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In This Issue
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Carlson Civil Suite $2,125
Includes Survey, Civil, Hydrology, GIS and IntelliCAD |
Everything You Need to Know About Surface Modeling
April 12-13, Hands On Training with That CAD Girl |
Upcoming Carlson Webinars
Detention Pond Design with Carlson Hydrology - Thurs, March 25 Today Sign Up Now if Interested!
Carlson PointCloud: Made for Surveyor and Engineers - Thurs, April 1
Carlson Tips & Tricks II: Beyond the Basics - Thurs, April 8 |
Carlson SurvCE 2.5 has been released
This is a FREE upgrade for those using SurvCE 2.0 |
Where to Get FREE GIS Data
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| Autodesk University Resources - FREE training materials |
| What Are Your Software Upgrade Plans? |
| Need a reasonably priced alternative to AutoCAD or AutoCAD LT? |
| Why You Should Consider Online Training |
| Eagle Point Software: Going, Going, Gone... |
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| Carlson Civil Suite $2,125 |
Yes, as soon as I sent out the Newsletter last month (same day, maybe even?), Carlson announced some pricing changes for their Civil Suite product.
Pricing listed below is our "Lowest Advertised Price" but please call us for a custom quote - we may be able to do better.
- Carlson Civil Suite $ 2,125 (Retail $ 3,500)
- Carlson Survey $ 1,275 (Retail $ 1,500)
- Carlson Civil $ 1,275 (Retail $ 1,500)
- Carlson Hydrology $ 850 (Retail $ 1,000)
- Carlson GIS $ 850 (Retail $ 1,000)
- Carlson TakeOff - $ 7,650 (Retail $ 9,000)
You can add Network installation and Annual Maintenance to any of these products for an additional 10% of Retail (10% for Network plus 10% for Maintenance).
Visit our Carlson Software Resources page to see 5 minute videos of many of the most popular features of Carlson Civil Suite.
For a comprehensive outline of the Carlson Software pricing structure, please refer to this new page on our website:
What You Need to Know About Purchasing Carlson Software.
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| Everything You Need to Know About Surface Modeling |
This class was originally scheduled for Mar 24 & 25 but I had to reschedule it.
On Monday and Tuesday, April 12 & 13, we will hold a 2-day training class covering Surface Modeling with Carlson Software.
This class will start with an introductory lesson on existing ground surface modeling and will then move to proposed surface modeling techniques including modeling for site and subdivision design, ponds, retaining walls and multi-level building pads. A thorough working knowledge of IntelliCAD or AutoCAD is considered a pre-requisite for this class.
This event will be held at the Hampton Inn on Hampton Woods Lane in Cary, NC. The cost for this 2-day session is $249. Lunch will be provided and NC licensed Land Surveyors and Engineers will receive 12 PDH credit hours for attending.
Please call us at 919-417-8351 to register by phone. Registration for this session is limited to 10 people.
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| Upcoming Carlson Webinars |
Detention Pond Design with Carlson Hydrology, Thurs Mar 25:
Bruce Carlson, president of Carlson Software, will lead attendees through "Before Construction" and "After Construction" runoff calculations by the SCS method using layer-based runoff coefficients, leading to Detention Pond sizing.
He'll show how ponds would be designed using DTM features, with dynamic resizing and repositioning. Multiple outlet design will be demonstrated, leading to Resevoir Routing. Outputs include Stage Storage Curves, Hydrograph reports and graphs. The use of layers for soil classifications will be shown as a way to maximize automation.
In addition, Carlson Hydrology's linkages to the popular program HydroCAD will be shown and how the programs can work for you for advanced pond outlet design.
Carlson listens and responds to its customers and the result is powerful, efficient, effective software that works the way you do. To ease your design of water runoff solutions for any site, this is the webinar to watch. Sign Up Here
Webinar will be posted here a few hours after its live presentation.
PointCloud: Made for Surveyor and Engineers, Thurs Apr 1:
See how Carlson, known for its surveying and civil engineering software, has produced a point clouds software that is made for the needs of surveyors and engineers.
Scott Griffin, Civil sales director for Carlson Software, will cover Field-to-Finish, Mesh, Contours, Sections and Profiles from PointCloud data back to CAD. He'll show you how Carlson PointCloud makes what your'e dealing with much more than just a bunch of points.
This Carlson Software office product allows users to export surface models, points, contours, breaklines and profiles to CAD. Carlson PointCloud enables users to read scan data from many instruments, view and process up to 1 billion points, and then perform the Field-to-Finish from the scanned data. This represents a whole new level of powerful automation for large data sets. It gives laser scanner users the ability to process millions of data points with Carlson Software ease-of-use.
Carlson listens and responds to its customers and the result is powerful, efficient, effective software that works the way you do. Sign up now to learn more about Carlson PointCloud and how the software can work for you. Sign Up Here
Carlson Tips & Tricks II, Thurs Apr 8: This updated version of Carlson Tips & Tricks will go beyond the standard tips and tricks normally shown in Carlson Software demos.
Some topics to be covered will be helpful in basic drafting tasks and other topics will be helpful for specific tasks in Survey, Civil & TakeOff. These techniques are guaranteed to help you save time and money on your projects. Sign Up Here
Miss a webinar you'd like to see? View all archived webinars here.
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| Carlson SurvCE 2.5 Has Been Released |
The newest version of Carlson Software's popular data collection software - Carlson SurvCE 2.5 - has just been released. Two years in production, with incremental updates along the way, Carlson SurvCE 2.5 is a free upgrade for Carlson customers already using SurvCE 2.0 and newer.
