IntelliCAD 7 Beta2 Release: Work Smarter and Faster with a Brand New Architecture

IntelliCAD 7 Beta2 Release: Work Smarter and Faster with a Brand New Architecture

Portland, OR., USA, February 10, 2010 – The IntelliCAD Technology Consortium (ITC) today announced a Beta2 release for ITC members of the all-new IntelliCAD 7 CAD software incorporating a new software architecture designed to optimize the core data import/export and application programming functions critical to users of the IntelliCAD CAD platform. The IntelliCAD 7 architecture uses DWGdirectTM from the Open Design Alliance (ODA) as its internal database for improved handling of DWG files. For companies building custom applications, IntelliCAD 7 also offers the powerful DRX object oriented application programming language (API) developed by the Open Design Alliance (ODA) with custom IRX extensions specific to the IntelliCAD platform.

The IntelliCAD platform, combined with ITC member solutions is being used by thousands of companies for creating engineering and design documents from the simplest 2D room design to the most complex 3D plant construction and BIM analysis. The new enhancements to the core IntelliCAD product offer architects and engineers an enhanced user experience through an improved user interface, more efficient drawing handling and improved product quality.

Companies building design automation applications on top of IntelliCAD will appreciate the DRX/IRX API to create sophisticated commands and industry-specific custom objects that interact intelligently with other objects according to their properties.  DRX and the IRX extensions provide the ability to create complex applications with custom objects similar to the Autodesk® ObjectARX® API. The unique IRX extensions offer special cursor handlers, specialized editing functions, document and layout managers and custom printing and plotting interfaces.

The new IntelliCAD 7 geometry subsystem improves graphic quality and supports a variety of graphic display devices. The extensive quality, performance and functional improvements to the IntelliCAD 7 product extends the decade long IntelliCAD tradition of incorporating new enhancements specifically requested by its members.

“When I got my first glimpse of IntelliCAD 7 I was excited about the potential of the new DRX/IRX programming environment,” said Bill Wright, President of WrightSoft Corp. of Lexington, MA. “We highlighted our new automated HVAC application developed on IntelliCAD 7 at a recent trade show, and I am convinced that this is a huge step forward for IntelliCAD. We’ve built a real-time HVAC load analyzer seamlessly triggered by clicking on specific areas of a building. Drawing creation and export has also been significantly improved making it easier for our users to send construction documents downstream. IntelliCAD 7 offers software developers like us an ideal development environment with significant power and flexibility advantages over our old CAD platform.”

New Features in IntelliCAD 7
IntelliCAD 7 offers many new end-user and development platform features:
Greatly enhanced general drawing productivity: docking properties pane and command window, layer management, Drawing Explorer, enhanced menus and toolbars, real-time rendering support, and more.
Integrated command compatibility and support for the DWG 2010 format.
New support for custom objects, including AutoCAD® Architecture objects using ODA ADTdirect to display and edit architectural entities such as walls, doors, windows, etc.

Full support for DRX with extended IRX methods; support for VSTA; new online developer help, including integration with Microsoft® Visual Studio®.
Expanded internationalization tools simplify localization in addition to the ten languages already available: single source for online help and printed manual; UNICODE support; switch languages on the fly; easier access to files for localization changes.

“We designed IntelliCAD 7 to give our member companies an improved CAD platform, utilizing the best technology available today. The Open Design Alliance has created a world class development environment with its DWGdirect libraries and the DRX programming language and those technologies are woven into the fabric of IntelliCAD 7,” said David Lorenzo, director of development of the IntelliCAD Technology Consortium. “We paid attention to the input from our member community and they demand a high quality platform with excellent interactivity and performance. We are confident that they are getting what they asked for with this new release.”

Availability
The Beta2 release of IntelliCAD 7 is available to members of the IntelliCAD Technology Consortium. Companies interested in more details about IntelliCAD 7 or in discussing membership in the ITC should contact the ITC directly. For more information about IntelliCAD, including case studies, please visit http://www.intellicad.org/.

Autodesk, AutoCAD, ObjectARX and Autodesk Architecture are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., in the USA and/or other countries. DWG is the native file format for Autodesk’s AutoCAD® software and is a trademark of Autodesk, Inc.  IntelliCAD Technology Consortium is not affiliated with Autodesk, Inc. IntelliCAD is registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office by The IntelliCAD Technology Consortium.

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