Caddie is a superb example of Computer-Aided Design software for architects and other designers, initially developed in South Africa, but available worldwide.

A Short History

The Authors initially dubbed their pet project Michael Angelo. But the first deliverable package which only occupied a single 360 k floppy was christened Caddie.

The software was initially able to run on an IBM PC XT incorporating 640k RAM and a double 360 k floppy drive, (no hard disk), and a monochrome monitor. After the first demonstration of the product, Caddie's founders realized that they had an excellent product and were ready to take on the CAD market by storm. In the early eighties, CAD had traditionally only been available on mainframe and workstation-based platforms, and the Personal Computer was seen as a toy with severe memory and storage limitations.

These limitations however motivated the Caddie programmers to write their code in an extremely economical and efficient way. This in turn provided a fast redraw response -- at a fraction of the cost of the mainframe equivalent.

With South Africa experiencing strong international sanctions, the term "local is lekker" often clinched a deal when Caddie was up against the imported CAD software offerings, and this provided a good foundation for the healthy user base it now commands.

The relationship between Caddie and its user base soon became a family affair. Within two years, the staff compliment had grown to eighteen strong. Most of these team members were from an Architectural, Mechanical or Civil/Structural engineering background, and this played a vital role in ensuring that Caddie was able to develop a user friendly product. To this end, Caddie is well known for its "ease in transition" which designers experience when moving from the old drawing board environment to the electronic medium. As a minimum number of actions are required to perform any given task, high productivity is guaranteed.

Caddie has an open ended approach and a powerful "command language" programming tool which turns simple or complex requests into user friendly application menus. From the original single disk installation, Caddie has kept abreast of the latest technological developments and is now in excess of 18 Mb in size. A concerted effort from the company's Research and Development team led to the launch of Caddie for Windows in September 1993.

The latest release of Caddie - Caddie Professional Version 16 is now available from Advanced Computer Solutions and is widely used by professionals all over the world.

European Sales

Advanced Computer Solutions (Europe) Limited
Unit 1, Home Farm Business Centre
Cardington
Bedfordshire
MK44 3SN
Tel: (01234) 834920
Fax: (01234) 832601
E-Mail: sales@caddie.co.uk
Website : www.caddie.co.uk