| News Announcement Visio, Visio Technical Plus
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SEATTLE
– Oct. 20, 1998 – Visio Corp. announces the availability of
Visio Technical 5.0 Plus, an upgrade to Visio's pioneering technical diagramming software
for users who need to create, view and share 2-D technical drawings and diagrams within
the enterprise. This special update, scheduled for release by the end of year, is being
offered free to users who purchase Visio Technical beginning today. Visio Technical 5.0
Plus introduces support for the Bentley Microstation DGN file format, enhancing the
program's use as a broadly deployable technical communication tool. The upgrade also
offers enhanced intelligent diagramming features and SmartShapes symbol-based content to
process engineering and facilities management users for easily accessing and working with
the technical drawings widely used in those industries. "Through its evolution from market pioneer to market leader,
Visio Technical has become the benchmark product in the technical diagramming
category," said John Forbes, vice president and general manager, technical products
at Visio. "The new content and functionality to be introduced in Visio Technical 5.0
Plus reflect Visio's ongoing commitment to delivering productivity-enhancing solutions
that exploit the power of Visio's unique SmartShapes technology. Visio Technical's ease of
use, proven robustness, reliability and superior customization capabilities continue to
make it the clear choice for creating technical diagrams in record time."
Visio Technical 5.0 Plus Expands
Content Offering
The new content for Visio Technical 5.0 Plus resulted from collaboration with
leading companies within the process manufacturing and facilities management industries.
Visio partners in the process plant industry, Technical Toolboxes and Sugars International, advised Visio on the development of the new
productivity enhancements for creating process drawings. Lomasoft and Decision Graphics, Visio
partners within the computer-aided facilities management (CAFM) market, contributed to the
development of innovative facilities management solutions. These new solutions will
complement the drawing templates, application-specific wizards, and existing SmartShapes
symbols library of more than 3,800 task-specific shapes currently found in Visio Technical
5.0.
The specific new content for process engineers and
facilities managers is as follows:
- Process Engineering Solution.
Visio Technical 5.0 Plus's enhanced functionality provides a faster and more intuitive way
of creating process flow diagrams (PFDs), piping and instrumentation diagrams (P&IDs)
and datasheets than is possible using traditional CAD applications. Important new features
in the Process Engineering Solution include customizable reporting (tags, datasheets and
lists) and valves that automatically align.
- Facilities Management Solution.
The Facilities Management Solution is an easy-to-use tool developed for facility managers
and others who track and manage the people and assets of a facility. The solution includes
tools for quickly creating space plans and for tracking assets across the enterprise, as
well as performing "what-if" space planning. Easier to use than CAD, Visio
Technical 5.0 Plus allows even non-CAD users to work with facilities data in an intuitive,
graphical environment. The Facilities Management Solution utilizes Microsoft Repository
2.0 for storing facilities management data.
Visio Technical 5.0 Plus will also include new import
capabilities for working with Bentley Microstation DGN files, providing a powerful
adjacent viewing and annotation tool to organizations with Microstation seats. Combined
with Visio Technical's ability to import and export Autodesk AutoCAD and IntelliCAD by
Visio DWG files, its comprehensive CAD file format support gives enterprise users a
superior degree of flexibility when working with drawings created in multiple CAD platform
environments.
In addition to the new industry-specific content and
improved CAD file interoperability, Visio Technical 5.0 Plus also will incorporate
improved task-specific business diagramming solutions designed to make the creation of
business diagrams faster and more intuitive. This new content is focused on enhancing
business communications and managing information, processes, projects and concepts.
Managing Drawings With Visio
Technical
Continuing in its role as a technology innovator in technical diagramming,
Visio has introduced functionality in Technical 5.0 Plus that will provide users with new
ways to manage drawings from inside the drawing application. Tools such as the new Project
Explorer and the CAFM Explorer provide an easier way to view and manage information at the
project level when that data is stored in multiple drawings.
Project Explorer (left hand side window) allows
project document sets to be managed conveniently in Visio.
Customizing Visio Technical 5.0
Plus
Fully compliant with Microsoft Windows 95, Windows NT 4.0 and the Office 97
Logo, Visio Technical 5.0 Plus represents the state of the art in implementing modern
Windows technologies, including ActiveX, COM and VBA. All aspects of Visio Technical 5.0
Plus are exposed to the Microsoft COM model, including the user interface, giving solution
providers and enterprise developers maximum flexibility in creating custom graphical
applications. Visio's pioneering ShapeSheet technology makes customizing SmartShapes
symbol behavior as simple as editing a spreadsheet cell, thereby alleviating the need for
familiarity with programming languages to create new shapes or modify shape behaviors.
SmartShape symbol behaviour coupled with
ShapeSheet technology gives Visio users formidible power.
Availability and Pricing
Visio Technical 5.0 Plus will be available for purchase in January 1999 for
US$349. Registered customers who purchase Visio Technical 5.0 after Oct. 20, 1998, will
receive the Visio Technical 5.0 Plus upgrade at no cost. Current Visio Technical 5.0
customers may purchase 5.0 Plus for US$49 in January. Customers using other versions of
Visio products can upgrade to Visio Technical 5.0 Plus for US$149. To place an order or to
obtain more information, customers can contact Visio at (800) 24-VISIO [248-4746]
reference 93W or visit the company's Web site at http://www.visio.com/.
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