Do the QC *BEFORE* the release, or Pay customers who find your bugs!

You have said nothing constructive nor provide examples of where you feel the software could be improved.

I know my customers use my products in ways I never expected or intended. It's been this way for my entire career, over varying products. 

It's not unusual to hear of a failure and I think, there is no way that could fail. Turns out, yes, there is a way, completely unexpected and unpredicted, you make adjustments and move on. 

I also make mistakes, lots of mistakes. In fact, I've learned over the years, the only time I don't make mistakes is when I'm not working. If I don't work any, I can guarantee there will be no mistakes in my work. 

I corroborate what @BenLoosli  and @StephenW have said that this does not seem to be a very constructive suggestion.

I also have been working with PTC Creo since when it wat PRo/Engineer 18.0, and although occasionally we have to deal with so called Fatal Errors of the software, it is not bug ridden as the original post implies. These are seldom ocorrunces. There was only one version that we tried that we did not implement at the time we tried, and it was Creo 1.0, and that needed much more bug hunting, it was essencial a Alpha or Beta version at the time, The fact that it was slower and bug ridden as not so much surprising since it implied a big change in the user interface. The other later versions that we tried were very usable and relatively bug free, although we are still frustrated that much needed (and apparently easy to implement) user requests sometimes take too much time to be implemented, or are not implemented at all.

About releasing "Bug Free" software, that is an impossible task. Much bigger software companies have much more bug ridden software, and I'm talking about operating systems and web browsers. To wait to release some piece of software until "All" the potential bugs are discovered means not releasing any software at all. So, there are customers who do prefer to have new releases more frequent to work faster with each new release, even if the software could (and cannot) be throughly tested.

Also, the comment that the developers should spend some time working with the software does not make much sense. They couls spend 11 of 12 months an year trying the software to discover new bugs and have Creo crash 2 or 3 times in a month (as in average we think it occur to us). So, they would spend most of their time essentially doing nothing in terms of programming. It's better to have Quality Assurance personel to deal with most of the testing, and having customer feedback for the "corner cases" is something that happens with any other CAD (or software) company.

They could give "bonuses" or "discounts" to customers that do take time and effort to report feedback, but is laughable that any company should pay the costumers to use their sofware.

Well, I apologize for not being a little more clear in my presentation. I hope you can look beyond my poor writing and attempts at sarcasm to see the point.

Yes, things happen. It's not about mistakes, but what you do with them, and more important, what you do to avoid making similar mistakes in the future.

I've been using PTC products for almost 30 years. v.13. I've used many others, and like PTC's best, but I really get tired of the same silly issues over and over. Especially when the answer is right there and so easy.

I'm not talking about fatal errors, or bug-free software. I also know that most people just deal with what they are given instead of looking to the potential of what it could be. Some comments above indicate that. To those who don't have demands that require a high level of efficiency, I envy you.

I want the software to succeed. PTC has the best thing out there, if they could only wrap their hands around the core issues -- first being the bugs, and second being all the inconsistencies and slowness in the UI. 4 UI's later, and they still have similar problems. ** When I say slowness, I'm talking about all the extra actions required to get work done. Things like requiring sequential mouse picks back and forth across the screen; inconsistencies in what mouse buttons to use for what; differences in when you have to pause (like for a menu to appear) and when you can just go; all the various modes that require different user interaction; 11 different menu types which all act different; and the list goes on. Truly, Creo 9 is really slow to work with because the overall thinking behind it is not consistent.

The solution to both of the big issues is internal use. None of the people that design and manage the software actually use it. They dabble, but they don't use it. I met with several PTC PM's and execs years ago. I had several ongoing meetings with them, and we spoke about ways to steady the ship.

When I was there, I asked. None of the execs or PM's had ever created a 1000 feature model. None a 500 feature model. 1 a 100 feature model. None, while at PTC had spent a week hardcore on a project.  It certainly appears that has not changed.  They listen, but don't hear, because it's outside of their realm of experience.  If they simply required the PM's and high-up developers to be doing that one day a week, the benefit would more than pay for itself.  As they use the software with an eye to inconsistencies, to efficiency, to speed, to usability . . . . (the things that mean something to their customers) . . . . they would see the issues and figure out ways to really make it better.

Perhaps most important, if they really use the software, they would get out of their silos and cross-pollinate consistency. The Assembly PM could learn a lot from using Sheetmetal, and vise-versa. Both could learn a ton by doing complex drawings and considering how to make all the user interaction consistent.

In the meantime, put a ransom on the bugs, and pay it to customers who take their time to help identify them.

