New tool for the 3D kit

Spatial Technology Inc., the Boulder, Colorado-based developer of modeling tools for the CAD/CAM/CAE industry, on Tuesday announced the latest release of its ACIS 3D Toolkit, version 5.3. ACIS 3D Toolkit enables users to create complex geometries, better translate data, and improve performance of all 3D operations.

Users upgrading to ACIS 5.3 can look forward to improved memory management, which allows ACIS-enabled applications to reduce memory use during design; enhanced translation tools; better control of tolerances during the healing operation; and more efficient handling and adding of customized Law surfaces. The addition of various APIs in ACIS 5.3 gives users a simplified process for the solving of splines to analytic surfaces, including the ability to set tolerances. New APIs are also available for the modeling of various spring types, allowing for coil expansion and contraction.

Spatial looks to maintain its premier position in interoperability solutions and 3D modeling by designating 35 percent of its annual revenues for research and development.  Most of the company's staffers are software developers, nearly 30 percent of whom hold doctorates.

Spatial Technology
2425 55th Street, No. 100
Boulder, Colorado 80301-5704
303-544-2900
303-544-3000 fax

Visualize this Basic conference

Take a look at the latest Visual Basic tools, technologies, and services at the annual Visual Basic Insiders' Technical Summit, the largest international conference for Windows programmers, which kicks off today in Orlando. Sponsored by Fawcette Technical Publications, the publisher of Visual Basic Programmer's Journal, the two-day conference brings thousands of developers together to exchange ideas and learn more about the new technologies and products shaping the industry.

VBITS is not limited to Visual Basic, but encompasses all facets of Windows development. This year's conference tracks include distributed computing, object-oriented programming, workgroup development, blackbelt programming, and data access.

Speakers at VBITS are industry experts who offer programmers the information they need to know to get to the top of their field. The conference also provides a venue for product and service vendors to promote their marketing plans.

VBITS has drawn about 28,000 attendees since it began in 1993.

Fawcette Technical Publications
209 Hamilton Ave.
Palo Alto, CA 94301
650-833-7100

Scott Adams gets richer

Those of us who are Dilbert fans are aware that Scott Adams is not on any sort of crusade to vanquish corporate idiocy or greed. Almost the reverse; so long as corporations remain idiotic Adams can continue making money off their idiocy. He's occasionally been accused of selling out, but his response is that he never never claimed otherwise. There's a refreshing honesty to that attitude. Now he, or rather his syndicator, United Media, has found a new way to make money.

United Media and XOOM.com have formed an alliance to provide free email services based on United Media's top comic strips. According to the companies, "United Media's popular Dilbert comic strip, created by Scott Adams, will be the first property to benefit from the partnership." It's not clear to us, though, how the Dilbert strip will benefit because the news release also states, "XOOM.com's MightyMail division will provide several of United Media's top comic strip properties with next generation online marketing and direct e-commerce opportunities." It sounds like in exchange for getting email at dilbert.com you have to submit to XOOM.com's sales weasels. It gets worse.

"The Dilbert branded free email service will provide United Media with a powerful one-to-one online branding and viral marketing strategy, as fans send their Dilbert emails to friends and family." Viral? Viral? Does this mean that users of this service should wear rubber gloves and masks when reading and writing email? Or are these new partners attempting to disarm us by admitting up front that their email service will spread viruses?

It's not even clear if those who sign up will have dilbert.com as their domain name. However, subscribers will be able to use an "official Dilbert 'letterhead,'" have links to www.dilbert.com, receive daily Dilbert comics, and be able to go to the Dilbert Store and buy stuff if they have any money left after being infected with the viral marketing strategy.

XOOM.com
300 Montgomery, 3rd Floor
San Francisco, CA 94104
415-288-2500