On 05/07/2010 22:40, DJ Delorie wrote:
> I looked at the press release a little, and it does't seem any more
> "free" than anything else we already have, except that you have to join
> their community to unlock the software. Even Eagle doesn't make you
> join their community for their "free" version, and gEDA and Kicad have
> been even more free (and sometimes more professional) than the give-away
> proprietary stuff.
>
> Plus, it seems to be a node-locked single-user license, limited to one
> license per DesignSpark member, unless you ask for an exception. Their
> privacy policy explicitly states that they'll use your personal
> information to spam you, too - information you have to give them to
> activate their product.
>
> It looks like EDA software is becoming such a commodity item that
> every's starting to use theirs as a loss leader to get people hooked
> into other aspects of their business - pcb fab, design forums, extended
> features, advertising. I'm reserving judgement on whether or not this
> is a good thing - competition is good, but fragmentation can be worse.
It looks like a full version of Easy-PC, I'll have a word with WestDev
about it tomorrow and see what they say. Easy-PC is a good package, I
used it for over 15 years before I got Pulsonix.
Leon
--
Leon Heller
G1HSM