SmartDraw 2008 Just Released

If you're still using SmartDraw 2007, you can upgrade to the newly released SmartDraw 2008.

You'll get:

Plus integrated photo editing, easier interface, faster performance, and much more.

Click here to upgrade to SmartDraw 2008

Or Get the Last Updates to SmartDraw 7

Click here to get updates to older versions of SmartDraw

Version 7.5 - released 1/6/2006

SmartDraw 7.5 includes new and enhanced org chart, flowchart, and floor plan templates, metric symbols and templates in floor plans, improved table functionality, improved PowerPoint integration, and much more.

More Flowchart Templates
Not a day goes by without our team developing more templates for you to use. With Smartdraw 7.5, we're releasing a new selection of flowchart templates for you to customize as you see fit. Additionally, cause and effect templates (a.k.a., "Fishbone Diagrams") have been included as well.

New Metric Symbols and Templates
You asked for them, and now you've got them! SmartDraw 7.5 floor plans now include a selection of metric symbols and templates. The metric templates can be found in the following categories:
- Floor Plans: Business\Furnish an Office: Metric
- Floor Plans: Home\ Furnish a Room: Metric

And the metric symbols can be found the following libraries:
- Floor Plans\Business: Metric
- Floor Plans\Drawing Tools: Metric
- Floor Plans\Home: Metric

In addition to the metric templates, we have updated some existing, standard templates throughout.

Improved PowerPoint^® Functionality
The PowerPoint^® button on the toolbar, introduced in the 7.4 update, now transfers a SmartDraw graphic to a PowerPoint^® slide with a transparent background, making it integrate more immediately with the look and feel of your presentation.

This only happens when the background of your SmartDraw graphic is white (the default). If you have created a specific olored background for your SmartDraw graphic, it is maintained when you transfer it into your PowerPoint^® presentation.

Improved Org Chart Templates
To make drawing even easier for you, we have changed the way our org chart templates work. In earlier editions, org chart templates would open across more than one page. But with SmartDraw 7.5, they have been reset to open on one page.

This is yet another example of how our updates not only provide you with more content, but with software that consistently becomes easier to use.

New Sales and Marketing Template Category
To better serve the growing group of SmartDraw users who are sales and marketing professionals, we have added a new category of marketing based charts and diagrams to SmartDraw Suite 7.5. Improved Tables We have made tables in SmartDraw 7.5 more flexible than ever before. Lines will no longer link at both ends to the same table, which makes it much easier for bars on a Gantt chart, for example, to be moved.

Also, you may now more easily manipulate table columns. Partial columns that do not extend all the way to the top and bottom of a table now behave like full columns, and can be inserted, deleted, given equal widths, and more.

Version 7.4 - released 11/16/2005

SmartDraw 7.4 includes a new template dialog (even easier to find what you want), new floor plan templates, new maps templates, new calendars, new textures, and much more.

More Floor Plans—and More Floor Planning Tools-—for Business, Home, and Landscape Design
Floor planning has always been one of the most popular uses for SmartDraw, and in SmartDraw 7.4, we have gone hog wild.

• HUNDREDS of new templates!
• The right template is now even easier find as floor plan templates are now sorted according to home and business uses.
• Custom-fill furniture objects and symbols with any color or texture.
• Use an updated floor plan wizard and other drawing tools.

More Calendar Templates and Tools
It's that time of year—the time of year when we start planning for next year—and there's better way to do so than with custom calendars made in SmartDraw.

Not only have we increased our calendar templates (more than 500 now), we have also created a "Show Me" movie that teaches you how to make a calendar from scratch, and we have included TWO revamped calendar wizards and other calendar-making tools!

More Maps!
We have redoubled our efforts to meet the needs of mapmakers of all stripes: sales territories, political campaigns, and even vacations are all much easier to map out.

Hundreds of new templates make it even easier for you to get started. (Why? Because when you start with the right map template, you're already halfway there!)

Easier Project Management and Process Improvement with SmartDraw
We have combined the tools and templates that were formerly spread into theGantt Charts and Business Process Management categories into one high level category called Project Management.

