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WASHINGTON, DC - WiZ WORX announces the latest release of IGESGUMP™ for Linux platforms. The default output in Linux is a pop-up X Window, with a choice of ANSI or ISO sheet sizes. This release will display KANJI characters (JIS-6226) in Type 212 (General Note) entities, a feature disabled in previous releases.

Use of the -T flag allows output to any of the GNU plotters, creating files in GIF, PCL, HPGL, Postscript, Adobe Illustrator, PNM, or GNU metafile formats. IGESGUMP™ can still output HPGL, PCL, and EPS files with -HALF and -FULL page scaling and translation, which can then be viewed with the new utility, HPGL2GNU, in a pop-up X Window.

Drawing sheet sizes are supported by -S <size>, where the size is "A".."E" for ANSI sheet sizes, or "A0".."A4" for ISO sheet sizes. If the image in the IGES file is not defined in the first quadrant, then using -S X will create a pop-up window with extents set from -100 to +100 inches.

This release of WISLjr™, the freeware (Lite) version of the WiZ WORX IGES Source Library, requires the libplot function library included with the GNU Plotting Utilities. The next release will feature libiges-1.0, a GNU friendly package with a pre-compiled object library and documentation, and hopefully destined to become the GNU standard for importing IGES files.

The development system for this release was Red Hat Linux 9.0, and the code has been cross-compiled in the Microsoft Visual C++ environment ... executables for both Linux and Windows are included in this release. To compile the source library under Linux, you will need to be sure that the libplot function library is installed if you want to generate graphics output from IGES files; other types of import-only applications (such as IGESPEEK™) do not require it.

The IGESGUMP™ package is distributed along with a shareware executable version of IGESPEEK™, the world's first interactive browser for IGES files. IGESPEEK™ will display the data for entities in an IGES file as formatted text with descriptive labels, and it can be used as a "helper application" for Web browsers.

CONCORD, MA - WiZ WORX announces the latest release of IGESGUMP™ in source code as part of WISLjr™, the freeware (Lite) version of the WiZ WORX IGES Source Library.

This release of IGESGUMP™ provides partial support for the MIL-PRF-28000B Class 7 (3D Geometry) Subset by creating 3D part files in Wavefont OBJ format which can be viewed and manipulated with a simple Java applet.

Since the technical content for IGES 6.0 was frozen at the IGES Project meeting at the Atlanta IPO meeting a few months ago, IGESGUMP™ has been redefined to allow its source code to be released as part of the on-line IGES preservation. Since it is the MIL-PRF-28000B Class I (Technical Illustration) Subset minus the spline entities (112 and 126), it is still sufficient for handling the 150 figure files for the printed IGES specification.

This source library provides a starting point for generations of IGES translator implementors who may encounter warehouses of accumulated legacy IGES files, and most of what they need to be able to look at them.

WISLjr™ is available to qualified academicians and graduate students for non-commercial use in a classroom/research environment. Contact dennette@wiz-worx.com for the URL of the self-extracting archive.

CONCORD, MA - WiZ WORX announces IGESGUMP™, a Generic Unsupported MIME Plotter (GUMP) for viewing Initial Graphics Exchange Specification (IGES) files with World Wide Web (WWW) browsers like Mosaic and Netscape. This freeware package (executables only - no source code included) is available for download from http://www.wiz-worx.com/products/igesgump.zip

IGES has been registered with the Internet Foundation as a MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension) data type (application/iges), and now IGES files can be referenced in a URL (Uniform Resource Locator) from an HTML (HyperText Markup Language) document on the WWW. Once you have informed your Web browser of the appropriate "helper application" to associate with files that have an extension of ".igs", ".iges", etc., then the file will be displayed by the viewer after it has been downloaded.

Since IGESGUMP™ was designed to support only a subset of the IGES entities sufficient for technical illustrations, it conforms to the MIL-D-28000 Class I subset. That means that it does not support

• dimension entities and arrowheads,
• drawing and view structures,
• electrical entities, or
• surfaces and solids.

For a complete list of MIL-D-28000 Class I (Technical Illustration) IGES Subset entities supported by IGESGUMP™, click [here].

IGESGUMP™ is (currently) only available for Windows™ users. IGESGUMP.EXE is a MS-DOS executable that converts IGES files to HPGL files, which can then be displayed, plotted, or imported into numerous viewers, word-processors, and desktop publishing systems. The package includes shareware utilities to view (plot) HPGL files in a (16 or 256 color) DOS graphics window (HPGL2IBM.EXE) and on Hewlett Packard LaserJet (PCL2) compatible printers (HPGL2JET.EXE). This release will permit the creation of Encapsulated PostScript (.EPS) files from IGES files, for which there are ample viewers and plotters available already.

Using IGESGUMP™ to view IGES files is a multistep process that requires Knowledgable User Intervention (KUI). The user must perform the following steps either manually or by some batch file mechanism:

1. "capture" the IGES file to a disk file,
2. run IGESGUMP.EXE to create an HPGL file, and
3. use either HPGL2IBM, or HPGL2JET to display or plot the file OR
4. create an EPS file and use a PostScript viewer.

Robust software packages for viewing, plotting, and manipulating complex IGES files are available from several commercial vendors. Assigning one of the commercial viewers, such as CALSVIEW™ from IGES Data Analysis (IDA) or IGES/Works® from International TechneGroup, Inc. (ITI), will permit the IGES file to be translated and displayed as a single operation that requires no user intervention. For a partial list of vendors who offer complete 3D model/draw/view IGES files, including surfaces and solids, click [here].

The IGESGUMP™ package is distributed along with a shareware version of IGESPEEK™, the world's first interactive browser for IGES files. IGESPEEK™ will display the data for entities in an IGES file as formatted text with descriptive labels, and it can be used as a "helper application" for Web browsers.