Cut List is like Democracy. It's the worst form of government except
for every other form.

I haven't found anything much better than Cut List. The only other real
options worth considering are a full blown CAD package that will
generate the lists from your designs. Much more expenive and big
learning curve.

Cut List can be tamed a bit if you fudge with the setting. It works
better for plywood than board stock. I do mostly boards and it doesnt
always do cross cuts first, even when I tell it too. But if you go back
and reset the properties for the bad layouts after it generates them, I
can usually get it to do the corss cuts and arrange them properly.

On certain jobs this program saves me many many hours.