I've been away from the bleeding edge of PTC for a while. Dropping in now at Creo 9, and the issues are hugely obvious. So many inconsistencies and extra steps and chasing things around the screen. After more than a month of everyday, right now I'm running about 50% efficiency because of all the frustrations, bugs and inconsistencies. Even as a visionary, I don't believe I can ever be as fast and efficient with these new paradigms. Maybe it's newness, or maybe it's that I'm not callused to the inconsistencies. Either way, I'm positive that if the PM's and some developers at PTC really used the software, with that eye to consistency, efficiency, speed and usability, it could and would be so much better. Not to mention they would find these fiddly bugs -- like those I have reported just in the last month. It's just so silly not to do high-level, preemptive QC on a product this vast.

IMHO, PTC has wasted a ton of time and resources in the past 20 years chasing UI's simply because they are unwilling to view their product from the eyes of their customers.  Sure, they talk to a lot of customers, but they don't really see through their eyes.  In all of my consulting over the years, the best companies are those where the decision makers are also customers.

What you're proposing is nothing new.  See this post from 2015:  Creo Parametric Rants & Die-Hard Users

(The "MOST ANNOYING THINGS WITH CREO" thread mentioned in the post above had more than 200 replies from people raising similar issues.  It has since been hidden from public view.)

Whether we like it or not, PTC is a publicly traded company.  Fixing bugs, minimizing mouse clicks, and unifying the UI experience doesn't sell more software or generate exciting headlines.  The product managers I've interacted with really do understand the software and care about it's quality, but they simply don't have the resources available to fix all the things that need to be fixed while also adding all the new stuff required for each new version's 'release themes'.  'New', 'Big', and 'Wow' are always going to get more development time than fixing problems.  Either we learn to accept it or switch to something else.  (Or buy the company if you're Elon Musk!)

And Epic "Creo Daily Grind"

https://community.ptc.com/t5/3D-Part-Assembly-Design/Creo-Daily-Grind/m-p/446098

These bring up memories from days gone by!

@ByDesign 

Sarcasm in writting is not always conveyd right. I interpreted yout original message first and foremost as potential arrogant, and possibly sarcasm. Arrogant in a sense that the original message conveyed the meaning that identifying and suggesting bug corrections is a more tough and skilled job than actual programming, which is not. I work as a CAD user mostly, but I also know about programming and the skills needed in that kind of job.

About your more reasonable and more humble portraying of the problems you identify with the software, I fully agree. Creo is not slow, on the contrary. The few demos of other recent CAD packages I tried make me want to stay with Creo for the foreseeable future. Top Solid 7 has a top notch user interface, but regeneration time seem slugish. Never tried with any big assembly, but even with small assemblies I prefer Creo. Siemens NX is updating at twice the pace of Creo, but even seeing real-time videos of demos of the latest version (December 2022), it's noticeable the time it takes for even creating a New Part. I think it takes at least 4 to  5 times what Creo takes only for the user interface appears. Maybe the user making that demo was using a slow notebook, I don't know. But even if as on a feature base and costumer feedback Siemens NX is getting much better than. But Creo is way better in terms of regeneration speed and user interface speed,

Having said that, I think you are right in wanting to improve workflows, excess mouse clicks and so on. There are several things that I have made suggestions for improvement that had no implementation much less any feedback. What frustrates even more is that some of these features were later implemented in other CAD packages, as even they were monitoring these ideas suggestion from PTC users, and move quicker to implement it there in these alternative CAD packages, because some of these suggestions could apply to any CAD package, and some would not even take much time to implement from a programming point of view. One the ones that I suggested here, was parametric specification of colors, a Color Feature, that just got implemented in the latest version of NX to be able to specify colors by varying parameters. Other would speed up common tasks as you suggested, avoiding too much clicks, or adding unedded features, like the ability to have the 3 embedded planes on a coordinate system, which most other CAD packages allow, but Creo doesn't. We know we can create them by offsetting 2 or 3 planes from the CSYS to be able to sketch on a CSYS orientation, but these are the little things you mention that without using the software intensively and doing certain tasks repetively would not seem to be needed. But they are, would speed certain workflows tremenddously.

Kudos for speaking up.  Like others pointed out, what you say is nothing new.  For me, the numerous product improvement ideas that haven't been addressed in decades are indicative of big problems that resulted in shrunk market share and a business situation where existing customers are being held hostage because cost of switching is too great. 

So yes, no software is perfect, grass is always greener on the other side, and your post was judged to be too sarcastic and not constructive - but I share your frustration and by occasionally venting, we maybe remind PTC that they need to keep getting better.

It is also good to gain from such conversations other's feedback and get a better perspective.

...are you my long-lost identical twin brother?  LOL

There are plenty of us who have used Pro/ENGINEER since the early days (v.15 for me back in early 1996) who have made the same complaints since then.  Best of luck, I'm still trying to get them to fix the BUG of splitting circles and cylinders in 1/2...  *sigh*