CAD software offers similar facilities to conventional drawing software like Draw and Artworks, but with many differences in approach. Whilst drawing software aims towards producing "pictures", CAD software lends itself more to material such as plans, designs, maps, layouts et cetera.

RISC OS 2D CAD software is in widespread use for designing real world 3D objects, ranging from precise specifications for custom engineered cogs, to detailed plans for housing developments. The results can be printed directly, exported to CAD packages on other platforms, or used via scripts to drive machinery for metal cutting or similar work.

RiscCAD Professional Release 10 is the latest version of the Professional 2D CAD System, which makes CAD facilities available on RISC OS at a price affordable for just about any user.

New features include Bezier curves, outline fonts, automatic fill boundary detection, DrawFile export and much more. The software is now Iyonix compatible, and supports high colour screen modes.

Peter McCafferty will be demonstrating the latest version of Release 10 at ROUGOL's meeting, a few days ahead of the official release date. You can download RiscCAD Professional Release 10, as well as online documentation, from the Quadrant2 website.

As a professional architect, RiscCAD has been central to the operation of Peter's business for a great many years, and he is delighted to see its development recommence. The demonstration will be accessible to those who have never used RiscCAD before. However, as a longstanding user of the software, Peter is also ideally placed to assist existing RiscCAD owners with hints and tips to get even more out of the software.