This combined collection shows that SmartDraw staff not only supply process improvement tools: we use them, too!

New Textures: A More Realistic Floor Plan Made Easy
Our floor planners loved the wood, stone, and other textures we included with earlier releases. Now in SmartDraw 7.4, you'll find more than 60 new carpet and fabric textures you can use.

New, Easier to Use Template Dialog
The Template Dialog has been updated with colorful buttons and icons to improve both your browsing, and your immediate grasp of what you'll find in each category.

Putting SmartDraw Designs into Word^®, Excel^®, PowerPoint^®, & PDF
What could be easier than copy and paste? How about one button that does it all?

SmartDraw has always worked seamlessly with Microsoft Office^® software such as Word^® and PowerPoint^®, but in 7.4, "seamless" just wasn't enough. These new buttons transfer what you make in SmartDraw into Word^®, PowerPoint^®, and Excel^® with one click. You can also save your SmartDraw designs as PDFs with one click as well.

Now, the only way it could be easier would be if someone pushed the button for you.

Version 7.3 - released 9/06/2005

CONTENT ADDITIONS AND IMPROVEMENTS

Movies, Movies, Movies! SmartDraw now has what we call "Show Me" movies for both flowcharts and org charts.

Every step in the Org Chart Wizard has a movie to better illuminate and demonstrate the tasks involved in making perfect org charts. And the Flowchart Wizard currently has a movie explaining how to get the most from each step within that Wizard.

Look for more of these helpful (and, of course, optional) "Show Me" movies as we create them! And send suggestions for "Show Me" movies to theexpert@smartdraw.com.

More calendar content! SmartDraw 7.3 has more than 150 different types of calendars, all ready for you to use for 2006! (Suite and Gantt Chart & Calendar editions)

More flowcharting content! New, easy-to-use templates for Flowcharts, Audit Diagrams, Block Diagrams, Data Flow Diagrams, and more. Also available, brand-new color "Themes" that illustrate just a few of the different color options you can use to make great looking flowcharts. (Suite and Flowchart editions)

More org charting content! New, easy-to-use templates for vertical, horizontal, and inverted org charts, as well as photo templates. You'll also find brand-new color "Themes" that illustrate just a few of the different color options you can use to make great looking charts. (Suite and Org Chart editions)

PROGRAM IMPROVEMENTS

Improved Content Delivery: With our improved OnDemand delivery system, you can download the template or library you want in seconds.

New Styles in Colors and Shadows: You'll find more than 70 cool styles in the Colors & Shadows menu, all of which deliver an instant professional finish to charts, diagrams, and other drawings.

New SmartDraw Printing Partner: Right through the SmartDraw 7.3 Print Dialog, you can access a SmartDraw Printing Partner, great for high-volume printing runs and for large-format and poster-sized print outs. No more hogging the office's only printer or burning through costly ink cartridges! You can send that job out for printing by connecting to a SmartDraw Printing Partner with one click!

Improved Searching: Streamline your SmartDraw searches with new functionality and find a more direct path to the template or symbol you want.

CONTENT ADDITIONS AND IMPROVEMENTS

New Flyers and Certificates Templates: there is now a grand total of 379 flyer and certificate related templates, custom created to suit both professional and personal uses (Suite Edition).

New Business Forms Templates: there is now a grand total of 178 form templates, all designed to meet every need a business may have and all easily customized (Suite Edition).

Improved Family Trees: by popular demand, we have created improved tools and templates for building family trees—there's even a new Family Tree Wizard (Org Chart and Suite Editions).

New and Improved Floor Plan Content: new textures-interior and exterior uses-new templates (more than 30, delivering a total of nearly 200 floor planning templates!) and brand new templates and symbols for interior designers. SmartDraw's new interior design templates include elevation drawings for cabinetry, kitchens, bathrooms, living rooms, pantries, and garages (Floor Plan and Suite Editions).

New Calendars and Charts: Photo calendars for 2005 and two photo timeline charts have been added (Gantt Chart & Calendar and Suite Editions).

New Categories: There are now new content categories for Medical Forms and Sports (both categories available in the Suite Edition only).

