As the demand for interoffice and intraoffice communication grows, so does the suite of Visualizer tools designed to satisfy that demand. You can make existing Visualizer data automatically available enterprisewide through your corporate intranet, or the Internet and World Wide Web. You can automate the daily broadcast of Visualizer graphs to the Web.

There are two File menu commands for publishing graphs:

• Export
• Web Publish

Use Export to convert Visualizer graphs, graph pages, and projects to HTML pages in a variety of formats including *.PNG (Portable Network Graphics), *.jpg, *.bmp, and so on. Once the graphs are converted, post them to a Web server using standard Web publishing procedures.

To automate the exporting of graphs, select Export in the Graphics event of an Automator script (see Adding-events).

Web Publish automatically converts graphs, graph pages, projects, and annotations to HTML pages (with a *.htm extension) in *.PNG format. It links you to the Microsoft Web Publishing Wizard, which posts the pages to your Web server.

From the Web server, anyone in your organization with a Web browser and appropriate access can display the graphs. To automate broadcasting, select Publish in the Graphics event of an Automator script (see Adding-events).

Web Publishing simplifies access to Visualizer graphs and broadens the number of platforms to which you can publish.

How Export and Web Publish differ

Both Export and Web Publish let you convert Visualizer graphs to non-Visualizer formats. While Export is not exclusively for Web publishing, Web Publish is. The following sections describe each function:

Export

Export lets you select from a variety of file formats for use in other PC applications. Formats include HTML, PNG, JPEG, Metafiles, MacPict, MacPaint, Sun, Bitmaps, and ZSoft.
Export requires no setup. It saves the converted files to the specified directory and drive but does not publish them to the Web. You must transfer the pages to your Web server. Anyone with access privileges and a browser can then access the published pages.

Web Publish

Web Publish is designed specifically for Intranet/Internet and Web publishing. You, or the Webmaster at your site, must configure Web Post, a utility distributed free of charge by Microsoft.

Once configured, Web Publish automatically converts the graphs, graph pages, projects, and annotations to HTML pages and transfers the converted *.htm files to your Web server.

Once the pages are on the server, anyone from your enterprise with access privileges and a browser can view them. Since Web Publish uses a Wizard interface, it is faster and more direct than Export. If the Web server is down, you are notified.

Version dependencies

The two ways to publish to the Web depend upon the level of software you are running:

• Use Export to convert graphs to HTML files ( *.PNG) and manually post them to a web server.
• Use Web Publish to automatically convert and post graphs to the Web.

Software requirements for Web Publish

You must have the following software installed to use Visualizer Web Publish:

• To publish graphs to the Web, you must have Windows 10 or later
• To access the Web, you must have Web browser software such as:
  • Google Chrome
  • Mozilla Firefox
  • Microsoft Edge
  • Microsoft Internet Explorer