirm what a few clients of brought to my attention in the last few months.

Voici un article provenant de la revue Cadalyst du mois d'avril 2008. Ca semble confirmer ce que quelques clients on porter à mon attention dans les derniers mois.

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DWG 2007 Format Found to Choke WAN

Ray Sirois, IT director for the New England–based engineering firm Wright-Pierce, is putting the brakes on his company's migration to AutoCAD 2008 "due to poor performance issues" related to the use of wide-area network (WAN) accelerators such as RiverbedTechnology Steelhead appliances. Wright-Pierce attributes the performance degradation to "AutoCAD's version 2008 Save command reorganizing or reordering much of the content within the DWG file."

"We suspected the problem actually existed to a lesser degree in version 2007," Sirois noted. "However, in our testing, we found the problem is much worse in version 2008." In addition to putting a strain on WAN transfer, the change can have a negative effect on IT backup operations. "Our Exagrid disk-to-disk backup system heavily leverages data de-duplication to enable months of backups to be stored on one disk array," Sirois said. "If all our DWG files look to be 80–90% new data each time they are touched, then that kills the effectiveness of the backup system."

Ironically, the modified DWG 2007 format was meant "to make it more compact and improve performance for AutoCAD users." Nevertheless, Autodesk acknowledges that "one of the side effects of the DWG format changes is that when users perform a complete save from within AutoCAD (as opposed to an incremental save), virtually every byte of the file gets changed — even if zero changes were made to the file itself" (see "Potential for reduced write performance for Riverbed WAN links when working with AutoCAD 2007 DWG files" at the online AutoCAD Services and Support page, published March 12, 2008).

The affected products include AutoCAD 2008 and 2007, AutoCAD Architecture 2008, Autodesk Architectural Desktop 2007, and AutoCAD Civil 3D 2008 and 2007. While it tries to come up with a permanent fix, Autodesk proposes the following workarounds:

  • Use a feature in AutoCAD called Incremental Save Percentage (ISP) and set it to 50.
  • Use a version of the DWG format other than the AutoCAD 2007 DWG format.

Wright-Pierce is cautiously experimenting with the first approach. Sirois hopes rumors of increased potential for file corruption with higher ISP settings will prove unfounded. For his firm, "saving the file in an earlier version's format is certainly not a workaround at all for Civil 3D and may not be for other verticals such as AutoCAD Architecture," he observed. "The newer model objects and entity types created in Civil 3D are simply not supported in earlier versions. Such objects can't exist in earlier-version DWG files without losing all their intelligence."

Sirois is encouraged by Autodesk and Riverbed's reaction. "The big news is, Autodesk has become enlightened about how important multioffice interoperability is to its mid-size and large customers," he noted.

Silver Peak, Riverbed's competitor, jumped at the opportunity to declare, "There has been uproar recently among AutoCAD customers because certain older WAN optimization products appear incompatible with newer AutoCAD file formats. Silver Peak has worked with Autodesk and other customers to verify that Silver Peak's NX appliances do not suffer this limitation."

Monday, April 21, 2008

United Airlines

I flew to Dallas with United Airlines from Montreal via Chicago last Monday and suffered a 3 hour delay in Chicago for 2 mechanical problems with the plane. I missed meeting Mario Andretti in the process. On Thursday, I was supposed to fly back to Chicago @ 5:55PM but the flight was delayed for unknown reasons. Since I would have missed by connection in Chicago, they sent me to American Airlines for a new flight. American had a conflict with Air Canada so back to United I went.

United found me a new flight but I would have to stay in Dallas one more night. They paid for the room but included no meal vouchers. I called United to complain about this and argued with a customer relations agent for 10 minutes about the spelling of my name.

Suffice to say, I got home with American Airlines 16 hours late. I hate United and will never fly with them again. Nobody's perfect, but they don't seem to understand customer satisfaction.

One more thing, they fill up a plane from front to back. Ridiculous!!! Air Canada has the good sense to fill up a plane from back to front so people don't bump into each other. Also, Dallas/fort-Worth Intl Airport is SOOOOOO badly designed it's not funny!

J'ai voyagé avec United Airlines pour me rendre à Dallas de Montréal via Chicago et j'ai eu un délai de 3 heures à Chicago pour 2 problèmes mécanique. J'ai manqué la chance de rencontrer Mario Andretti. Jeudi, mon vol de retour à 17h55 a été retardé pour des raisons inconnues. Puisque j'allais manqué ma connexion à Chicago, ils m'ont envoyé à American Airlines. Après qu'un problème avec Air Canada, j'étais de retour chez United.

United m'a donner des nouveaux vols mais je devais rester une nuit de plus à Dallas. Ils ont payé pour la chambre mais pas pour les repas. J'ai contacté le support à la clientèle pour poser une plainte et je me suis battu avec le représentant pour 10 minutes pour bien épeller mon nom.

En bout de compte, je suis arrivé chez moi 16 heures en retard. Je déteste United et je ne prendrai pu jamais de vols avec eux. Personne n'est parfait mais ils ne comprennent pas la satisfaction du client.

Une dernière chose, ils remplissent les avions du devant vers l'arrière. Ridicule!!! Air Canada comprend qu'un avion doit être rempli de l'arrière vers l'avant pour éviter que les passagers d'enfargent. Aussi, l'aéroport de Dallas/Fort-Worth est tellement mal concu, ce n'est pas comique!

Back from Dallas / De retour de Dallas

Hello,

I was in Dallas, TX last week for the annual AutodeskTech Camp where all resellers (except ImaginIT) were present to be trained on the new products. ImaginIT, according to rumor, boycotted the whole thing because of the ridiculous costs associated with sending hundreds of people there for a week.

I really enjoyed the Revit Structure 2009 class as well as the BIM for Sustainable Design and Giving Great Presentations seminars. The flights I was on with United Airlines sucked (view next blog entry for details). I am glad to be home after a long week.

Salut,

J'étais à Dallas au Texas la semaine dernière pour le Autodesk Tech Camp annuel où tous les revendeurs (sauf ImaginIT) étaient présent pour être formé sur les nouveaux produits. La rumeur qui courrait était qu'ImaginIT faisait un boycott pour protester les couts nécessaires pour envoyer des centaines de personnes là pour une semaine.

J'ai vraiment aimé le cours sur Revit Structure 2009 ainsi que les séminaires sur le Développement durable avec Revit et Donner des présentations fantastiques. Mes vols aériens avec United Airlines étaient pourris (voir le prochain article du blog pour les détails). Je suis content d'être de retour chez moi.

Monday, April 14, 2008

AutoCAD 2009

Hello!

I installed my copy of AutoCAD 2009 on Saturday and it's looks nice. A brand new interface a la Office 2007 (which I kinda like). You can always go back to AutoCAD Classic mode if need be. My only problem was that I can't register the product because Autodesk's system has not been updated yet. I will you know when it is.

Salut!

J'ai installé ma copie d'AutoCAD 2009 samedi dernier et ca regarde bien. Un nouvel interface à la Office 2007 (que j'aime un peu). Vous pouvez toujours retourner à AutoCAD Classique si nécessaire. Mon seul problème est le fait que je ne peux pas enregistrer ma copie parce que le système d'Autodesk n'est pas encore à jour. Je vais vous aviser lorsqu'il l'est.