120606 curved beams

Comment

Comment by David Rutten on June 7, 2012 at 8:37am

Shadi (and everyone else with similar sentiments), there is simply no way that McNeel can provide all this functionality in the base product. We don't have the manpower or the knowledge to write a lot of the specialized tools that independent developers like Jon include in their plug-ins.

I understand it feels icky to purchase a plugin when the core application is free, but intuition and gut-feelings have no place in economic policy. The only reason to buy software is because it will save you money in the long run. If your hourly rate is $25 and you can eliminate 20 hours a month by buying a $1000 product, you've earned your money back in 2 months and everything else is gravy as they say.

There is a conflict of sorts between McNeel & Associates and 3rd party developers as I outlined in this response, but so far the benefits of having an active 2nd & 3rd party development community have far outweighed the costs. You, me and Jon are engaged in a symbiotic relationship that ideally benefits us all. If you feel it doesn't, then you have the freedom to ignore it or even ask for your money back.

But whatever your personal feelings, it cannot be denied that Jon is providing worthwhile solutions for other people who are probably quite interested to see what he is working on.

Comment by Shadi Ossaili on June 7, 2012 at 7:59am

ok just stop saying that my plugin can do this and do that in each post , people are trying to do it with grasshopper , and don't want to buy anything , they did grasshopper free so that more people gain benefit of it and get in the parametric design , i don't get it why McNeel allow you to use this website to advertise your product . 

Comment by Luis Fraguada on June 7, 2012 at 5:53am

By the way, nice beams Jon ;)

Comment by Luis Fraguada on June 7, 2012 at 5:53am

@Shadi The component sets which Jon creates are targeting a crucial market for grasshopper: professional practice and real world projects.  If a company doing professional / commercial work sees that through Geometry Gym they can enhance their capabilities and remain compatible with their established workflow, then they might go ahead and buy Rhino.  For the GH community, this is great for several reasons:

1. More licenses of Rhino sold = more potential GH users

2. More professional projects created with Rhino / GH = the continued development of GH as a robust associative modeller capable of handling very real project tasks (which it can already do, and which each revision gets more mature).

All of these things feed back to affect the maturity and robustness of grasshopper, a tool you use for free ;)

Comment by Danny Boyes on June 7, 2012 at 4:51am

@Shadi, your comment does not seem to be in the spirit of grasshopper.

Grasshopper is still free to all Licensed Rhino Users to use in its native form. If you want to develop tools that exceed grasshopper's current capabilities then you are free to do so and charge people for the privilege of benefiting from your hard work, if you wish it.

But with this approach you have to support all of your users and overcome difficulties that they are presented with each time David decides to change the core of GH and third party plug-ins stop working. Also you run the risk of competition from others so you have to continually stay ahead of the curve with development of your tools. Many hours of work might be involved. After all, this, if you choose to pursue it, is your lively hood, how else are you going to buy housing/food/beer/computers etc.

If you don't want to use Geometry Gym, that's up to you. If you don't want to see the updates about its capabilities, like the one above, please refrain from opening them and commenting on them with messages of hate.

It would be much better if you funneled you attention into contributing something to the community as a whole with help, examples, tutorials etc.

If someone comes online asking for help and Jon suggests using GeoGym why not present an alternative. Most things can be solved in different ways with Grasshopper.

Above all else be constructive with your comments, not hateful as every one is entitled to courtesy and consideration. Constructive criticism is not only to be expected but sought.

Comment by Jon Mirtschin on June 7, 2012 at 3:20am

Sorry that my work leaves a bitter taste in your mouth, fortunately you are in a minority.  I'm not sure how else I can work full time on BIM enhancements for this software, I'm not employed by McNeel.

I have made my work freely available to academics and researchers.

Comment by Shadi Ossaili on June 7, 2012 at 2:59am

man i realy hate your plugin and the way you commercialize grasshopper .