Shape Design

Published on March 3, 2014 by David Parker

Mapping SharePoint List Columns to Visio Shape Data Types

The shape data in Visio 2013 diagrams can be linked to many external data sources, and one of the most useful is a SharePoint List. However, the Shape Data rows have a smaller number of expected data types than the column types that are available in SharePoint. This article begins an exploration of the mapping of SharePoint list column types to Visio data types.

The Type cell of a Shape Data row defines the data type, which is a number from 0 to 7, that is stored in that row.

Data Type	Description
0	String
1	Fixed List
2	Number
3	Boolean
4	Variable List
5	Date or Time
6	Duration
7	Currency

The Format cell can modify the display of Value, or can provide the option values for the two list types.

Published on November 28, 2013 by David Parker

New Visio book out now!

After the trip to Hyderabad for the Visio MVP Conference, as described in my previous post, my wife and I went to Bangalore, Vadodara, and Mumbai. This gave me the chance to drop-in on Packt Publishing because this is the week that my new book is published ( see http://www.packtpub.com/microsoft-visio-2013-business-process-diagramming-and-validation/book ). The book’s title is Microsoft Visio 2013 Business Process Diagramming and Validation, and, although this is an update to my 2010 book (with an extra chapter for integration with Office365 and SharePoint 2013), it should resonate with a wider audience because Microsoft decided to merge the Premium and Professional editions into one Professional edition for Visio 2013, so that it now includes Visio Services and Validation. This means that there are millions more Visio users who can take advantage of validation rules to ensure that they have well-constructed diagrams in Visio. I would also like to stress that validation rules can be applied to all types of diagrams, not just process diagrams, and I will demonstrate this over the next few months here.

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Published on June 18, 2013 by David Parker

Comparison of Visio Save As Web Outputs

SharePoint 2013 Visio Services provides a great solution for viewing the actual Visio file directly within a SharePoint web page, however you need to be logged into your corporate web to do this. So, how can you view Visio files in a web page if you cannot use Visio Services?

You could build a web page with the Visio Viewer control, but that is ActiveX and will only work in certain controlled conditions. The benchmark has to be allowing the Visio file to be viewed on an iPad, or an Android tablet, or Surface RT. Visio Services in SharePoint 2013 will enable this, and will allow for the Visio document to be zoomed, panned, and the Shape Data and hyperlinks to be viewed and used, but, again, this is not always available.

Published on May 21, 2013 by David Parker

Getting the Name of Glued Connection Points

A Visio developer asked me if it is possible to get the name of connection points that a connector is glued to in Visio. Well, it is not possible directly from the ShapeSheet, but is easy if you use a little code.

First of all, I created a simple Block shape with 3 named connection points on either side of it. I added a little text to the block to display the shape name, and to remind me where the named connection points are.

Published on November 20, 2012 by David Parker

Announcing Metro Icons and a Windows App Tile Shape for Visio

My last two blogs have been about how I managed to convert XAML icon shapes into native Visio masters. Well, I have now converted all of Syncfusion’s Metro Studio 2 (now 5) shapes, and got their permission to release my own version of them. See Products/MetroIcons for more information.

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Published on November 3, 2012 by David Parker

US Election Special–Vector Visio 2003 – 2010 Icons

Following on from my previous post, http://blog.bvisual.net/2012/11/02/us-election-special-vector-visio-2013-icons/, I have saved the stencil that was generated in Visio 2013 back to Visio 2003 – 2010 format … and, guess what? All of the new Bezier Curves got automatically translated to Nurbs, which means they work! (Except for themes … but they can be coloured)

They can be downloaded from : tp://sdrv.ms/TlzoEB

Perhaps someone would like to make Data Graphic icons from them ? : http://blog.bvisual.net/2012/04/19/make-your-own-visio-data-graphic-icons-sets-automatically/