open letter to Autodesk.

Hi Luis,

Greatly appreciate reaching out to us on this Forum, I will do my best to take care as accurately as possible your questions.

First, lets be clear, EAGLE design files are stored locally on your computer, EAGLE neither Autodesk have no access to this or stored them in some cryptic cloud. The only thing Autodesk EAGLE needs to access is your license which its validation which is on the cloud, everything else remains locally on your computer. 

EAGLE files are stored in ASCII XML data structure, we also provide users with the .dtd documentation if you wish to understand how the file is structured. You can find the .dtd file in the EAGLE document folder.

If for some reason you needed to go offline, EAGLE will remain fully operational for 14 days, before that you need to get online and allow to validate the license entitlement.

If your subscription was to expire, EAGLE will remain working free mode, which allows you to open your designs you can also print, and export from it, including but not limited to, Gerber and Drill files for designs that exceed the free version limitation.

The Autdoesk EAGLE development team are diligently and consistently working on adding many new features which will enhance your design experience.

Why would Autodesk ever pull the servers or go out of business with EAGLE?  Autodesk is a well established company that intentionally would not jeopardize their hard earned reputation.  You can be assured if this was to ever happen, some sort of solution will be provided. 

Best Regards,

Ed

Hi Ed,

Thanks for coming back to my rumbling.

First, lets be clear, EAGLE design files are stored locally on your computer, EAGLE neither Autodesk

> have no access to this or stored them in some cryptic cloud. The only

thing Autodesk EAGLE needs

> to access is your license which its validation which is on the cloud,

everything else remains locally on your computer.

That was perfectly clear... I had no intention to suggest otherwise

neither any of my comments presumed otherwise.

EAGLE files are stored in ASCII XML data structure, we also provide users with the .dtd documentation

>if you wish to understand how the file is structured. You can find the

.dtd file in the EAGLE document folder.

Indeed the guts of the file format is not really interesting for me to

understand, sorry. Same applies to the .dwg files of autocad I have no

interest also however they flawlessly work in nano-CAD, Draftsight,

Rhinoceros etc.

So please let me know a list of software packages where I can I can

continue a design that I started in Eagle. Thanks. (maybe they exist...

I don't know)

If we have the freedom of renting, stop and continue in another

software, then rental is fair.

If we rent, start a project and then are forced to keep renting to the

same company in order to finish the project, sorry but that is not fair.

(In this part of the world mortgages/loans can be moved from one bank to

another, if they could not be moved would empower a bank to rise the

values and squeeze a poor man to the last cent). I don't know how to

explain my point any better than this sorry, and this is my main

objection to this compulsory subscription

scheme.

If for some reason you needed to go offline, EAGLE will remain fully operational for 14 days,

> before that you need to get online and allow to validate the license

entitlement.

If your subscription was to expire, EAGLE will remain working free mode, which allows you

> to open your designs you can also print, and export from it,

including but not limited to,

> Gerber and Drill files for designs that exceed the free version

limitation.

That is clear, and all fine. Sounds right and according to the model you

want for Eagle.

Don't see any problem here. I've read that before... all fine.

The explanations you kindly gave here in this post and in earlier posts,

we all appreciate, denote the difficulty you are having to understand

the real issues that people are complaining about.

There is an underlying problem you should take an effort to grasp, which

is the modus-operandi of Eagle users. You may consider to resist the

temptation of trying to educate

everybody as it never worked out in the past.

The Autdoesk EAGLE development team are diligently and consistently working on adding

> many new features which will enhance your design experience.

We would be happier if you add something that we want, the goal of any

company

is to please the customers... at least for my small one is.

Why would Autodesk ever pull the servers or go out of business with EAGLE?

I can't really tell, as we are out of crystal balls for the moment, but

I'm sure you could come up with some ideas if I give you 6 months. About

the same time span from "Eagle will not go subscription " until today

  One idea that comes to mind is that one day it may become

financially uninteresting... who knows !

Autodesk is a well established company that intentionally would not

> jeopardize their hard earned reputation.

I fully agree with the term "intentionally"

... these Eagle licensing issues are certainly not improving your

reputation as I see it.

It is clear that the decision was taken and Autodesk is going to stick to it

so all I can say is that we will keep using ver 7.7 and will move to

KiCad (or else) on

the next big project that justifies the effort of moving.

