Product category:
Infrastructure and CAD Software
News Release from: SolidWorks Corporation | Subject: Education Edition 2008-2009 3D CAD
Edited by the Buildingtalk Editorial
Team on 11 June 2008
New 3D CAD software enriches learning
experience
The new SolidWorks Education Edition 2008-2009 3D CAD software introduces a streamlined user interface, fluid analysis capabilities, and an F1 racing car design project.
SolidWorks Corporation has released the next generation of its leading 3D CAD software for students and educators, SolidWorks Education Edition 2008-2009, which delivers all the powerful capabilities of SolidWorks 2008 Office Premium plus new analysis software, curriculum, and more Students from middle school through graduate school will immediately notice the most sweeping enhancement, a new, intuitive, time-saving user interface (UI)
This article was originally published on Buildingtalk on 15 Jun 2005 at 8.00am (UK)
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Students can work more efficiently than ever because the UI gives them new opportunities to interact directly with the model in addition to intuitive menu options.
A streamlined workflow anticipates which tools students will need in the context of the specific task they are undertaking and presents them for use.
The interface increases useful window real estate, reduces mouse travel, provides innovative customisation options, and offers task-based command selection.
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These attributes have helped establish SolidWorks as the easiest to use 3D CAD software system, focusing students on their designs and minimising distractions.
"SolidWorks Education Edition 2008-2009 makes it even easier for students to rapidly realize their design and engineering visions," said Kim Alan Olson, instructor of tool design engineering at Moraine Park Technical College in West Bend, Wisconsin.
"It improves usability and eliminates complexity without in any way dumbing it down for our students.
If anything, SolidWorks' easy-to-use capabilities expose students early to engineering principles they'll encounter in the professional environment down the road".
SolidWorks Education Edition 2008-2009 for the first time includes COSMOSFloXpress, an easy-to-use fluid dynamics application that calculates how fluid flows through a part model.
Based on this analysis, students can easily find and fix problem areas in their designs.
More advanced students can graduate to COSMOSFloWorks, a full-featured computational fluid dynamics and thermal analysis application in SolidWorks Education Edition.
SolidWorks Education Edition now offers the most comprehensive integrated analysis capabilities in education software.
* F1 racing car: SolidWorks Education Edition 2008-2009 includes a new 'F1 in Schools' curriculum for teaching middle and high school students about SolidWorks software, 3D CAD, and analysis.
The curriculum includes lessons for designing, analysing, simulating, rendering - then actually constructing - a scale model Formula One racing car.
Students can enter regional, national, and global competitions.
* SWIFT overcomes traditional CAD obstacles: In addition to the interface, analysis software, and curriculum, SolidWorks Education Edition 2008-2009 incorporates more than 250 user-requested enhancements introduced in SolidWorks 2008, including powerful new features built on SolidWorks Intelligent Feature Technology (SWIFT).
SWIFT Instant3D, one of several unique new features built on the SWIFT framework, lets users create and modify 3D model features simply by manipulating drag handles directly on the model.
Users don't need to deal with esoteric commands, dialogue boxes, and extensive data input other CAD systems require.
"Live cross-sections" enable users to make edits by dragging edges while looking at a slice of the model.
In addition, SWIFT DimXpert automatically sets geometric dimensions and tolerances on parts, saving time and providing expert information every design team needs.
DFMXpress promotes design for manufacturability, preventing costly downstream design errors by automatically flagging elements that are difficult, expensive, or impossible to machine.
"A design is just a fantasy unless it can be manufactured, and these two features especially give educators ways to raise the consciousness of students without requiring new software, machine tools, or curricula" said Marie Planchard, director of worldwide education markets for SolidWorks Corporation.
"It's just a matter of switching the tools on, interacting with them, and exploring what's happening".
More academic institutions and engineering schools have chosen SolidWorks than any other 3D CAD software.
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