This product was reviewed three years ago in AECbytes when it went by the acronym ADT. Coincidentally, at that time I was writing a book on ADT called Mastering Architectural Desktop 2006. Since then, much has evolved and changed in AutoCAD and its architectural vertical. I am honored to have been asked to write this ...

What’s New in AutoCAD 2009 AutoCAD® software lets you design, visualize, and document your ideas clearly and efficiently. Autodesk redesigned the user interface of AutoCAD® 2009 software to accelerate tasks, allow commands to be easily found, and help rapidly train new users. Ribbon With the ribbon interface, overall drafting productivity is increased as the number of steps ...

Adobe's FireWork CS 4 (actual version 10) is the new "tool" of the trade for (web) developers and designers that want to create: websites, RIAs (Rich Internet Applications), UIs (User Interfaces) and any kind of design or layout that will interact with users. FireWorks is not very popular in the design market, since most of ...

In my review of Adobe InDesign CS3, I complimented all the various aspects about that new version, but lamented how Adobe still had a lot of work to do to fill in the shoes of the missing FrameMaker for Mac. They did ...

Adobe Soundbooth CS4 is an audio editing application for the video editor, it integrates well with Adobe Premiere Pro CS4 and the other applications that go with the Production Premium Suite. Soundbooth CS4 is still targeting a specific audience as opposed to the fully trained professional audio editor. As a previous user of CS3 I was ...

New InterBase 2007 combines performance benefits of a multi-generational architecture with peace of mind of log-based journaling and disaster recovery. Easy installation, small footprint, automatic crash recovery, self-tuning, Unicode, SMP support, SQL 92 compliance, and near zero maintenance makes InterBase 2007 the ideal database for embedded and business-critical small-to-medium enterprise server applications. New in InterBase 2007 Journaling ...

New features in Op-Center 6.5 Interactive or scheduled execution of remote scripts and processes from Management Console Availability lifecycle scheduling (chron-like) for any Managed Object. Enhanced Template selection experience when building Configurations. Right-click profiling of J2EE application performance using seamless integration with Optimizeit Profiler and ServerTrace. Right-click JMX monitoring for supported J2EE application servers. Expanded Templates for popular J2EE servers, VisiBroker ...

CodeGear RAD Studio Professional gives you a highly productive IDE with hundreds of ready-to-use components and features like refactoring, code completion, syntax highlighting, live templates, full-featured debugging, unit testing and local database connectivity to Blackfish SQL, InterBase and MySQL. CodeGear RAD Studio 2007 combines Delphi, Delphi for .NET, and C++Builder in one environment for rapidly developing ...

With Logic Studio 8 dropping in price, it’s easy to wonder if the world needs Logic Express. As the cut-down budget version, it’s very much cheaper, but – not so predictably – includes most of the features of its bigger brother. There are no limitations on track count or audio quality in the stripped down version ...

Create and produce music like a pro Create your own music using an advanced spectrum of features and tools for computer based music production. Logic Express provides a step up from GarageBand for aspiring musicians, producers and composers without breaking the bank. With the same flexible layout as Logic Pro, you can dive deeper into the ...

If you asked Mac IT people what previous versions of Mac OS X Server have been missing, a calendar server would be at the top of most lists. Mac OS X 10.5 Server fills that gap. For the most part, iCal Server is easy to set up. The only big problem we had was trying to ...

Soundtrack Pro is an audio postproduction triple threat. Introduced at NAB, it's a robust environment for audio editing, analysis, and effects processing that offers seamless file exchange with Final Cut Pro and Apple's other professional applications. It's a powerful platform for loop-based arranging and mixing. And, it can be used as a standalone program for ...

Generally I don't review point-one software updates. But Shake 4.1 is something different. Not that the program has changed all that much, but it's now available in Universal Binary form, so it runs on Apple's Intel-based hardware (extraordinarily well, as we'll see). And, what's more, the price has been lowered drastically to make it affordable ...

Apple fans will be well aware of the company's policy of releasing yearly operating system updates. Unlike Windows, which sees a major release every three to four years, new releases of Apple's system are much more incremental, and have been since the release of OS version 10 (or X, to use Apple's term) way back ...

Nero 9 is an extremely competent suite for burning CDs and DVDs of all types, as well as for playing, importing, and manipulating video and audio, including HD. But Nero 8 was competent, too, and while the improvements in Nero 9 are most welcome, they’re probably not enough to warrant upgrading from the previous version. The most ...

New CS4 Features: Smoother panning and zooming and fluid canvas rotation (New) Navigate to any area of an image with new, ultra-smooth zooming and panning. Maintain clarity as you zoom to individual pixels and easily edit at the highest magnification with the new Pixel Grid. And use the revolutionary new Rotate View tool to smoothly turn your ...

Adobe InCopy CS 2 is Adobe’s editing application for editing workflows that combine with InDesign CS 2. InCopy and InDesign are increasingly often being used together as a publishing solution at magazine publishers, newspapers, ad firms, etc. The advantage of having two separate applications like InCopy and InDesign is that you can split up the workflow ...

Adobe keeps Illustrator CS the top dog in the field of professional drawing tools. Although Adobe is trying to convince all Photoshop enthusiasts to use Illustrator as their primary drawing tool, almost every graphics professional still uses Photoshop. That could change, thanks to Illustrator CS. Beyond Illustrator CS's ability to work in a check-in, check-out production ...

Late last month, Adobe announced their latest addition to the Acrobat family of products, Adobe Acrobat 3D, which now extends the visualization, publishing, and collaboration capabilities of the ubiquitous Adobe PDF format from 2D documents and drawings to 3D models as well. This can only be seen as a testament to the growing importance of ...

This is an important software category. You can drop off your flash memory card as if it were film at some photo finishing shops to get prints. But most digicamers are on their own after they press the shutter. In the beginning that meant laboriously transferring images from the card to your computer to print from ...

Flash Media Server products combine in themselves the functions of streaming and flexible development environment, which allows creating and putting interactive multimedia applications for a wide range of users. Adobe Flash Media Server 3 products consist of Flash Media Streaming Server 3 and Flash Media Interactive Server 3 packages. The first product, Flash Media Streaming ...

Adobe acquired Syntrillium Software in May 2003 and morphed its flagship Cool Edit Pro product into Adobe Audition. Version 1.5, which has an estimated street price of AU$559, results in a dynamic yet accessible audio-editing powerhouse, now better integrated into the Adobe video-editing product suite. Although experienced audio editors will get the best use out ...

Introduction: I've been working with several beta-versions of After Effects 6.5 for a while now, and the last couple of months I've been doing all my production work with 6.5 in various stages of completion. With the official release coming up very soon, I'd like to share a little bit of my personal experiences ...