Actify SpinFire 8.0

By Mike Hudspeth

Whether you work for a global company with 250,000 employees or a small business with three partners who share all the tasks, inevitably there will be times when people must do something with the data you create. How will they do it?

It’s a safe bet very few of those people will have the same 3D modeling system you do. They may not even have a modeling system. They may be from corporate procurement or marketing, sales, or manufacturing. Whoever they are, they can access what you create by using Actify SpinFire 8.0.

Collaboration Is the Key

Say you use some powerful enterprise 3D modeling software. You work hard to make sure your models are the best they can be. You build parts and assemblies. You assign attributes and properties. In short, you define your product in every way. But you are not the only person who must know that product inside and out. Manufacturing must work with your geometry to build the product. Marketing must have your data so they can do whatever it is that marketing does. Sales must use your data in its brochures and materials to sell the product. But none of them uses the same software.

> > Figure 1:  With Actify SpinFire for Microsoft Office, you can embed 3D data right into your MS Word documents, eliminating the need for canned animations.

 

There are several levels of Actify SpinFire 8.0 to cover the spectrum of what users need to accomplish. SpinFire Professional takes your data and puts it in a CAD-neutral .3D file format that is readable by Actify’s free SpinFire reader. SpinFire 8.0 is based on the STEP format and the ACIS modeling kernel so you will not have to worry about compatibility now or in the future. You can share 3D modeling data, Word documents, spreadsheets, and all sorts of things ranging from text files to vector graphics files. SpinFire Professional costs between $495 and $1,500, depending on the importers you choose.

SpinFire Publisher, which costs between $5,000 and $15,000, will allow you to securely send out your data over the Internet to suppliers or even customers. You can control permissions attached to different files to allow different people to read it, change it, whatever. And you can step up to Actify Design Share, which costs $40,000 to $150,000, depending on how many seats you need, for full-function, no-holds-barred secure application.

At this point, you might find yourself asking why you should pay so much for something that Adobe Acrobat seems to do. A valid question, but Actify SpinFire 8.0 does more than Acrobat (and to be fair,  Acrobat is roughly comparable in price). For example, Acrobat Professional runs about $450. It allows you to bring in text and graphics, as well as 3D models just like SpinFire. The difference is that with Acrobat you are creating and manipulating a PDF file. SpinFire allows you to embed these other file formats into MS Word documents or PowerPoint presentations.

< < Figure 2:  You can set up SpinFire to allow data recipients to rotate and disassemble your design model.

 

One of the handiest of SpinFire’s modules is SpinFire for Microsoft  Office. For $360 you can actually embed interactive 3D models within Word documents or PowerPoint presentations (see Figure 1, above). Word is ubiquitous among non-engineering types, and the ability to present such accessible diagrams to non-engineers is invaluable. SpinFire for Microsoft Office lets you rotate the model and show off its wonderful form instead of relying expressly on words. If a picture is worth a thousand words, this is surely worth a thousand pictures. Of course, this capability will lose something when you print out a hard copy. You see,  SpinFire is all about interactivity.

What Can You Do With It?

I think one of the coolest (yes, coolest) things you can do with SpinFire Professional 8.0 is construct exploded assemblies that are as close to the real deal as can be. You can bring all the parts together and then interactively disassemble the device (see Figure 2, above). If there’s a better way to create an owner’s manual or repair guidebook, I don’t know about it. I wish I had one of these for my car or air conditioner. You even can turn parts off if they are in your way so that they disappear from the view to reveal parts behind them.

> > Figure 3:  You can attach annotations to your data to pass along to anyone on your distribution chain. With the ability to rotate the model, you can see where each notation is applied.

 

You can measure parts and attach notes for others to use for changes (see Figure 3, above). New to SpinFire Professional 8.0 is Geometric Dimensioning & Tolerancing (GD&T) interaction. You can specify what area of your model must conform and send that information out to those people who are responsible for speccing, designing, buying, or tooling that part of your project. They will be able to rotate the model and zoom in on any area that interests them.

Actify has worked hard to make this product compatible with just about any format you might require. You can read in native file formats like .SAT, .DWF, .DXF, .CGM, CATIA V4 and V5, SolidWorks,  JT, I-deas, Unigraphics/NX, HPGL, IGES, Pro/Engineer,  STEP, .STL, TIFFs, and VRML, and more. Actify wants to make it easy for you to use and distribute your data.

< < Figure 4:  Actify SpinFire Professional is but one part of the company’s plan to streamline what you do. Actify wants to help you get all the use out of your data that you can.

 

Actify SpinFire Professional 8.0 is a great tool for collaborating across the breadth of your business team (see Figure 4, above). It might be a little pricey for the small shop but for a mid-range to large company, it might be just the collaboration tool the enterprise needed.

Mike Hudspeth is a senior designer for a global medical company and has been using a wide range of CAD products for 20 years. He,  his wife, two daughters, and their cats live outside of St. Louis, MO. Send your comments about this article through e-mail by clicking here. Please reference “SpinFire 8, September 2006” in your message.

Company Information

Actify SpinFire 8.0
Actify,  Inc.
San Francisco, CA


Pricing
> SpinFire Professional 8.0:  $495-$1,500
> SpinFire Publisher:  $5,000-$15,000
> Design Share: $40,000-$150,0000
> SpinFire for Microsoft Office module: $360