Practical argument against depending on the cloud
So I’m working on a Sunday, sue me. I went for some help in the SolidWorks Help at 9:50 AM, which as you can see just happened to be unavailable at the time. When I do maintenance, I usually do it at a time of my choosing. When some cloud provider does it, they do it at their convenience. To me, the unpredictability of when something is not going to be available is reason enough on its own to avoid cloud applications. Add to the maintenance time the time your ISP leaves you off line for some reason, as well as times when you are simply not connected. With that possible combination of causes, you could be without access to your Help more than is useful. This is before we even talk about if you are able to find what you are looking for in the Help.
So are the claimed benefits of updating the Help really worth the inconvenience? You update anyway for service packs. And if you don’t, why would you want the Help updated? No, I believe the Help belongs on the machine that the software is on. Didn’t anyone live through the time when you had to timeshare on a mainframe? Maybe you did this in college. Sharing a mainframe was ok for stuff like word processing, but not for anything very involved. At RIT we had a VAX system in the early 90s. There were also PCs, and some Unix workstations. The PCs were always in short supply, because you got to work on your own, and you just felt more in control of your situation.
Honestly, what is different between working in “the cloud” and timesharing on a VAX mainframe 20 years ago? I’m not in school any more, and I’ve got a job and a choice about how I will work. I should have learned not to trust the shared community resources 20 years ago, but then I turned on the SolidWorks Web Help. Won’t do it again. Work locally. Update my help files locally. Don’t make me dependent on resources I can’t control.
Of course all of this is punctuated by the recent cloud failures with cloud companies losing customer data, or becoming temporarily unavailable. Sidekick/Microsoft, Amazon, Palm, T-mobile, all names that are big enough to know better, and all names that have lost customer cloud data or connectivity. Every time Gmail goes down, it makes the national headlines. You can buy a terabyte of storage for less than $100. That’s 10^9. That’s a lot of SolidWorks models for cheap. There is a valid argument for backing up data off-site, but the security issues as well as speed/infrastructure and reliability issues point to solutions other than the burgeoning cloud storage industry.
The techno-optimists keep trying to sell this like A) it’s something new which it isn’t and B) it’s better than sliced bread which again, it isn’t. So you are being dragged into this issue whether you want to be or not. SolidWorks is putting your help files in the cloud. And while you have a choice to use the local files or the web-based files, Solidworks may not be updating your local files in the same way. We’ve heard a lot of solid arguments against SolidWorks application running in the cloud, but now they’ve put the Help there, and I’d like to hear what you have to say about it.
Totally agree.
I went to check there, its still down at 16:33GMT, and I get an even worse error:
http://solidworks.burkesys.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/solidworks-help-offline.jpg
No offer of a Launch Local Help, just a “Application Offline” error.
No trace of any SolidWorks news alert or tech alert either. At lease when an ISP/Hosting company schedule downtime, they notify their customers about it.
Anyways, in case anyone is looking for the offline help, its under:
C:\Program Files\SolidWorks Corp\SolidWorks\lang\english\sldworks.chm
The cynics that look down on cloud computing have always dismayed me. Correctly implemented “cloud infrastructure” is subject to no human foibles.
Correctly implemented cloud computing would take a data breach or loss and automatically heal itself, recover lost data and punish the data thieves while resecuring data and firing incompetent employees or managers that compromise the integrity of the system. During any interuptive issues there would have been automatic redirection of users to geo dispursed non failed instances such that they would never notice an interuption or failure at all and the failed/interupted location would have automatically restarted on non failed hardward and automatically redirected/recovered all the data from other sites. It would automaticaly take Chinese and other hackers and place them in a virtual reality jail where they could never threaten anyone again. Real cloud computing would also have psychic attributes that would in virtualy all cases see the threat or problem before it happens and create the preventive proactive solution before an in house solution would have caught the fresh breath of first thought.
What is there here not to like?
