I haven't read every single post in this thread, but in general it seems that users' anger with PTC is in direct correaltion with how many years they have been using the software. I've seen the same feeling from users of different softwares. See Iain's comments about Excel for instance.
I know that some are immediately going to reject a psychological view on this issue, but it is true that some people are reluctant to change. This is said to be the case because with change comes a period of a loss of control which is, duh, undersirable. When a person becomes an expert software user it becomes very satifsying and when the software changes their expertise takes a hit until they learn the "new way". If in any situtation you find yourself hating the "new way" it might be because you have become set in your ways.
Forgive my lack of clarity in this view. This is just an idea I'm working on as I type this post. I'll bet that users new to CAD enjoy PTC software and don't see anything wrong with it. This sounds obvious I know. Now, look at it in reverse. If you embrace change and adopt the acceptance that a new user has with the software, then new releases don't have to be terribly upsetting. However, this may not be the case at all--we would need new users to chime in and rate their experience with the software in order to know. Maybe new users' opinions are how PTC makes its improvements 
, that would definitely make the experts angry.
If you were to only ask the experts how to improve the software it would look & operate like an ancient version of Pro/E, just with all the bugs worked out. I for one would hate this. I used 2000i and was floored with how alien the software felt with it's countless drop down menus embedded within drop down menus. It was a carpal tunnel nightmare. I think I'm in the minority--I'm a user (of 4.5 years) that is satisfied with the changes PTC makes to Pro/E. However, like most, I have a list of software improvements that I can't believe have yet to be attended to.
Regards,
Kevin B.
Hah! New is just new, and Bad is just....bad. I hate change simply for the sake of change itself. It's stupid and a complete waste of my time. If it's change with a tangible benefit, I'm all for it. Like I said, up until the ghastly WF interface I looked forward to each new iteration. Since the "Microsoft Boyz" seem to have taken over PTC, I've hated the interfaces. As a user with over 15 years on Pro/E and over 10 years of AutoCAD before that and some experience with Wavefront as well, I can say with all honesty that these interfaces have become increasing worse, with MORE mucking around, and slowing me down.
Now, I like the failure resolving feature in Creo, it's more like.....Solidquirks so that's a good feature....finally. But, overall, I'd stick with WF4 and Intralink if it was my money to spend or if I ever got into a point where I made that decision. How's that? so, if you've got a loyal, highly skilled, long-time customer/supporter saying that, shouldn't they listen? Also, the folley of pissing off 90% of your existing experienced users to try and gain a few more rookies from the Excel/word world floors me....
Also....don't make mistakes and you won't have to "resolve" failures.......
P.S. another thing, these "new" users don't have any frame of reference to make any sort of comparison like WE the experienced users do, especially as they are NOT presented with the old GUI to try out. It's like rasing someone in a remote village and telling him horse-puckey is chocolate. He'll munch it down and never know until he tries the real thing (sorry, coke), that it DOES get better.
Excellent (and far more diplomatic ) response as usual.
I learned the power of Pro/E by going thru the books, and by going through all those "carpal tunnel" menus to learn as much as possible about the software. I didn't need to be or want to be spoon fed anything. I wanted to try as many different things as possible. As a result, I've had some techniques I developed within the first couple years of using it that PTC still probably doesn't know about. I didn't consider there to be "too many" menus, if there really WERE that many different commands, I wanted to learn ALL of them, and did learn the vast majority of them, especially when it came to geometry creation.
The "Lead vs. Follow workflow" idea introduced in the original WF is HORRIBLE. This is some "fresh-faced" developers interpretation of what a real, experienced user would want....and it failed miserable. Before, the geometry and edit geometry commands were segregated and easy to find. Now, especially for those advanced commands rarely used, you have to try and remember whether or not to highlight the geometry first. A TOTAL nightmare. 2 projection curves being a great example, as are surface merges etc. The GUI is the LEAST powerful tool, yet when it's bad, causes the worst frustration and lost time. And things like this as Brian M. pointed out: "
More? How about an On-Point Hole? That hole type doesn't even appear on the drop-down list! Unless you knew you USED to be able to do it back in the older, dinosaur days of Pro/E, you'd never even think to try it." and: "I don't resist the interface changes simply because they're new. I resist them because they've hidden commands or scattered them. I resist them because, in the name of saving a few picks, everything has gotten much less intuitive. I resist the changes because often they feel cursory. For example, why does my dashboard need to be at the top?"
As far as adding to their client base, I totally disagree with the warm and fuzzy Microsoft ribbon crap. You show an Engineering manager (generally one of us experienced crusty old guys) that the tool works for his experienced Engineers, and as long as the interface is intuitive, they're not gonna care if it's menu-based or icon-based. In fact, icons just suck. Hyroglyphics-based languages have all died off, except in the case of perhaps Chinese etc. Why? Because it's much easier to decipher a WORD than some indecipherable icon. sure, I can "hover" over every single friggin' icon......for 30sec while it thinks, but that's a waste of my time. A word, I can see and respond to instantly.
Here's a friendly challenge for you KevinB (w/4.5 years experience) from a crusty old guy (of 47): soon, I'll attach a couple STEP files I made of geometry when I'd only been on the system for maybe 4 years max, and one I did 1-1/2 years ago, and you see if you can duplicate them or explain how it was done. With one exception, these were done pre-WF, some on V17 or so. Up for it? 
P.S. @Brian M.: I'll promise to try and go easy on him.
