Engineering Solutions in Visio Professional

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Often, the tasks that engineers need to solve visually are quite complex and integrate data in the form of specifications or tolerances. Chemical industry workers need to see material streams moving between vessels; an engineering team needs to generate electronic equipment specifications and schematics. Although Visio shapes snap together quickly to present a flat picture of your world, shapes can also store and in some cases respond to real-world data so that your diagram becomes an accurate model of your system, process, or plant. For example, dimension line shapes automatically display accurate measurements. Custom properties can store additional attributes for shapes.

Most of the engineering drawing types in Visio Professional can be assembled using the "drag-drop-done" approach: drag shapes from stencils, connect as appropriate, add text, and then save your work. The process engineering templates, however, take a model-based approach to the diagramming task, as explained later in this chapter. Table 27-1 lists the engineering drawing types included with Visio Professional.

Table 27-1. Engineering Drawing Types in Visio Professional

Folder	Templates
Electrical Engineering	Basic Electrical Circuits And Logic Industrial Control Systems Systems
Mechanical Engineering	Fluid Power Part and Assembly Drawing
Process Engineering	Piping And Instrumentation Diagram Process Flow Diagram