AutoSketch vs. AudoCAD

Autocad LT is the "lite" version. Autosketch is the "xtra lite" version.

Keith

Make friends in the hobby. Visit Garratt photos for the big steam lovers.

I haven't seen the recent versions of AutoSketch, but when I got one of the early versions in the late 80s, it was AutoDesk's cheap entry CAD package which, IIRC, it had taken over from another company, and it bore little resemblance to AutoCAD at the time.

Then AutoCAD LT came along, and that was a genuine Lite version of AutoCAD, basically AutoCAD with very few 3D facilities. I remember AutoDesk selling it as a cheap version that AutoCAD users could use at home to work on their AutoCAD drawings.

Jim.

True. AutoDesk bought out QuickCad and repackaged it. The user interface was bad. I bought release 5, current is 8, and haven't found reason to upgrade (6 year old software) (May have found a reason to upgrade, doesn't support the newer image files)

For the occasional user who wants to use the computer to do what you used to do with paper, pencil, etc its great.

Jim

Jim,

I found my early AutoSketch a good package to use and I did a lot of work with it along with a (then) new HP DeskJet and an HP plotter. However, it had one drawback for me since I wanted to design track with it and it would only rotate objects by degrees and I needed a lot more precision than that. So I moved up to LT which had come on the market.

I'm still using some track drawings done on my Autosketch which were transferred out as DXF files.

Jim.

I had AutoSketch from version 1.03 when I got a math coprocessor. When I was on the phone with Autodesk purchasing one of the upgrades, the marketing manager and I were chatting about the software and she told me an interesting story on the creation of AutoSketch: One of the founders of Autodesk (I don't remember his name, but I'd recognize it if I heard it) had an idea for a vector-based drawing program suitable for "the masses" (in both price, storage space, and hardware it would run on). It would run on an original IBM-XT off a 360K floppy disk (yeah, we're talking about 15 years ago!)

He rented a hotel room on a Friday, checked in with his laptop, and started coding. When he emerged on Monday morning, he had the raw code for Autosketch creaking along (but still needing some polishing and refining) just about ready for beta testing. Total project time: three days.

Later on, Autodesk had bought out an early CAD program that was written for the Windows interface from the start: Drafix CAD.

Both AutoCAD and AutoSketch had started as DOS applications.

Autodesk tried to use a warmed-over version of the Drafix interface as a "new version of AutoSketch," which ended up alienating a pile of AutoSketch users, by trashing the interface they were used to, and a pile of Drafix users, who found that that many of their favorite features -- such as scripting -- were yanked or butchered beyond use.

Some adapted to the new FrankenCAD, and I think some of the old features were eventually resurrected. I haven't seen or used the product since Version 5 -- Autodesk also stopped contacting me with news and information on the product line, even though I was a dependable customer.

Oh, well. I've moved on to other pastures in the decade since.

Your sideline observer from the midst of the skirmish,

Toolfox