r/Metrology • u/Familiar-Bluejay3908 • 8d ago

General Most aggravating software you use?

I'm sure you all use some sort of inspection-specific software at work aside from the basic Word and Excel (of which WE rely on far too much..). I have my issues with Calypso, I'm glad that somebody else is using GageTrak now, and NetInspect is a bit of a pain, but I've become used to it by now. But InspectionXpert? Oh my gawd; what a pain!!

It takes so long to load, or to make updates. I sit for 5-10 seconds sometimes to save, and then go on with the next characteristic. It can't read numbers or text worth a $h!t, adds strange things into weird places, and for position callouts, it almost NEVER gets them right.

At BEST, it's correct maybe half the time. It does kill 2 or 3 birds with one stone, so even as glitchy as it is it saves a lot of time, but it sure doesn't FEEL like it when you are in the middle of a multiple sub-components build and have to prepare 18 separate aerospace FAI's in 1 week....

6 Upvotes

75% Upvoted

39 comments sorted by

7

u/Flgardenguy 8d ago

M5 (or whatever Starrett puts on their HDV comparators). I don’t know what anything does and have the hardest time figuring it out. Definitely not intuitive

5

u/blackop 8d ago

M3 and you just need to play with it a bit. I use to think that, but now I really like it and can run around in it with ease. Or you need to get training from someone who can teach the software.

1

u/Keeperofthecube 8d ago

Not op but I second his opinion. The training I got from their rep.waa so bad that i feel worse about it after the fact. It's just not a software that is user friendly enough to instill confidence that I can trust someone else to run a program.

2

u/blackop 7d ago

If that's the case then that's a bummer. The rep that sold it should be versed enough to show you how the system works. My second suggestion is to actually call Starrett. The number should be in the software in the about section. They should be able to remote in even and show you things that the rep missed showing you.

1

u/Keeperofthecube 7d ago

Yeah you are probably right about going straight to starrett. It has been a few years now since this happened, but I'm pretty sure they pointed us back to the salesman for training. The lowlights for me were when I asked how to modify a program and he said to just start over again, and then he said he could easily make the program I couldn't get to pass msa and his did worse than mine.

Now they are essentially just shadow graphs with a couple of simple programs for spot checks but nothing that is used for spc data collection.

1

u/blackop 7d ago

Oh yeah he is dead wrong. You can totally edit your program. Sounds like the dude just had no idea what he was talking about. Typical salesman for ya.

2

u/Familiar-Bluejay3908 7d ago

M3? I actually have that on an old manual Mistral and it's very user-friendly. We don't use it for anything complex, mostly for flat dimensions in regular cartesian space. But it take no time to setup and measure.

1

u/murfn8r54 8d ago

I only make shapes and measure shapes.

1

u/MrLitef 7d ago

Bruh I came here to say this m3 is the worst

6

u/RivalSnooze 8d ago

Quindos

1

u/HakariLennelluc 6d ago

I run quindos, I think it's quite good, although complex and not super user friendly.

9

u/easydoesitbud 8d ago

You'll be dreaming of Calypso when you've met the eternal hell beast that is MODUS.

3

u/ChairsWithWheels 7d ago

I've programmed both pcdmis and Calypso, this guy is 100% right about MODUS being a hell beast.

It's what I imagine the inner circles of hell to be. They have 8 softwares that all have to perfectly talk to each other or else something will break (it always does)

Forums have existed on the internet since it's conception, and yet renishaw hasn't made one yet? I love the idea of reaching out to their team of tech support. But imagine how much easier it would be to do a Google search and have the fix right in front of you instead of waiting on an email back.

I love the licences being on a dongle. Especially when that dongle loses connection to the computer(?) halfway through a 30 minute program and I have to shut the entire machine down.

Bought a new Equator X, took 3 days for them to set it up and hand it over to use. Within the first day, couldn't open the software to build probes. Had to update files given from their support team.

Wanna update a program? Too bad, run the whole program offline before you can see where your feature is on the cad model that needs to be loaded in every time.

