Turn raw data into attractive graphics easily with this all-in-one presentation tool.
Shelley Cryan
You're a businessperson, not an artist -- but that doesn't mean you can't create good-looking graphics for your reports and presentations. ClarisImpact fills the gap between analyst and designer by giving you an easy way to turn your statistical data, outline, or scribbled notes into a wide variety of professional-looking business graphics. The latest version still has everything that made the first version so easy to use: uncluttered dialog boxes, extensive online help, and attractive ready-made styles. It's also packed with new features that will save you time and effort. For instance, the DataDraw feature helps you easily transform exported data into an eye-catching graphic. The program has also beefed up its presentation feature, added spreadsheet functionality to its tables, and broadened its selection of flowchart symbols.
Picture This
ClarisImpact covers all the bases for business graphics. Buttons let you create a table, an outline, a graph, an organization chart, a timeline, or a calendar within a report or presentation. You can also create graphics separately and drop them into your project or export them for use in another program.
If you have a spreadsheet with tasks, start dates, and durations and you want to turn this information into an attractively formatted timeline, the new DataDraw feature will let you do it in just a few minutes. First, you export your data as a tab- or comma-delimited file. In ClarisImpact, you select DataDraw from the File menu. ClarisImpact will ask you to select the exported file, choose a design style, and match the ClarisImpact timeline fields with your data. Then the program will extrapolate information such as finish dates from your data and create a fully formatted, editable timeline. You can use DataDraw in the same way to turn exported data into a calendar, a table, an organization chart, or a graph.
If your source information changes, you don't have to step through the process again. After exporting altered source information, you open its corresponding ClarisImpact graphic and choose Update Graphics from the DataDraw menu option. You can also set up ClarisImpact to check for modified source files each time you open a ClarisImpact graphic created with DataDraw.
Using DataDraw is a slick, simple, and fast way to create basic business graphics, but the feature has a few glitches. You have to strip unwanted records, such as spreadsheet column headings, out of your source file, because you can't exclude a record while you're importing the source file. And if you've added some records to a source file and you import the changes into a ClarisImpact graphic, the additional information won't always be in the same font or color as the original information.
ClarisImpact 2.0 is richer than ever in graphics resources and variety. And now, in addition to the standard ANSI symbol set and computer-diagram set, ClarisImpact has flowchart-symbol sets for transportation and telecommunications networks, decision trees, brainstorming, root-cause analysis, total-quality management, and block diagrams. In flowcharts as well as organization charts, you type text inside the symbols and along the connector lines. The symbols automatically resize to fit the text, but the connector lines don't. If you move the symbols, their connector lines will move with them and remain connected.
Tables now have additional spreadsheet capabilities, beyond support for typical formulas and functions. You can add a column of numbers, crank out an average value, or calculate an internal rate of return. You can also paste a function into a table or have the program automatically calculate and fill in a row with a data series, based on a few initial numbers. You can even sort on up to three fields.
Design styles -- collections of colors, line weights, and fonts that look good together -- give your business graphics a polished look. In ClarisImpact 2.0, the design-style selection has been somewhat revamped. The more fanciful styles have been replaced with more-professional-looking ones. More of the styles look good when printed in black-and-white -- which is useful if you don't have a color printer for your reports. The various styles are available in every feature, so you can create a consistent look within your presentations and reports.
ClarisImpact will not give Microsoft PowerPoint a run for its money, but it has borrowed some good features from the top dog in presentation software. The slide-presentation feature now has a built-in outliner, so you can organize your thoughts. It also has a slide sorter, a virtual light table on which you can rearrange thumbnail versions of your slides. There's also a new markup feature, which you can use to draw on your slide to emphasize or illustrate a point, and 50 new transition effects. However, ClarisImpact doesn't have a run-time player, so you can't send a presentation to a colleague who doesn't have the program.
Since ClarisImpact creates so many types of business graphics, you probably won't have to import a lot of tables, graphs, or timelines from other programs, but you still might need to export your ClarisImpact graphics or import, say, your company logo or a colleague's outline. ClarisImpact ships with Claris XTND translators for QuickTime; the CGM, EPS, GIF, ClarisDraw, MacPaint, PICT, and TIFF graphics formats; and the Claris MacWrite, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Write, RTF, and ASCII text formats. ClarisImpact files are fully interchangeable between the Windows and Macintosh versions of the program, although fonts, margins, and page breaks might appear somewhat different.
The ClarisImpact package includes both the PowerPC-native and 680x0 versions of the program. You'll need about 18 MB of hard-disk space to install all the files, mainly because of the extensive 6-MB library of clip art and the hefty 4-MB help file.
The Bottom Line
ClarisImpact 2.0 is a terrific all-in-one business-graphics program. Although it can't compete one-on-one in feature depth with specialized presentation or graphing programs, it does have a suave simplicity that will help you get your work done -- and its new low price won't jeopardize your bottom line.
ClarisImpact 2.0
Rating: Very Good/Outstanding (3.5 of 5 mice)
Price: $129 (list).
Pros: Easy to use. Uncluttered. DataDraw feature streamlines import and graphics creation. Additional and improved flowchart, table, and presentation features. Cross-platform. Inexpensive.
Cons: DataDraw's Update Graphics function needs improvement.
Company: Claris, Santa Clara, CA; 800-544-8554 or 408-727-8227.
Reader Service: Circle #408.
ClarisImpact 2.0 has a broad selection of flowchart-symbol sets that let you diagram almost anything, from decision trees to telecommunications networks.
With the new DataDraw feature, you match data exported from other programs with import fields in ClarisImpact 2.0 to create attractive, fully formatted data charts, calendars, timelines, or organization charts.