Featuring hundreds of additions and improvements, Carlson SurvCE 2.5 works with more brands of Total Stations and GPS receivers than any other data collection software on the market. New instrument drivers added for Total Stations and GPS receivers include: CST Berger, Foif, GeoMax, Hemisphere Crescent and Eclipse, Javad receivers, Leica Flexline, NavCom 2110, Ashtech ProMark 500 and ProFlex 500, Sokkia GRX1 and Stonex S9 GNSS and Orion.
"SurvCE 2.5 continues to set the standard in data collection, says Bruce Carlson, president of Carlson Software. "While Carlson is well known for its surveying and roading features, especially in the U.S. and Australia, the new options in SurvCE should also appeal very strongly to the European market with the emphasis on precision occupation for total stations, and expanded reporting of GPS localization and measurement data." Click here for more details.
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Image from Machine Control Online.
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Upgrades from earlier versions of SurvCE are available for between $295 and $495 based on your current modules. Call us at 919.417.8351 for a customized price quote.
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Where to Get FREE GIS Data
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I expect that this will not be news to many people, but I thought I'd include it for those who haven't taken advantage of all the free information available in the public domain. The information provided below is primarily for North Carolina but data provided by other states, cities and municipalities will be similar.
www.geocomm.com is a site that allows you to download various GIS data on a county-wide or state-wide basis. The link takes you to a list of states and prompts you to pick on a state to see the available data. The site does require you to create a FREE account in order to download data.
The county-wide and state-wide data available for North Carolina includes (but is not limited to): Hydrography, Soils, Transportation, Flood, DEM, Wetlands, Land Use and Utilities.
Some of the data available for download will require conversion to a format accessible to Carlson or Autodesk programs. For instance, Digital Elevation Model (DEM) files are in a compressed zip format with a ".gz" extension. You can unzip the file using WinZip. The files contained in the zipped file are in SDTS format and have ".ddf" extension. The ".ddf" files must be compiled and converted to a ".dem" file that can be read into Carlson or Autodesk programs. Follow this link to download sdts2dem.exe which is a conversion utility that converts SDTS to DEM format. Sdts2dem.exe must be copied into the same directory as the ".ddf" files before it is run. You can read more about sdts2dem.exe here.
After creating the ".dem" file, you can use Carlson Civil or Hydrology to import the ".dem" file. This function is available through the "Import Grid" option in the "Grid File Utilities" command.
http://www.ncdot.org/it/gis/DataDistribution/ is another handy site for North Carolinians needing county-wide contour, flood or aerial photo data. This data is typically available in either ".dxf" or ".shp" file formats.
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| Autodesk University Resources |
It's tough to top this as far as FREE handouts, datasets and online webinars. Click here for a link to the Autodesk University Online Class list. You can search for class materials based on the Speaker, Topic, Autodesk Software program or keywords.
Once you've narrowed down the list of classes, look under the "Materials" column to see what materials are available for each class.
For instance, the image below shows the Materials available for the class, "The Power of Constraints Within Dynamic Blocks - Revealed". This class has a Session Preview, Webcast, Dataset, Screencast, Downloadable Screencast, Power Point and Podcast available.
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Check it out - I think you'll find lots of good things!
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| What Are Your Software Upgrade Plans? |
I ran this Poll last year at about this time and will post the comparative results next month.
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| Need a reasonably priced alternative to AutoCAD or AutoCAD LT? |
Call us at (919) 417-8351 or email us to find out about a trial or purchase of Carlson GIS with IntelliCAD.
The IntelliCAD engine is a practical clone of AutoCAD and will read and write DWG files from all the way back to R11 and DXF back to R2.5 and up to Release 2009 (2010 coming soon). Pairing IntelliCAD with the Carlson GIS extends your capabilities beyond what AutoCAD or AutoCAD LT provide because it includes the following tools:
- Drawing Cleanup - Various cleanup tools including the ability to convert ellipses and splines to polylines, flatten extruded entities, ability to convert Land Desktop points and contours to basic IntelliCAD/AutoCAD entities, reduce polyline vertices, and many more tools.
- Ability to import and export LandXML files
- Ability to work with survey points
- Ability to use LISP routines and XREFs
- Ability to work with Z values and 3 dimensions
- Ability to work with GIS and Image files such as shape files and Mr. SID images
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| Read more about IntelliCAD here and see a 5 minute overview here. |
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| Why You Should Consider Online Training |
Have a last-minute training request? Don't have time for travel?
Online training is quickly becoming the most popular form of training that we offer. Why? One reason is the immediate nature of it. Assume you are working on a project and just can't get your profiles to draw the way you need them to. In many cases we can schedule an online training class with only a few hours' notice.
And, like all other training, this training will be customized and personalized to you, your office and your project. Check out our list of AutoCAD classes , list of Carlson Software classes or list of Land Desktop/Civil Design classes for training ideas. Custom Training can be developed for any, all or a combination of the classes listed.
Additionally, if you find yourself having problems or not able to work your way through a specific project, we can customize your training to walk through the project, start to finish, in order to get it completed.
If you'd like to speak to one of our online training customers to hear how well it has worked for them, please contact us and we will make those arrangements.
Click here for more reasons you should consider online training.
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| Eagle Point Software: Going, Going, Gone... |
Following Autodesk's lead in retiring Land Desktop, Eagle Point Software has recently announced the end of their civil-survey product line.
Carlson Software is now the only reasonably priced software solution that offers a complete surveying & design solution and that won't cost you thousands of dollars every year to stay current. Visit www.thatcadgirl.com to learn more or download our mailer inviting Eagle Point customers to see what Carlson Software has to offer.
Click on picture for a larger view
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Carlson is offering special pricing to Eagle Point customers to help them migrate over to a similar Carlson program or programs. That CAD Girl is also offering one hour of FREE, customized, online training for all purchases of Carlson products.
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