Anyone useing Blockpad yet? Any thoughts, comments or suggestions?
First I’ve heard of it.
I finally canceled my MathCAD maintenance contract and was looking for a replacement. Was planning on using SMATH, but going to give this a test run instead.
Seems nice… until you check the prices.
I’m a carpenter, so I don’t rent my tools. I checked the lifetime license and it’s 950$. For an Excel replacement!
Sticking with Excel and VBA. Learning Python and Julia.
I like to own my own tools also. I own Mathcad but I have to rent Office to get Excel and Word. Yes, I know I could get OpenOffice, etc and I used those extensively but they just are not as good. I have no trouble paying for good tools. Since Mathcad is effectively dead and I have not liked Prime everytime I try it, I’m once again looking around. I’m not a fan of the work-arounds to make Excel use units or look like Mathcad, I’ve not been too impressed with SMath and a few others for my needs. So, I decided to give Blockpad out for a spin. So far, I like what I see, and they reply to emailed questions quickly.
It imports Mathcad (mostly)
It will import Excel soon (they say)
It will import CAD files soon (they say)
It makes PDFs quickly.
I like the flexible display system which can show your work.
The spreadsheet seems more like GoogleDocs than Excel but It has it’s plus points also.
Having a Mathcad replacement that also has native spreadsheet and word type documents is a plus.
It’s organization and presentation is growing on me.
I’m looking for anyone with experience to share, as I will as I try it.
I’m looking at Blockpad, too, but I have some concerns. It’s still pretty “young”.
Actually some of my concerns have arisen due to my attempt (at work) to use Smath regularly. I have been foiled several times by the updates that are not backward-compatible. In particular the reorganization of its linear equation solver 2 years ago caused a lot of grief because it happened at a very inconvenient time and burned a lot of hours to downgrade Smath to an earlier version to get the report finished, then find the change, then re-write the report.
My other beef with Smath is that it simply does not create pleasant graphs while this was simple and looked rather nice in Mathcad (IMO).
I am looking for something more than a glorified pocket calculator. I know that’s not a very tolerant attitude but when I had a highly functional tool and now I see it slowly wither away I’m still not over my disappointment.
It is pretty young but on the other hand maybe it gives me input to how it is being developed and because the development team seems small I get very quick and detailed responses to questions. My biggest issues are (1) is there a perpetual stand-alone version at a reasonalble cost (yes - for me the cost is OK compared to annual MathCad + Excel and the additional functiontality it seems to bring to the table), (2) does it work for me now - can it replicate exactly the answers in my current MathCad and Excel sheets (yes, so far), (3) do I like the direction it is headed (so far, yes like what I see), (4) does it have features missing from MathCad and Excel that will make my life easier (yes but I have only begun to scratch the surface) and (5) when it is orphaned, sold or killed for some other reason will I be as happy as I am now with dead MathCad (to be determined).
Summary: this is the first program I’ve thought was worth pursuing…
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Rereading my post, I realised it came out as totally wiseguyish… I’m sorry for that.
I just meant that I don’t think that the subscription model is adequate and that the price point is way off what my market allows me to spend.