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bVisual Blog by David Parker

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Preparing for Visio Web Access control events

The Visio Web Access (VWA) web part for SharePoint 2010 can be used to display and interact with Visio documents. The VWA web part includes a Shape Information pane that can be used to display the hyperlinks and shape data of each Visio shape. This article describes how to control the information that appears in this pane.

The Visio Web Access web part for SharePoint 2010 itself has the ability to inhibit interaction with hyperlinks or shape selection by using the Edit Web Part properties panel.

The hyperlinks of a shape can still be available from the Shape Informtion pane, if you have not hidden it.

Active hyperlinks on a shape can get in the way of selecting it in the VWA web part, so Disable Hyperlink is usually required.
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Language Support in Visio 2010

I was recently asked to provide the ability to store multiple language shape text and page names in Visio 2010. An interesting request that has inspired me create a useful add-in for Visio 2010 (Multi-Language Text for Visio coming soon), and prompted me to investigate language support in Visio 2010. I have written Visio add-ins that have needed to work in several different language editions of Visio before, and have been aware of the special considerations in creating ShapeSheet formulae, but this is more about supporting different languages in the same edition of Visio … and I was surprised how good this feature is!

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New MSDN Article : Introduction to Validation Rules in Visio Premium 2010

I was planning to write a quick blog today, but it seems that Microsoft have moved all spaces.live.com bloggers to WordPress! Another new tool to learn ….

In the meantime, I am pleased to announce that Microsoft have just published an article that I have written at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff847470.aspx

This article goes through the new diagram validation feature in Microsoft Visio Premium 2010 and shows you how to use the Validation API to create your own rules and rule sets to validate Visio 2010 diagrams.

Of course, those of you who wish to delve deeper could always buy my book from all good bookstores – see http://www.visiorules.com

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Viewing Pre-Visio 2010 Documents in Silverlight

You should all know by now that Microsoft Visio 2010 can save as Silverlight files … which is absolutely great … if you have Visio 2010. What if you do not have Visio 2010 but you want to view Visio documents in Silverlight? Well, you could save your document as a PDF or XPS file, and then view it in a viewer. A Silverlight viewer for XPS files would allow them to be seen on any browser or operating system that supports Silverlight, not just Windows. Although Microsoft have included an XPS viewer in Windows 7, and have made XPS viewers for earlier Windows versions, Microsoft do seem to have cooled-off promoting XPS as a replacement for PDF, which is a shame because XPS is an open, extensible format that is based on XAML.

Unfortunately, Microsoft do not provide a free Silverlight viewer for either of these formats, but there are several companies that do. I know that there is a CodePlex project for a Silverlight XPS Viewer ( http://azharthegreat.codeplex.com/ ), but it does not currently seem to like XPS documents from Visio. However, the company, First Floor Software,  that provides the excellent Silverlight Spy has also written the Document Toolkit for Silverlight ( http://firstfloorsoftware.com/documenttoolkit ). This Silverlight control enables you to view an XPS document in several different ways, for example, with a page turn action, or by using thumbnails, or even to display the metadata inside the XPS file. The latter is extremely useful for checking the formation of the document.

Actually, there are two methods for creating XPS files from Visio …

The first method is to use the Microsoft add-in. In Microsoft Office Visio 2007, you have the option to download the free add-in from Microsoft (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=4D951911-3E7E-4AE6-B059-A2E79ED87041&displaylang=en ). It is already built- into Microsoft Visio 2010. This will create an XPS file, complete with hyperlinks as necessary, as can be seen in the screenshot below when I loaded one of my Visio documents into the Document Toolkit online demo ( see http://firstfloorsoftware.com/documenttoolkit/online-demo/ ):

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A Patch Panel that can be 1U too

Microsoft Visio 2007 Professional and 2010 Professional and Premium includes the Network / Rack Diagram template, which opens the Rack-mounted equipment stencil. This stencil includes the Patch Panel master which can be stretched from 2U to 25U high. However, I have often required a 1U patch Panel, so I decided to look into the Microsoft shape to see if it could be modified to allow it to be reduced to 1U without looking ridiculous.

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Holiday in Akbuk, Turkey

Time for a break from work, so we went to Turkey for the third time. Our previous trips have been to Icmeler, so we decided to try somewhere different. Akbuk is not as pretty as Icmeler, and we were a longer walk from the beach, but much closer for a visit to Ephesus.

It is hard to believe that Ephesus was a bustling port in Roman times because the coast is 7 kilometres away now, however it is an extremely interesting place to visit.

This first panorama was taken inside the theatre at Ephesus, with a 360 degree sweep. Again I used Microsoft Image Composite Editor ( see Image Composite Editor ) to piece these images together.

imageHD View : http://www.bvisual.net/views/EphesusAmphitheatre_stitch.html

This second panorama was taken from near the top of the seating looking back towards the sea in the far distance.

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HD View : http://www.bvisual.net/views/ViewFromEphesusAmphitheatre_stitch.html

The coach trip to Ephesus from Akbuk was a little spoilt by the three retail opportunities (leather, ceramics and jewellery ) forced on us afterwards.

Ephesus in Bing Maps:

Map picture

We stayed in self-catering apartments at Mandalya Gardens (see http://www.mandalyaproperty.com/ ), where the accommodation and staff were very good. It would have been useful to have air-con in all rooms, since the bedrooms were just too hot to sleep in.

My family and me … sweltering in the heat!

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