Cloud is only handy if you use more then 2 computers. Or make your own cloud at home or work so you can use your cloud everywhere.
A big cloud like Steam is also handy for storing big (external) files that you don’t need to use that much and would only take up space on your hard drive for 95% of the time.
I don’t think it is handy to put files that you use a lot on a cloud. But who uses help a lot?? And google beats help for 90% of the time.
The cloud idea works well in countries with major internet infrastructure. Here in china, the internet goes down all the time, so all this new cloud talk is treated with a grain of salt here.
But where ever you are, you need an on and offline solution to truly advance computers beyond what they are now.
Online = backed up, lots more data, view it anywhere
Offline = instantly retrievable, yours, if internet is not available (eg. most plane flights around the world)
And so far nobody has come up with a really good solution for syncing, organising and stabilising this approach.
And the new google OS sounds great in theory, but is really designed for people who “wanna write their first novel” and other newbies who use their computer for 15 mins a day.
It’s a joke and it’s totally not ready yet!
It’s been clearly communicated that with SW 2010 if you want to use the ‘local’ help files, you can choose that method, and it will get updated with service packs just like it have forever, so if you’re able to choose that and use it, what are you bitching about?
Ronald,
If they are exactly equivalent, why have two? I believe half of the point of having a web system is to avoid updates to the local. The other half is that they believed web search options were better. Don’t be naive enough to believe that SW is going to maintain redundant help systems. SW documentation is all about cutting costs. This is the first step in yanking the rug out from under us.
I am not sold on the “CLOUD” idea. Call me a cynic but I have very little trust with those who hold data offsite and God knows where it is. Eventhough I don’t have much trust for things like this, we all are exposed to it in some fashion. Like electronic banking. Unless we all get off the grid we’re subject to it. I much rather control my own data and backup.
People were upset to see the printed manual go but considering the number of users and all the editing to be done I guess it really wasnt practical any more.
I suppose too it saves trees and postage although personally I find reading a pc screen much less satisfactory than a typeset page.
Next we had the .pdf of the .chm however enough people apparently werent interested in it to make it worth their while to do. I’m not really sure that people really care about the format. Perhaps no one uses the Help cos they gave up already years ago or they are just extremely intuitive?
Recently we have the abandonment of indexing, nonspecific illustration and a move to the net.
I would think its just a matter of time until there is no on board Help at all.
Most likely its all ready decided but in the true SW bit wise, patronising and secretive fashion we just havent been told yet.
There are quite a few applications I have on my pc where the Help is only on the net.
I have to say I find it highly annoying that I dont ‘own’ my own Help and can only access it when the server is up and I can connect. I find a scowl forming on my face as the browser opens.
To be fair though I have found the SW online beta Help search and nearby access to the Knowledge base quite useful although its annoying to have to log in to move deeper. I also have been able to report missing stuff to the doco team if I am feeling particularly pissed about it.
I think it needs refinement but generally it helps me find more information.
The trouble is most of the time I actually find out the solution to the Help issue I am looking up is that something is broken or that key information that should be in the Help is obscurely hacked into a quick explanation of a known issue of which there are 38 to read.
If the actual Help section itself was improving it would be good but it isnt.
All these measures do is give you access to a jumbled scrap book of disorganised and incomplete info to pick through yourself.
In that fashion it does afford some help but then so does visiting a forum to ask a question.
I guess the issue is what is a ‘Help’ supposed to be?
If the answer is it is for a user to attain a high level of independance by the access to a full and authoritative account of the workings of the program the SW Help is still a failure whether it is online , offline, dropped by helicopter or in a weekly comic.
Matt,
Your statement, “Don’t make me dependent on resources I can’t control.”, says it all.
Whilst we are, in general, ‘dependant’ for other on many things controlling our life and the way we live and work; for some things it simple does not make sense, nor is it good business practice to take the risk (in a cloud) with the sort of data we are handling for our customers and ourselves.
