DIVESTCO DEPLOYS FLARE FROM MADCAP SOFTWARE TO ENHANCE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE, SPEED ONLINE HELP PROJECTS
San Diego, CA, USA – January 7, 2008 — MadCap Software, the leader
in
multi-channel content authoring and a showcase company for Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) Visual
Studio 2005 and Microsoft XPS, today announced that Divestco, Inc. has successfully implemented
MadCap Flare 3.0, making Flare its new Help content authoring solution for its oil and gas
exploration software. With 10 online Help projects already completed in Flare, Divestco has been
able cut project time by up to one-third.
“We thought it would take a long time to complete our first project with MadCap Flare,
which was for an upgrade of one of our software packages, but in minutes we were able to convert
the older Help project, and everything moved over perfectly,” said Mat Hepton, vice
president of software development at Divestco. “From there, we could simply add the new
content, formatting, and contextual links into the Flare project. We were done days ahead of
schedule.”
Divestco, headquartered in Calgary, Canada, is a leading provider of software, data, and
services
to the oil and gas industry. Its extensive line of exploration software for oil and gas
professionals
has been designed with a thorough understanding of the needs and demands of the land,
geological, geophysical, and engineering communities. With a focus on allowing exploration teams
to collaborate, the company licenses its software for on-premise use, as well as offering it as
a
hosted solution. To support some 30 applications, Divestco provides HTML-based online Help that
can be easily accessed through a browser.
After using another authoring product for years to create its online Help, Divestco decided to
evaluate alternative packages. The older Help content authoring tool lacked the flexibility to
easily
create different skins for its online Help projects or to find related links. At the same time,
with more
of its applications being delivered over the Web, Divestco wanted a Help authoring tool that
easily
created HTML Help.
Growing buzz in the technical writing community about a next-generation product, called Flare,
led
Divestco to look at MadCap Software. Upon reviewing Flare, Divestco was attracted to several
features: its native XML architecture; support for Microsoft .NET, which will be important for
future
integration; and reusable components that cut project time.
“Flare’s ability to create snippets, which are reusable content, is a big
feature,” said Mr. Hepton. “For example, we can create a dialog box as reusable
content and then insert it into each appropriate topic. If we edit this dialog box in one place,
that
change is automatically reflected everywhere.”
Two other key features for Divestco are the ability to relate context-sensitive Help and
toggling. The
latter feature lets the author put content into a toggle, for example an image. A reader who
wants to
view the image, doesn’t have to scroll back to a previous page. Instead, he or she can
click
on the toggle to view the image from the current page. Additionally, Divestco has taken
advantage
of MadCap Flare’s patent-pending graphical user interface (GUI).
“Flare’s GUI has allowed us to provide a modern image to reflect our cutting-edge
software,” said Mr. Hepton. “We’ve completely revamped our style sheet
and look concurrently with our Flare updates. The efficiency we’ve gained from the style
guide and formats has been really nice. Equally
important, Flare applies exactly which output and skin we want—and there’s been no
problem viewing our Help over the network or using a Web browser instead of Flare’s
viewer.”
MadCap’s support has contributed to the success of Divestco’s deployment as well,
Mr. Hepton notes. “We took a class and spent a month to learn the product. We also
purchased the platinum-level support, and MadCap was always been there immediately to answer
questions or help with anything we didn’t understand.”
“Divestco delivers some of the world’s most advanced applications for oil and gas
exploration and understands the importance of intuitive, easy-to-use Help systems to support
these
sophisticated software solutions,” said Anthony Olivier, MadCap Software CEO.
“We’re excited to see the rapid gains in efficiency that Divestco has achieved
through Flare’s XML-based design and GUI innovations, along with being able to create a
richer online Help experience for its customers. And we look forward to supporting Divestco in
advancing its industry-leading solutions with equally ground-breaking software for delivering
online
Help.”
About Divestco
Divestco is an innovative software, data, services, brokerage, and consulting company providing integrated solutions for the oil and gas industry. By implementing a strategy of integration between software, services, and datasets, and potentially all three together, Divestco is creating a unique set of offerings. Divestco is headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, Canada and trades on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) under the symbol “DVT.” For more information, visit www.divestco.com.About MadCap Software
MadCap Software is a trusted resource for more than 20,000 companies around the globe for single-source, multi-channel authoring and publishing solutions designed to streamline the process of developing and delivering training content, learning and development programs, technical documentation, online Help, knowledge bases, and more. From authoring, publishing and translation, to cloud-based project and content management, to contribution and review in the cloud, you can streamline content delivery and manage the entire content development lifecycle with MadCap Software. MadCap Software’s services include product training, consulting services, translation and localization, and an advanced developer certification program. Headquartered in San Diego, California, with offices in Austin, TX, MadCap Software is home to some of the most experienced software architects and product experts in the content development industry.
