bVisual

ShapeSheet Functions

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Visio Sessions at MS Ignite Conference 2016

I will be a co-presenter at the Microsoft Ignite Conference on 28th Sept. 2016 ( see Dive deep into advanced Data Visualization with Visio ) along with my fellow MVPs Scott Helmers and Ed Richard, and led by Sandeep Srivastava, from Microsoft. I am really looking forward to it because it will be a great opportunity to learn more about all of the exciting developments happening at Microsoft nowadays. Of course, I will also be showing off what we can do in Visio too, and to that end I have created a session location finder in Visio.
The MS Ignite Conference is an enormous 5 day event, with over 1300 sessions spread over three buildings and 5 floors. The conference website provides the opportunity to build your personal schedule, and to download a Word trip report. Unfortunately, this report does not include the rooms and the zone or building that they are in. Therefore, I used some of my facilities management experience and Visio to provide a multipage Visio document with building section and plans provide the location context for each session in my, or attendees, schedule.

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The Visio document contains macros to import the Word report downloaded from the MS Ignite website, and for running a timer between a start and end time.

Section TImer.gif


I have provided the Visio document for download*, so that it can be used by any attendees how have Visio Professional 2016 or Visio Pro for Office 365:
MS Ignite Trip Reporter.vsdm
I will explain how it all works in a future posting, but the document contains full instructions of how to use it, and it includes my current schedule of sessions so that it can be played with even by non-attendees.
*This document was updated with the up to date Session locations on 20 Sept. 2016

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MS TechNet UK blog : A history of messaging and encryption

This is just a quick note to say that I have just had a blog post published on a Microsoft web-site. It is a very selective history of messaging and encryption, using Visio SmartShapes to demonstrate some aspects of this :
https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/uktechnet/2016/05/27/a-history-of-messaging-and-encryption/


You too an visit The National Museum of Computing at http://www.tnmoc.org/

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Getting better value from your process diagrams with Visio 2016

I will be presenting a one-hour webinar today at 1pm UK time entitled, Getting better value from your process diagrams with Visio 2016.

Process flow diagrams are amongst the most popular diagram types in Visio, but many users do not know some of the tips, tricks and techniques for getting the best out of Visio, in terms of productivity and efficiency.

This webinar covers understanding structured diagrams, enhancing shape data rows, hyperlinking, validation and exporting.

Follow this link to register : Microsoft Visio Webinar Series

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Displaying the Fill and Line Section Values of a shape

A few years ago, I wrote an article about displaying the RGB value of shapes ( see http://blog.bvisual.net/2010/04/22/displaying-the-rgb-values-of-shapes ). I had forgotten about it, but a reader recently asked if it was possible to force the Foregnd field to display the RGB value for the standard color palette values. For example, red is number 2 in the palette, and has a value of RGB(255,0,0). In revisiting the article, I realised that there is a smarter way to display the values, without the need of any macros.

I simply created a master shape that exposes each of the cells in the Fill and Line sections as Shape Data rows. This allows me to enter values in the Shape Data window and see the effect on the shape immediately. So, it was easy to drop one shape, insert text fields, and then use the Array Shapes tool to layout the shapes. Finally, I just entered the the standard color map numbers 0 to 24 in the FillForegnd Shape Data row.

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Visio for FM Session Recordings

Today I demonstrated how Visio could be used for Facilities Management. I covered CAD integration, space chargeback, personnel and asset locations, and finished off with fire escape routes and equip.


You can register for see the recording, and get the pdf of the slide deck, at https://vts.inxpo.com/Launch/QReg.htm?ShowKey=27721 .
I have made some of the materials available from my OneDrive – Sample CAD file, Excel data and Visio Drawing : https://1drv.ms/f/s!AqkzN8kb1lAzlspZ6XOX4d-sI4royw
A screenshot of the Visio drawing

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Using the Cross-Functional Flowchart Phases in Visio

The cross-functional flowchart template is possibly one that I use most frequently, and I do like the way that the Function Shape Data value is automatically evaluated from the Swimlane that is is within. But why did Microsoft issue the template without the same feature for the Phases? This article describes how to fix that issue, and is also a plea to Microsoft to correct it in a future release….

So, all of the flowchart shapes contain a Shape Data row named Function, as in the following screenshot, and the value is automatically updated to that entered into the Swimlane header. If the user updates the header text, or moves the shape between lanes, then the value gets updated.

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