They must be rewriting the entire help system. It is still offline.
The real problem will start when local help starts to disappear.
Its back. You obviously frightened them.
Computing in the cloud is perfect for the SW corporate mentality: They automatically add bugs, SPs, so your models fail to rebuild or are corrupted. Then they charge you for the bugs, and every file that has been updated and corrupted. If you complain very quietly, they might eventually fix the bug.
Of course a less ethical company might corrupt your valuable work and then extort for the service of repairing you defective files. I think that cloud computing will bring the ethics and customer service attitude of the telephone company to the software industry.
I don’t understand why—even on the “cloud”—the files aren’t available during “maintenance” or updating. The user should automatically redirected to the location of the non-updated back-up version. Doesn’t make sense to me why this isn’t happening, since doing so isn’t a matter of incredibly difficult coding or anything. Also, I cannot imagine the documentation being a terribly large library file, either, so the update itself (in terms of uploading to the server) would probably be very quick. My guess is that in this case the server itself failed and wasn’t discovered for quite some time.
@ Jeff.. Yeah!!! isn’t cloud computing supposed to be storing all your data everywhere and “in the cloud” as if it had no physical location.
This is supposed to be way better than the 1-2 servers used for hosting a website and the occasional down time..
THERE SHOULDN’T BE ANY DOWN TIME! THAT’S THE WHOLE POINT OF CLOUD!!
solidworks could take an old machine, set it up in a corner as a web server link it to the help site and manually update the help files to it as and when they desire.. and that would be more stable than what they have presently.
I guess the people who are marketing/programming cloud computing have their heads in the clouds. hehe
I kind of have mixed feelings about this one. I’m all for control of my own data, but the reality is we have so many ways that we need to access it. I still don’t own a laptop or smartphone, but I will someday and will want everything to be “in one place”. I’ve already ported ALL my email accounts to Gmail, and it plain rocks. I can now just go to ONE place and it’s all managed there, no matter if I log in at home, at work, or somewhere else. No syncing this and copying that, it’s all already there. As a “backup”, I’ll fire up Outlook once in a blue moon and let it download all the messages.
I wouldn’t mind SW on the cloud as long as the speed was there, which I think we still have a ways off before that happens.
On the original point about SW help – it is not working. This morning I checked the help using SW2009 SP5 – placing a caterpillar weld annotation. The local help pops up OK but the “example” buttons presumably link to a website somewhere and these fail.
Not acceptable.
SolidWorks is a £5000 application – minimum. Yes it is complex but help systems should work in all situations. Take Google SketchUp. When it was under the original developers @last software the help was installed on the machine and local. Now under the Google banner ALL help is online. Now that is great but it assumes you can get online. Big mistake.
A robust help system should have a core that is installed locally – including all the animations and video clips, then that core should be updated by service patches as part of the SP install. The only thing that it should be going to the web for is EXTRA content.
I have no issue with help running via a browser, but I have a huge issue with help only running fully when connected to the net.
FACT – telecoms systems fail – both locally in the office and at the provider
FACT – web servers break
Case in point – there was a gas explosion 200yds from my office the other day. Power supplies and telecoms have been disrupted in the local area. I had no internet connection all Monday.
I can see the value of cloud for synchronising email, contacts and files across machines and mobile devices (I myself depend on Apple’s Mobile Me for this). That works well – but the data is still available offline and it syncronises after it has been changed.
But if I pay big bucks for a software application I expect it to be available in its entirety all the time – not to depend on an error some developer makes 3000 miles away in forgetting to type in the right links or forgetting to restore one part of a server after a rebuild.
The only people benefitting from the cloud are the software vendors, not the end users. Now they have a zero physical delivery solution, full control over the distribution and licensing, and full knowledge of what we are running, when, and on what, and what else we are running it with.
So will we get a discount aor reducing software costs? Yeah right!