In the old (late 1990's, AOL?) PowerCADD forum, there was a section topic titled something like "Baselines and Bricklines", in which users posted more social type messages. I remember talk of the annual crappy fishing tournament, plane fly-ins, and other things that PC users were involved with around the country and world, and I found it interesting as a one-man office. Sort of a virtual water cooler for PC users, who seem to have a lot in common. I miss that section.
I hope you all are healthy and weathering these strange times.
Regards,
patrick
Hope all are doing well...
Re: Hope all are doing well...
I ran the Macintosh Graphic Arts & CAD forum on AOL from the start when it was still Applelink Personal Edition in the late 80's and I don't remember Baselines and Bricklines. I did create a Powercadd group as well as a Photoshop group and a Kai's Power Tools group with Kai Krause. We had dozens of message boards and 9 live chats per week. Was that after AOL added when Windows users came online? If it was late 90s, I left AOL in 1995 when they restructured and I would have had to move to Vienna, VA to stay with them and finally get paid. By that time I had a better job managing Target Stores prototype store development.
A lot of us got our online start on Compuserve in the early 80's I still have Chris Black's three bound set of printed out messages on there. Joe Burke was another major player. I haven't looked at them for a couple of decades to see if I remember all the other players.
A lot of us got our online start on Compuserve in the early 80's I still have Chris Black's three bound set of printed out messages on there. Joe Burke was another major player. I haven't looked at them for a couple of decades to see if I remember all the other players.
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Alfred Scott
- Posts: 272
- Joined: Wed May 29, 2019 8:47 pm
- Location: Richmond, VA
- Contact:
Hope all are doing well...
I've heard from Joe Burke recently. He has had a stroke and now lives in Easton, PA, to be near his daughter. He no longer has a Mac, now iPad and iPhone only.
When I got started I knew almost nothing about CAD, but I had the experience of teaching myself drafting working on the Falco drawings. So I understood the process but not how it should be done on a computer. When I was introduced to PowerDraw, I had already had the experience of using MacDraw II, and I was completely disillusioned with ClarisCAD when it came out. I was provided with it for free as a beta tester, but I remember being overcome with the feeling of being defrauded, so far was the program from what was needed.
PowerDraw was easy to use, and it had some great features, particularly on-the-fly snapping, which has never been equalled by any other program. But it was also very limited, and I wanted to put my fist through the screen every five minutes. It had a macro programming language, and when they developed the ability to create external tools, I was the only one involved initially. I started writing tools, initially the Insulation Fill tool, and then an Intersection tool, an awkward trimming tool that evolved into the Trim tool we now have.
I finally threw up my hands and decided to create a whole new tool palette, initially called “NewTools” that became WildTools. I started going in the wrong direction, and Joe Burke was sending me hot emails about how I was missing the mark. He had been an office manager of a large architectural firm in Hawaii that had used PowerDraw and then moved to Microstation. Joe then gave me a guided tour of every idea worth stealing from Microstation. If stealing ideas were a crime, Joe Burke and I should have been lined up against a wall in front of a firing squad with machine guns.
The logic of the Trim tool of clicking on the part you want to keep came from Microstation, and then later evolved with finger technology when I became frustrated with my own tools.
Joe Burke was a screaming firebrand, who was hard to take at times but I knew I was plugged into a genius, and I valued every moment I had dealing with Joe Burke. We are all in his debt for what we have in WildTools.
Alfred
When I got started I knew almost nothing about CAD, but I had the experience of teaching myself drafting working on the Falco drawings. So I understood the process but not how it should be done on a computer. When I was introduced to PowerDraw, I had already had the experience of using MacDraw II, and I was completely disillusioned with ClarisCAD when it came out. I was provided with it for free as a beta tester, but I remember being overcome with the feeling of being defrauded, so far was the program from what was needed.
PowerDraw was easy to use, and it had some great features, particularly on-the-fly snapping, which has never been equalled by any other program. But it was also very limited, and I wanted to put my fist through the screen every five minutes. It had a macro programming language, and when they developed the ability to create external tools, I was the only one involved initially. I started writing tools, initially the Insulation Fill tool, and then an Intersection tool, an awkward trimming tool that evolved into the Trim tool we now have.
I finally threw up my hands and decided to create a whole new tool palette, initially called “NewTools” that became WildTools. I started going in the wrong direction, and Joe Burke was sending me hot emails about how I was missing the mark. He had been an office manager of a large architectural firm in Hawaii that had used PowerDraw and then moved to Microstation. Joe then gave me a guided tour of every idea worth stealing from Microstation. If stealing ideas were a crime, Joe Burke and I should have been lined up against a wall in front of a firing squad with machine guns.
The logic of the Trim tool of clicking on the part you want to keep came from Microstation, and then later evolved with finger technology when I became frustrated with my own tools.
Joe Burke was a screaming firebrand, who was hard to take at times but I knew I was plugged into a genius, and I valued every moment I had dealing with Joe Burke. We are all in his debt for what we have in WildTools.
Alfred
Re: Hope all are doing well...
I'm one of those players from those GEnie, ALPE, and AOL boards. The person who first got me to look at PowerDraw and jump in was an employee of Media 5, that Hawaii firm that Joe Burke later went to work for. His name escapes me at the moment, but we got together at a Boston Macworld Expo. I met Joe Burke in person at the one and only Washington DC Macworld Expo in 1989, I think. I had a job interview with Media 5 myself in January 1990, but I had just gotten a freelance client and ended up staying here.
I'll never forget Alfred showing up on my doorstep once, too. At the time, he couldn't cope with my Wacom tablet, so I had to find a mouse and attach it for him to demonstrate stuff.
Also, as I recall, it was David Stoval who foretold of a new program coming out from an architect he knew, Lee Anderson, called UpFront. I ended up using that program for 3D for about 10 years until SketchUp came along with a Mac version.
I put up a post about UpFront on the SketchUp forum here: https://forums.sketchup.com/t/bsu-befor ... ront/77440
I'll never forget Alfred showing up on my doorstep once, too. At the time, he couldn't cope with my Wacom tablet, so I had to find a mouse and attach it for him to demonstrate stuff.
Also, as I recall, it was David Stoval who foretold of a new program coming out from an architect he knew, Lee Anderson, called UpFront. I ended up using that program for 3D for about 10 years until SketchUp came along with a Mac version.
I put up a post about UpFront on the SketchUp forum here: https://forums.sketchup.com/t/bsu-befor ... ront/77440