Layout plays an integral part in specifying products for many applications. Traditionally, designers will create a layout drawing and then count up the devices or pass their designs to manufacturer reps to create bills of materials.

Using Technicon’s Web-based VisNet tool, customers and sales reps can drag and drop products from a catalog tree into a 2-D layout area. As items are added to a layout, an order-ready bill of materials is built.

Products are modeled as “intelligent objects.” Chairs snap to set locations on tables. Connections between products are automatically drawn, e.g. from a sensor to a control panel. Constraints limit the devices that can be connected to the panel.

Floor plan images can be uploaded, adjusted for scale and used as backgrounds for layouts. Wall, door and window tools can be used to trace over existing images or draw floor plans from scratch.

With an intuitive drag-and-drop interface, VisNet can be run anywhere, any time from a browser, requiring little or no training and no software installation. Project team members can collaborate on layouts across the Web.

Three-D data can be associated with products where there is a strong visual component to the product sale, such as architectural and furniture products. Virtual cameras can be placed anywhere in the layout to generate photorealistic renderings on the fly.

The layout app can be also run in a fully automated, non-interactive mode to generate schematic drawings. Applications include riser, piping and instrumentation and HVAC diagrams.