Internet CAD Software Allows Sharing of Designs

CollabWare Corporation, an Idaho Falls-based Application Service Provider (ASP) and software developer, recently released a new 3D CAD system designed from the ground up for use over the Internet.

Originally developed at Lockheed Martin to manage extremely complex design programs such as the F-22 Stealth Fighter, GS-Design is an aerospace-grade CAD system capable of modeling ultra-large assemblies and managing an almost limitless number of design configurations.

With its web-based, three-tier (client/ server/database) architecture, the software provides for true collaborative design, whether members of a design team are located thousands of miles apart, or just around the corner from each other.

?Our three-tier architecture provides design teams with the tools they need to handle the really tough design problems,? said CollabWare president Barry Moyer.

With GS-Design, multiple users on geographically distributed design teams can work concurrently on the same project. The program manages revisions and configurations, and provides secure central storage of design data. Each user can see the state of the design in real time, eliminating version control problems encountered with other CAD systems.

?High-performance CAD software such as GS-Design is typically very expensive, but is justified in cases where mainstream commercial CAD software simply isn?t up to the task,? said Brad Holtz, CAD industry consultant, and author of The CAD Rating Guide. ?But CollabWare?s ASP distribution model has brought the price of GS-Design down to the level where companies can afford to put it on the desk of every person who needs it. It?s a unique situation: A very advanced CAD system available to even the smallest CAD budgets.?

GS-Design is available for rent on a month-to-month subscription basis over the Internet, which provides for significant cost savings. Upfront installation time and cost, as well as maintenance and upgrade costs, are reduced to zero.

Users download the GS-Design client program, and get to work immediately using CollabWare?s secure HP application servers that host GS-Design. Model data is centrally stored on HP servers running Oracle database software.

According to Scott Cullins, an spokesman for CollabWare, the system could be used by an engineer working for a city water or wastewater department to begin preliminary design work. Once the preliminary layouts and other data were ready, engineering consultants could be given access to the Internet files so they might bid on the job.

?Say the city awards the contract to a British company. The engineer can manage the development right from his desktop,? Cullins said. ?There would be no need to have the latest drawings Fed-Exed. They?re available right over the Internet. Not copies, but the real data.

?The job might be awarded by subsystem to several vendors. All would have access to just the data they needed to perform their particular job,? he said. ?The engineer can give access to manufacturers, also. They might discover early on that a particular fabrication technique that the engineering firm is calling for will not work. Better to know this information sooner than later.?