Version 7.2 - released 5/10/2005

PROGRAM IMPROVEMENTS

Insert Photos into Any Edition of SmartDraw: Adding photos to your SmartDraw drawings—no matter what edition of SmartDraw 7 you may use—is now easier than ever.

If you're using the Suite Edition, simply double-click a photo frame in a template and SmartDraw's Image Plug-In runs. Then you just 1) select an image, and 2) add the image.

If you're using the Floor Plan, Flowchart, Gantt Chart & Calendar, Org Chart, or Technical Edition of SmartDraw, you simply double-click a photo frame in a template and you'll see a standard Windows "Import" dialog, which allows you to choose a photo from your files and folders. Then follow steps 1 and 2 above.

No matter what Edition of SmartDraw you use, your photos are automatically resized to fit the frame. The chief difference is that the Suite Edition’s Image Plug-In enables professional photo editing (such as cropping, removing red eye, etc.).

New textures: Not only are there more than 100 new textures in SmartDraw, but you can do more with them as well: scale textures to the ruler setting, align textures to both an entire document or to individual shapes, create new texture categories, add new textures, and more.

New default save location: New installations of SmartDraw will now automatically save documents in your "My Documents" folder.

Improved layer functionality: Layers are central to complex charts and drawings (such as large corporate organizational charts and facility floor plans). The Bring to Front and Send to Back commands will now reflect layers, allowing objects to be placed in front or behind other objects within the same layer.

Objects may be easily moved to a different layer via the Move Object to Layer command.

Also, all SmartDraw drawings and templates now remember the active layer in which they were saved.

FLOOR PLANNING IMPROVEMENTS (Floor Plan and Suite Editions):

• Improved Area Calculation and Line Dimensioning
• Feet and Inches in the Position and Size Dialog: If the ruler is set in feet, the position dialog now shows dimensions in feet and inches. It also accepts entry in this format.
• Wall Tools: Filled lines, segmented lines and polylines now snap their left and right edges to the grid when the snaps are set to top-left. They snap their centers when the grid is center.

In addition to these program improvements, SmartDraw 7.2 also includes easier text entry in forms and flyers, improved text alignment, and many other enhancements to make your drawing experience even easier.

Version 7.1 - released 3/02/2005

SmartDraw 7.1 is an absolutely free update for SmartDraw customers using version 7 (if you own an earlier version of SmartDraw and have not yet upgraded to version 7, you can do so for only $99: click here for your upgrade).

SmartDraw 7.1 includes some major improvements-an all-new maps library and wizard, revised and revamped floor plan symbols, a retooled Textures menu, and much more.

MAPS
Probably the most instantly recognizable change in SmartDraw 7.1 is the addition of maps. There are new map templates for every country in the entire world and new map wizard so that you can easily map sales territories, plan a vacation, or perform most any kind of custom map work in just minutes!

ENHANCED FLOOR PLAN SYMBOLS
You'll find updated doors, windows, and conference room libraries to make creating floor plans in SmartDraw even easier. And it's not only symbols that have been updated: all templates have been updated to 1) show the length of each segment of a line or shape when it is selected, and 2) have the default fill color set to Transparent for more effective room creation. The Floor Plan, Room, and Furniture Wizards have all been updated as well.

OTHER CHANGES

Textures Menu: The Textures menu is easier to access in SmartDraw 7.1 as it is now also available under the Fill Menu for shapes.

Page Orientation: Saved drawings now retain their Portrait/Landscape setting.

Custom Line Thickness: Easily create lines and borders of any thickness (you can more easily adjust the thickness of walls in floor plans, for example).

Spelling Dictionaries: Updated Spelling dictionaries include new words recently added to the dictionary.

Gradient Fill: Improved Gradient Fills remove gaps that previously would occur when a gradient was transferred to Word^® or PowerPoint^®.

Font Sizes: The Font toolbar will now allow up to 3 digits for font sizes.

And there are many other enhancements to make your drawing experience even easier.

NEW IN VERSION 7.01 - released 11/02/2004

1. Updated the PDF filter for exporting Symbol fonts.

2. Improved SmartDraw installation experience.