SMARTDRAW IN SOFTWARE DESIGN:

SmartDraw Scores Points in Online Game Design

Falling Behind
It's not all fun and games for the movers and shakers in the online game industry. Just ask Dustin Juliano, President and CEO of Ethereal Evolution, Inc., and creator of Universe Unlimited, an ambitious online multiplayer game.

Pressed for time, Juliano was looking for a quick way to create visual representations of his new game in its development stage. The answer? Flowcharting software.

"Flowcharts allow us to see the 'big picture,' upfront, so I don't have to spend time coding something that wouldn't have worked because of the design," he said. "Completing these complex projects would be nearly impossible without flowcharts."

Juliano tried Visio^®, but was less than impressed.

"I used Visio's^® trial software and was very hesitant to spend that much money on something so complicated and time consuming. It was not what we needed," he said. "There had to be an alternative…something simple!"

Then he found SmartDraw on Google and decided to give it a try.

Ahead of the Game
With SmartDraw, Juliano started creating flowcharts right away. He didn't even need to use the tutorials.

"The interface was just so intuitive," he said. "The intelligent tips helped a lot, and kept me up-to-speed on all the features I was using. As a developer myself, I can appreciate the extra attention to detail that took."

Juliano was also impressed with SmartDraw's speed—his number one priority. SmartDraw offers easy drag-and-drop drawing, and hundreds of symbols specific to software design. That meant Data Flow Diagrams, GUIs, and UML diagrams were just minutes away.

"SmartDraw is much faster than Visio^®," he said. "I could tell it would save me time by allowing me to design, and redesign, my software diagrams quickly."

Everybody Wins
These days, Juliano uses SmartDraw for all types of software design. SmartDraw ensures that he gets the design right-before he starts the time-consuming process of coding.

"In my industry, function follows form, so if the design is bad, the software will be bad, too," he said. "I believe if you have time to do it over, you had time to do it right in the first place."

Juliano refers to SmartDraw as his "visual notebook," which he uses to explain difficult concepts in simple terms.

"It's made it easy for me to plan massive and complicated systems that would have been difficult to comprehend, let alone explain to someone," he said. "SmartDraw has really helped make this game project come to life."

The final WORD^®?

"The smart choice is SmartDraw," he said. "Who doesn't want to save time and money?"