ATLANTA, April 29, 2009 — Building Systems Design, Inc. (BSD) today announced that the first public demonstration of its new BSD LinkMan-E (LME) software will be conducted at the AIA National Convention and Expo in San Francisco, April 30 – May 2, 2009. LME has been designed to permit automatic two-way communication between disparate construction software applications. Initially, LinkMan will be configured to connect the new BSD SpecLink(R)-E (SLE) specifications product with Autodesk's Revit Architecture 2009, the preeminent building information modeling (BIM) software in use today.
Both LinkMan-E and SpecLink-E are client-server software products that use Microsoft's SQL Server database management system to support multi-user collaboration over a local area network or a wide area network between multiple offices. The LME and SLE software can also be easily installed on a single computer with Revit Architecture for standalone operation by a single user. Ultimately, BSD plans to add an updated version of its BSD CostLink/AE cost estimating product to its suite of linked software tools, and other linked software products may be offered in future.
LinkMan is designed for use by a project manager to review and coordinate data on the same project from all connected applications. Each software product provides a view of its linked assemblies and building products, and the view can show all possible objects or can be collapsed to show only those that are currently active. LinkMan also offers two "dashboard" views — one for individual products and one for assemblies of multiple products. These dashboard views show the status of objects in each of the linked applications, and the views can be collapsed to show only those that are active in one or more applications or further collapsed to show only those objects that are not consistent across all the linked applications. A project manager can then determine whether corrective action is needed.
LinkMan can also be set to "turn on" any missing products in the BSD SpecLink-E application, based on data from Revit. This LME capability can be employed to automatically "pre-edit" the specifications to conform to the assemblies and products used in the Revit building information model. Conversely, if the user employs an "office master" specification in SLE, the data from SLE can be used to choose appropriate objects to populate the BIM in Revit. Most of the objects offered within Revit will be pre-linked to LME, as will virtually all the products within SpecLink-E. However, users will be able to add their own objects and will be able to create their own links to LME and SLE.
About BSD: Building Systems Design, Inc. develops, maintains, and provides training and technical support for innovative cost estimating and specification writing software tools for the architecture, engineering, and construction markets of North America. The company was founded in 1983 and is headquartered in Atlanta. Learn more at http://www.bsdsoftlink.com.
For more information, contact:
R. Dale Corley, Jr.
Building Systems Design, Inc.
888-BSD-SOFT
Email
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