Veteran dev: AI-built TraceDraw beats CorelDRAW 2026, predicts software industry upheaval by 2036
Maxiol777 · reddit · 2026-11-06
A veteran developer shares his prediction that AI will reshape the software industry by 2036, based on hands-on testing:
- Evidence: TraceDraw, a free open-source Rust vector editor built with Claude Code that reads CorelDRAW .cdr files, ran faster than CorelDRAW 2026 on his test tasks despite being alpha. He installed it on his wife's laptop instead of buying another license — 'one potential sale Corel has already lost.' Inkscape never convinced him; this small AI-assisted project did.
- Timeline:
- 2027: explosion of serious open-source apps built by individuals/small teams with AI coding agents.
- 2028: price competition — vendors face 'why pay hundreds of dollars when a free alternative almost suffices'; even 10 mature survivors per 100 projects could flip market segments.
- 2029: tiny companies shipping complex software; more apps expose agent-facing APIs; possible attempts at AI-first desktop environments.
- 2030–2032: companies choose between buying software and having agents build custom solutions; internal tools and converters become dramatically cheaper.
He concedes enterprise systems won't vanish overnight, but argues the shift has already started with his own CorelDRAW test.
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