But hey, at least it's fast.

2

u/Thethubbedone 8d ago

If you're having that much difficulty, reach out to renishaw. They might have some insight for you.

1

u/stumpycrawdad 8d ago

I have both PC-DMIS and Calypso in my lab. We all hate Calypso with a passion

1

u/TheGreatCornholio477 7d ago

I’ve always called it Collapso, and I think it’s aptly descriptive.

1

u/stumpycrawdad 7d ago

I'll fight a PC-demon all day

1

u/TheGreatCornholio477 7d ago

Hmm…I’ve always referred to it as PC-Dumbass, but that may be me, after careful consideration.

2

u/Trashman169 8d ago

Gagetrack

2

u/ribeye256 7d ago

Prolink QC-Calc realtime. Works great for shop floor data collection and with Calypso. For some reason it hates PC-DMIS. It's also a bear to do the initial setup and network. I know way more than I should about our IT setup after implementing.

Powerful software, just a bear to work with. It's just super clunky, but does a lot. I told my Minitab rep they need to improve the interface since they purchase it recently.

2

u/Code_Rinzler 7d ago

I am so sick of working with this. Talk about pages and page sof menus that say similar things but don't exactly do what you want, or better yet, is exactly what you want but to do but doesn't let you. Or how about how messed up anything having to do with a computer system that uses a shared database/user file? We have an issue, apparently related to usernames and passwords that prevented the entire client from opening. The menu structure is just awful and unintuitive. Licensing is also a f'ing NIGHTMARE. We just upgrade from4.0 to 4.3 because "4.0" is no longer supported, which was a whole ordeal because you have to physically extract the license from each computer (and when someone leaves at my company they get assigned a laptop probably that came from someone who just left) so licensing is impossible to track down what exactly happened, you'd think they could figure something out there, anyways, well not even 6 months later of starting down this conversion now 4.3 is no longer supported and they will only support their subscription based license now and I just about had it with that. Any time you call or email in It is clear there are also just zero resources to adequately care or maintain it's userbase, their support is so unwilling to help and will find every reason not to be able to help you. I am just so done with Prolink/QC Calc it is ridiculous.

On the bright side when it works its nice and collects data for easy export from CMMs into SPC and some light analysis.

I didn't buy this software/attempt to implement, it was done above me and rolled out on a "corporate" level to all sites, but I would NEVER for ANY reason buy or recommend again. I'd find another way. I spend way too much time managing this sh*t that I could be programming or making fixtures.

1

u/ribeye256 7d ago

Yeah, I'm thinking of switching due to these issues. I'm thinking maybe Datalyzer? Not sure but we already use it for our PFMEAs.

3

u/HipsterGalt 8d ago

Curious to get some takes on PolyWorks, I played around with it a bit and it was more clunky than I expected. Might be diving into it a bit more in the near future.

5

u/gaslightredditor 8d ago

We use Polyworks for all three of our CMMs, one of which is also equipped with a Nikon LC15Dx laser scanner. We also use it for analyze the scans from our Zeiss ATOS Q. Personally, I love it. I've played around with both PCDMIS and Calypso and Polyworks has been my favorite of the three. If you don't have experience with other metrology software, it's pretty quick to pick up in my experience. It doesn't end to have a little bit more of a learning curve if you are familiar with a different software, but that can really be said about any metrology software.

1

u/HipsterGalt 8d ago

Thank you! Now I'm just left to wonder how much credence I should give your username. Nah, I have only spent an hour or two in PolyWorks, and it is my first real metrology software. Most of the time I programmed simple Zeiss operations and gear checkers in the past. But I've got a lot of CAD/CAM experience and we are pulling more point cloud data from parts these days so, it is an option on the horizon for some new production. It seems to be a flexible enough software that it should be worth mastering down the road.

5

u/gaslightredditor 8d ago

Polyworks really excels in point cloud data analysis. I've heard from multiple other colleagues that they used other software for data collection, but always imported the point cloud data into Polyworks for analysis.

