Visio 2000: The Official Guide, 1st edition
Authors: John V. Hedtke, Elisabeth Knottingham
Venue:  (1999)

From the Book:Welcome to Visio 2000: The Official Guide. This book shows you how to use Visio 2000 to create diagrams of all shapes and sizes. Why This Book Is for You Visio 2000: The Official Guide is for anyone who wants to use Visio 2000 to its fullest. Readers who are unfamiliar with Visio 2000 will be able to learn about the features and options it offers to create professional-looking diagrams. Readers who are already familiar with the program will learn about the powerful new features in Visio 2000 Standard Edition as well as learn about some features and options in the other Visio products: Visio 2000 Professional Edition, Visio 2000 Technical Edition, and Visio 2000 Enterprise Edition. Everyone will able to further their productivity with Visio 2000 and be able to tailor-make Visio solutions for their own diagrams. If you already have Visio 2000 to create diagrams, the process-oriented approach of this book makes it excellent for an easy reference guide to features that you haven't used before. Experienced users will find discussions on how features can be used together to create more sophisticated Visio 2000 solutions. How This Book Is Organized This book is divided into eleven chapters and three appendices, as described here. Chapter 1, "Visio 2000 Basics," introduces you to Visio 2000. It shows you how to install Visio 2000 Standard Edition and discusses its various options and basic components. You'll learn how to install and configure the program, understand the basic screen layout, and use the product's general features. You'll also learn about printing and saving your Visio 2000 drawings. Chapter 2, "Creating Your First Diagram,"introduces you to creating Visio 2000 diagrams. You'll learn how to create a drawing using the standard tools, such as stencils, connectors, and templates. You'll also learn how to print drawings using basic printing options. You'll be shown how the drag-and-drop feature works, as well as how to draw lines and add text to Visio 2000 drawings. You'll also learn how to use the text rotation, drawing, freehand, shape, view, and pointer tools. In Chapter 3, "Going Further," you'll continue exploring Visio 2000 tools. You will learn techniques to create custom shapes, layers, backgrounds, pages, and other advanced tools. This chapter demonstrates how to create an overall look for presentations using these tools. You'll learn how to insert graphics and how to use them to make drawings look personal and meaningful. Chapter 4, "Using Stencils and Templates," discusses the many kinds of stencils and templates that come with Visio 2000. You'll learn how to bring up a stencil, choosing it from the list of stencils that ship with Visio 2000. You'll see how to modify a stencil with either standard or custom shapes created in Chapter 3. This chapter also teaches you how to create a stencil in Visio 2000. You'll learn how a template works and how to choose one from the list of templates that come with Visio 2000. You'll understand how templates and stencils work together, and you'll learn to choose new stencils to go with your template from a list showing which stencils come with which templates. You'll see how to modify an existing template and how to create a template of your own. In Chapter 5, "Creating Flowcharts," you'll learn how to choose the right flowchart template and how to use the special features of connectors and SmartShape symbols to make your flowcharts work beautifully. You'll learn how to create organization charts and flowcharts from databases, as well as how to create database information from flowcharts. Chapter 6, "Using Visio 2000 with Microsoft Office," teaches you how to use Visio with Microsoft Office products. You'll learn how to place a copy of your current drawing into an Office document and how to dynamically link Visio 2000 diagrams to Office 2000, Office 97, and some Office 95 products for automatic updates when the data changes in either the drawing or the Office document. This chapter discusses linking and embedding Visio 2000 diagrams with Word for Windows, as well as going from Excel data to a Visio 2000 diagram. It also discusses how to use the PowerPoint color schemes in Visio 2000. Chapter 7, "Linking and the Internet," discusses how Visio 2000 is completely Internet-compatible. You'll learn how to set links between pages or documents within Visio 2000 and how to link to documents outside Visio 2000. You'll learn how to use Visio 2000 with HTML and the Internet. This chapter shows you how to create hyperlinks, in Visio 2000 diagrams, as well as how to create HTML documents in Visio 2000. You'll see how this can be useful for creating Web pages and for linking to Web documents and HTML Help. Chapter 8, "Organizing Your Business with Visio 2000," shows you how to track a project with Visio 2000. You'll learn how to keep track of project status and scheduling using Visio 2000 solutions, such as special templates Visio 2000 developed for this purpose. You'll also learn how Visio 2000 works smoothly with Microsoft planning software by importing and exporting Microsoft Project information. You'll learn how to use the Office Layout template to create an office layout diagram and how to use the template to create an office inventory. Chapter 9, "Getting Your Point Across Graphically," shows you how to use Visio 2000 to communicate graphically in meetings and on paper. You'll learn how to create charts, forms, and graphs, as well as how to add maps and geographic shapes to your diagrams. You'll also learn how to create a slide show in Visio 2000, how to add comments to shapes, and how to find all the shapes on a stencil. Chapter 10, "Using Visio 2000 Technical Edition," discusses the differences between Visio 2000 Standard Edition and Visio 2000 Technical Edition. You'll learn how Visio 2000 Technical Edition is used by engineers to create specific drawings and precise diagrams. This chapter also includes a discussion of the added stencils and templates that come with this version. Chapter 11, "Using Advanced Visio 2000 Features," discusses the highly technical, advanced features that come with different versions of Visio 2000 and how to take advantage of some of these features to help with specific types of diagrams. Appendix A, "Stencils and Templates," lists all the shapes, stencils, and templates that come with Visio 2000, as well as special features of each template. Appendix B, "Features in Visio 2000 Editions," describes the different editions of Visio 2000 and helps you identify which one has the functions you need. Appendix C, "Resources," contains a selection of Internet, newsgroup, and other online resources for Visio 2000 users. The appendix also mentions user groups and other interesting information.