The new version lets designers create and manage controls-hardware schematics with greater speed, ease, and accuracy, the company claims. Bidirectional in-place text editing between schematics and reports lets users edit properties such as device tags and function texts where they are displayed in the wiring diagrams, without having to call up a device dialog box. Revamped PLC/bus topology handles centralized processing of automation components. A project options module lets users generate complete project documentation for product variants. The user defines the electrical schematics for different machine configurations, selects the option(s) for that product, and the system displays (or removes) the associated schematic sections and data. Users can redo or undo a series of actions with a single mouse click, shield report pages from automatic updates, output projects to smart PDF in different languages, group connections for numbering in a different format, transfer format and display settings of an object to other objects with the copy-assign function, and split dialog boxes horizontally or vertically for easier viewing and working.

Eplan Software & Services LLC, 33533 W. 12 Mile Rd., Suite 180, Farmington Hills, MI 48331, (888) 375-2668,