Thanks for your time.

Luis C.

If we rent, start a project and then are forced to keep renting to the

same company in order to finish the project, sorry but that is not fair.

(In this part of the world mortgages/loans can be moved from one bank to

another, if they could not be moved would empower a bank to rise the

values and squeeze a poor man to the last cent). I don't know how to

explain my point any better than this sorry, and this is my main

objection to this compulsory subscription

scheme.

I sadly agree.

In 2015 I got a 1 year free license from Element14 as part of the PiIoT Challenge kit, so I unexpectedly experienced the period renting product. During this licensing period I moved from version 6.x to 7 and all was fine. Then I decided to buy a 7 unlimited license but almost in the same period I starting reading the news about the Eagle products acquired by Autodesk so I wait. At the actual date, unfortunately I have stopped this move, jut for the cost respect the projects (some also commercial ones) I am working on.

Indeed the guts of the file format is not really interesting for me to

understand, sorry. Same applies to the .dwg files of autocad I have no

interest also however they flawlessly work in nano-CAD, Draftsight,

Rhinoceros etc.

The way to port is something I am thinking too, as you can imagine. At the moment the only possible solution I see is through the Gerber export process, a format that can be imported in some other electronic CAD products.

It is clear that the decision was taken and Autodesk is going to stick to it

so all I can say is that we will keep using ver 7.7 and will move to

KiCad (or else) on

the next big project that justifies the effort of moving.

I have tried to understand what can be the reason of this apparently illogic move.

The only reason I can see is that after Autodesk put his hands on the Eagle package has already internally decided that the small and personal users are no longer interesting for the business model of the company. As a matter of fact the Autodesk business model applied to Eagle is something starting a process of natural selection, orienting the product to their core business without the need to explicitly declare this traumatic (for small users and small companies) decision as well sounds acceptable and reasonable for big customers.

Enrico

If we rent, start a project and then are forced to keep renting to the

same company in order to finish the project, sorry but that is not fair.

(In this part of the world mortgages/loans can be moved from one bank to

another, if they could not be moved would empower a bank to rise the

values and squeeze a poor man to the last cent). I don't know how to

explain my point any better than this sorry, and this is my main

objection to this compulsory subscription

scheme.

I sadly agree.

In 2015 I got a 1 year free license from Element14 as part of the PiIoT Challenge kit, so I unexpectedly experienced the period renting product. During this licensing period I moved from version 6.x to 7 and all was fine. Then I decided to buy a 7 unlimited license but almost in the same period I starting reading the news about the Eagle products acquired by Autodesk so I wait. At the actual date, unfortunately I have stopped this move, jut for the cost respect the projects (some also commercial ones) I am working on.

Indeed the guts of the file format is not really interesting for me to

understand, sorry. Same applies to the .dwg files of autocad I have no

interest also however they flawlessly work in nano-CAD, Draftsight,

Rhinoceros etc.

The way to port is something I am thinking too, as you can imagine. At the moment the only possible solution I see is through the Gerber export process, a format that can be imported in some other electronic CAD products.

It is clear that the decision was taken and Autodesk is going to stick to it

so all I can say is that we will keep using ver 7.7 and will move to

KiCad (or else) on

the next big project that justifies the effort of moving.

I have tried to understand what can be the reason of this apparently illogic move.

The only reason I can see is that after Autodesk put his hands on the Eagle package has already internally decided that the small and personal users are no longer interesting for the business model of the company. As a matter of fact the Autodesk business model applied to Eagle is something starting a process of natural selection, orienting the product to their core business without the need to explicitly declare this traumatic (for small users and small companies) decision as well sounds acceptable and reasonable for big customers.

Enrico

Enrico Miglino schrieb:

The way to port is something I am thinking too, as you can imagine.

At the moment the only possible solution I see is through the Gerber

export process, a format that can be imported in some other

electronic CAD products.

Apparently someone provided a way to port EAGLE designs to KiCad:

<http://hackaday.com/2015/12/27/eagle-to-kicad-made-easy/>

Tilmann

Hi Tilmann,

good suggestion, I was searching but I have not yet found this. I was thinking to something wider than kikad but reading the article it is anyway a good starting point.

Enrico