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Bentley Releases V8i for the Intelligent Infrastructure Cycle

Bentley Systems released the new MicroStation V8i today, together with 30 other existing products engineered to run on the new platform. CEO Greg Bentley announced the release together with Bhupinder Singh and Ed Mueller. The 'i' is the focus of this release - intuitive, interactive, intrinsic, incredible and interoperable.

Bentley Systems released the new MicroStation V8i today, together with 30 other existing products engineered to run on the new platform. CEO Greg Bentley announced the release together with Bhupinder Singh and Ed Mueller. The 'i' is the focus of this release - intuitive, interactive, intrinsic, incredible and interoperable.

"The focus is on a interoperating platform," said Bentley.  "We have spent a billion dollars developing this product." He explained how Bentley has been working in teams to produce V8i and support it across the largest combined release ever announced at one time. In fact, Malcolm Walter said that Bentley is so excited that it would offer the product, at 0% financing - 1/3, 1/3 and 1/3 cost over 3 years. Furthermore,  there would be no charges for back payment if people signed by December 31 for the product.

"GenerativeComponents, the Bentley parametric modeller software is included in V8i now," said Keith Bentley. He also pointed to the new abilities to render using the new Luxology rendering engine and a new Dynamic Views capability that enables 2D and 3D dynamic viewing. He explained this as right, left and center plane intersection that can be regulated - the result was impressive.

As Greg Bentley indicated, "the concept is about realising a 'Intelligent Infrastructure Cycle' and this was described as integrated project delivery incorporated into the product as well as a very high level of interoperability. This was explained as having both an intra-platform and inter-platform component, and GIS users would recognise the approach as a federated approach that is designed to integrate with many manufacturer's products from a multitude of servers.  In other words, V8i is optimised to work anywhere, with anyone and doing just about anything, design wise. Coupled to the Bentley product line for utilities, rail, water and other areas, this linkage obviously extends the platform to capitalise upon all the companies and products Bentley has been buying the last few years.

Bhupinder Singh suggested that the release "adds value well beyond the design." He mentioned the word reuse more than once, suggesting that interoperability and integration are enabling higher levels of reuse and increasing scaleability of the product significantly.  Interoperability, Continuity and Breadth and Depth of the portfolio was presented.  Local caching has been included into V8i, thereby speeding up processing and avoiding the transfer of sizeable files back and forth, a gain in efficiency.

The graphics spinning off the new Luxology engine are impressive. They are also fast. It was suggested that a 64 bit Vista operating system be used for the product since the double or more cores add greatly to the rendering speed and efficiency - 8 cores for example would reduce rendering time to 1/8th. The luxology engine also integrates more closely into the MicroStation workflow, explained as a two-click operation now and improving workflow speed. Clearly the Dynamic Views is a winner, because it cuts across the arguments between the 2D and 3D crowd, allowing both groups to produce from the same product in whatever 'D' they wish.

You can read more about this product here and here.

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