From: Sergio Masci <sergio@titan.demon.co.uk>
Subject: COMMERCIAL: IPAD v0.6.1 (Intelligent vector drawing package)
Date: Tue,  7 Apr 1998 13:16:28 GMT

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IPAD V0.6.1 (Beta) for Solaris 2.5 (SPARC), Linux 2.0.x (Intel),
OS/2 WARP, NT 3.51, Win 95, Win 3.1 and MSDOS is now available for
download. Although IPAD is a COMMERCIAL product, the evaluation
version is available for download FREE of charge.

    *********************************************************
      Some very simple IPAD demos are now provided which
      can be displayed on most web browsers (as animations)
      without the need to install IPAD. They can also be
      displayed on image viewers which are capable of
      displaying GIF animations.
    *********************************************************

To recap:

IPAD is the multiplatform front end to a special tool to be
completed some time in the future (see ZMech announcement
below). It currently provides most of the functionality of an
interactive GUI vector drawing package, together with some bit
mapped image handling. It allows easy editing across files using
multiple overlapping windows. The graphics objects drawn and
edited by IPAD have built in intelligence. They react to the
mouse and each other so as to maximise user productivity and
reduce tedious repetitive setup sequences.

With most other packages an object must first be selected and
placed into one of many modes in order for the package to
provide handles through which the object must be manipulated.
With IPAD however, simple rules govern the behaviour of an
object depending on what other objects it is touching and how it
is approached and grabbed.

Any object may be picked up and moved or its shape changed
without it first having to be selected, and if its edges are
touching any other object, IPAD will intelligently manipulate
those objects in order to reduce the knock on effects of the
change even where there are recursive dependencies. With most
other packages a simple change can require a lot of rework.

A very powerful feature of IPAD is the way it is able to
manipulate groups of selected objects. A group is not just a
collection of objects, it has properties of its own. A group can
be edited like any other object. Objects can be very easily
picked up or dropped from a group. Groups can also be opened and
their contents edited in their own windows.

IPAD also has a catagory system that allows the user to define
the properties of an object and to override those properties in
a derived object. Complex objects can thus be built by grouping
simpler objects and assigning them properties. This makes it a
very simple matter to create a set of component objects which
can be held in a template window, copied across into the working
drawing and the properties modified to suit the working drawing.

IPAD supports printers using PCL 5 (most HP), ESC-P2 (most
Epson), PostScript and anything else via ppm or png. It has been
designed from the ground up to be fast and responsive. The base
system is a 486DX 33MHz + 8MB RAM + ISA video card.

IPAD will (in the future) provide a mechanism to drive third
party backend software (e.g. code generators, state machine
generators etc.) For now you are restricted to just drawing with
it. Since IPAD is a COMMERCIAL product, its source code will not
be made available.

IPAD currently provides the same GUI interface on SPARC Solaris 2.5,
Linux 2.0.x (X11 and SVGALIB), MSDOS 6.2, OS/2 Warp, Windows 3.1,
Windows 95, and Windows NT 3.51.

The Linux version is distributed as two seperate ELF executables,
one being the SVGALIB exacutable (which handles the screen directly)
and the other being the X11 R6.3 executable. The SVGALIB executable
will only run on machines that have an SVGA card that is supported
by SVGALIB 1.2.10. Anyone having problems with ELF, SVGALIB or X11
R6.3 that would like to take a look at IPAD is advised to look at
the MSDOS version.

    *********************************************************
                              NEW
      ZMech - a state machine development tool is now
      provided as an example visual programming tool built
      using IPAD. Get a copy, stick it on a floppy and hide
      it somewhere safe until you need it. Its a really
      sophisticated case tool and the evaluation version is
      currently available for $0.00. Get it now from the
      primary IPAD distribution site.
    *********************************************************

IPAD is available from

    primary (high availability) site
        http://www.demon.co.uk/titan

    secondry sites
        sunsite.unc.edu  (and mirrors - linux distributions only)
	pub/Linux/apps/graphics/draw

	hobbes.nmsu.edu  (and mirrors - OS/2 distribution only)
	pub/os2/apps/graphics/draw

Send feedback and questions to
     ipad@titan.demon.co.uk



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