4 ms·

Lucidchart debuts Chrome/Firefox extension for viewing Microsoft Visio files

31 points by enuncajon 13y ago

balac 13y ago
Does anyone know of an open source web based SVG editor with Visio compatibility than can be embedded into applications?
- dmgrow 13y ago
  Lucidchart isn't open source but it does have a public API allowing the editor to be embedded in other applications. https://www.lucidchart.com/pages/api_documentation https://www.lucidchart.com/pages/api_documentation Or it has a simpler Visio API which allows other applications to use Lucidchart as a Visio viewer.
draugadrotten 13y ago
Lucidcharts has promise but their subscription model isn't working out for business use in large organisations. Lucidchart seems to target large accounts but their business model seems tuned for small businesses. Companies wants to centralize licensing and not add yet another vendor. Since you can't subscribe through normal licensing channels, the tool isn't widely adopted. For personal use, I can't justify the subscription cost and I tend to avoid subscriptions for anything for better budget management.
- dmgrow 13y ago
  Interestingly, a recent survey of enterprise Google domains found Lucidchart as the 8th most popular web application in enterprises: http://www.forbes.com/sites/joemckendrick/2013/03/27/20-most-popular-cloud-based-apps-downloaded-into-enterprises/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/joemckendrick/2013/03/27/20-most... What is not working for companies today is the $250 - $1000 price tag for each license of Microsoft Visio.
- j_s 13y ago
  One competitor ( http://Draw.io http://Draw.io ) is free forever if installed as a Google App before May 01, 2013. https://www.google.com/enterprise/marketplace/viewListing?productListingId=18806+14512935155953175632&pli=1&src=hn https://www.google.com/enterprise/marketplace/viewListing?pr...
atesti 13y ago
I bet this became possible because of the recent progress in the past months with this great library: http://cgit.freedesktop.org/libreoffice/contrib/libvisio http://cgit.freedesktop.org/libreoffice/contrib/libvisio Or they embed Libre Office directly in order to convert visio to svg. So far there seems to be no documentation at all about the binary Visio file format and that library is the only thing out there!
- dmgrow 13y ago
  Actually Lucidchart has imported and exported Visio documents for a couple years, and we don't use the LibreOffice library at all. We reverse engineered the binary format!

31 points by enuncajon 13y ago

balac 13y ago

Does anyone know of an open source web based SVG editor with Visio compatibility than can be embedded into applications?

dmgrow 13y ago
Lucidchart isn't open source but it does have a public API allowing the editor to be embedded in other applications. https://www.lucidchart.com/pages/api_documentation https://www.lucidchart.com/pages/api_documentation Or it has a simpler Visio API which allows other applications to use Lucidchart as a Visio viewer.

draugadrotten 13y ago

Lucidcharts has promise but their subscription model isn't working out for business use in large organisations. Lucidchart seems to target large accounts but their business model seems tuned for small businesses. Companies wants to centralize licensing and not add yet another vendor. Since you can't subscribe through normal licensing channels, the tool isn't widely adopted. For personal use, I can't justify the subscription cost and I tend to avoid subscriptions for anything for better budget management.

dmgrow 13y ago
Interestingly, a recent survey of enterprise Google domains found Lucidchart as the 8th most popular web application in enterprises: http://www.forbes.com/sites/joemckendrick/2013/03/27/20-most-popular-cloud-based-apps-downloaded-into-enterprises/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/joemckendrick/2013/03/27/20-most... What is not working for companies today is the $250 - $1000 price tag for each license of Microsoft Visio.
j_s 13y ago
One competitor ( http://Draw.io http://Draw.io ) is free forever if installed as a Google App before May 01, 2013. https://www.google.com/enterprise/marketplace/viewListing?productListingId=18806+14512935155953175632&pli=1&src=hn https://www.google.com/enterprise/marketplace/viewListing?pr...

atesti 13y ago

I bet this became possible because of the recent progress in the past months with this great library: http://cgit.freedesktop.org/libreoffice/contrib/libvisio http://cgit.freedesktop.org/libreoffice/contrib/libvisio Or they embed Libre Office directly in order to convert visio to svg. So far there seems to be no documentation at all about the binary Visio file format and that library is the only thing out there!

dmgrow 13y ago
Actually Lucidchart has imported and exported Visio documents for a couple years, and we don't use the LibreOffice library at all. We reverse engineered the binary format!