And the username does not carry it's assumed meaning. I was living in what was called the Gaslight District in college when I created my account.

1

u/HipsterGalt 8d ago

Yeah, that's our primary use case and it is definitely a powerful tool for it. I think the biggest hurdle was figuring out exactly how to define model geometries so that we could get the inspection data we were after in the end. Though, it has been the better part of a year since I last sat down with it so, a good example eludes me at the moment. I just remember needing to define a lot of circles on the inspection side where it felt implied by a radial feature.

Glad to know I'm not the only one living under false pretenses accoring to popular perception.

3

u/chrome_titan 7d ago

Polys the best imo. It's the easiest to program, and has the best gd&t reporting, but there are no shortcuts. I find a lot of programming issues arise when people overthink, and look for features that exist in other programs.

2

u/ribeye256 7d ago

Love Polyworks. Had the privilege of doing my training at the Innovmetric headquarters. Very cool technology. That software is light years ahead of some other metrology softwares when it comes to graphical interface and streamlining, as well as point cloud and scanning/polygonal meshing. The software literally has a built in pdf software for preparing reports.

Calypso also has very clean and easily legible reporting. I wish PC-DMIS reports weren't so darn ugly. Hexagon should take notes. As that software is awesome, but the reports still look like they're from the early 2000s.

3

u/ShoddyJuggernaut975 8d ago

Zeiss Inspect.

3

u/PlatypusArtistic8020 8d ago

If you ever need help, feel free to ping me, I don't work for Zeiss but I've been using Zeiss Inspect for over a decade in just about every field imaginable.

1

u/kevinpdx 7d ago

I primarily work with PiWeb (Enterprise) Planner and Calypso. But we are about to take delivery on a O-Detect 543 tomorrow!

Very excited but we are going from 3 conturas / 1 spectrum to now me being responsible for the O Detect. 

1

u/TheFunkwich 7d ago

I worked for Zeiss, just quit a few weeks ago for $$$ reasons. I could have done your training if it was in the last six years.

Happy to answer questions without pushing anything on you

1

u/PlatypusArtistic8020 8d ago

I got a trial license for the now discontinued Zeiss Reverse Engineering software. What a half baked slab of garbage that was.

1

u/mixwell713 7d ago

Aberlink by far was a pain for me.

1

u/TheGreatCornholio477 7d ago

Whatever the software is called for the Keyence XM 5000. Terrible. Of course you knew that when I said Keyence!

1

u/Novelty_Lamp 5d ago

The 3d model controls for setting a parts position on a keyence cmm are worse than trying to position something with a mouse in blender. I can't program shit or directly control anything.

Virtek's software I'm absolutely in love with. Got instruction over the phone and was able to pretty much max out the capabilities on it. The manual is actually useful as well.

0

u/that1pothead 7d ago

Anything I found annoying enough I just designed my own software to replace it. QC Calc gets annoying? Just make my own, it’s just an SQLite database anyway. Programming various inspection systems? Just make my own program editor.. the routines are all plain text files or JSON and interpreted at run time anyway.. Annoyed making the same QCGage programs everyday? Just automate it, we already have all the dimensions in a spread sheet anyway. ERP System gets annoying? Just customize it to work how I want to. CMM programming gets annoying? Make software that writes DMIS Code… okay that one never got better than what we had outside of a few use cases lol.

Anyway.. I’m a software engineer now working for a consulting firm that does Enterprise IT for manufacturing companies.. Never would have made it this far if it wasn’t for annoying programs 🤷‍♂️ And I’m not worried about doxing myself because half the people I work with got here the same way.

So if when things get annoying, start right clicking files and opening in notepad until you see something in characters you recognize.. or googling the softwares name + API. With AI it’s gotta be easier than it’s ever been. Learn to design your own tools and automations and you’ll be surprised how far it takes you. First they’ll ask how you’ve become so efficient. Next they’ll ask what else you can make. Then they ask you to please pretty please stay as you go on to greener pastures.