Need Landscape software? I found some while surfing that looks pretty good.
Carla
Was just surfing for a change and ran across this page of gardening
software. I know some people have asked in the past where to find some
software for this type stuff so I thought I'd be helpful and let everyone
know about it.
Not affiliated with this company, just passing along the info.
--
Carla Goodloe
Zone 7 No. Alabama
KrisHur
looking around and checking out some others (burpee, broderbund), it seems
to be the best of a bad lot.
My post regarding this software from some time ago:
I have Sierra Landscape Designer, it stinks. It erases plants and text from
your designs, I contacted their customer service dept on several occasions
and they never got back to me. Someone here told me that it might be my ram-
I upped it from 125 to 256 and it still happens, albeit less frequently.
I've heard others here say they've
had trouble with it too.
The plants are "cartoons" and do not resemble the real thing. There are only
7 colors to choose from and they are as artificial as it gets, (white,
bright yellow, orange, red, shocking pink, purple, dark navy blue).
It doesn't appear to be made to work on garden areas or perennial beds--more
like overall landscape designs. For example, when setting the background
grid to 1'x1' a single daffodil is 3' sq. ft., once you shrink it down to
real size it's too small to tell what it is, unless you really zoom in; then
one isn't able to view the entire garden area. After all that, when you go
into 3D mode it's an overgrown mess; it doesn't appear to realize you've
shrunk things down to size. When it's set to 5'x5' it's better, but you
still have to zoom in.
Good things:
You can add info on plants not listed in the database but cannot upload a
photo.
You can set everything on "layers", for example I have 4 layers marked
spring, early summer, late summer and fall and can view the design by
season. I find that helpful so that I can see if I'm overloading w/spring or
summer plants, or if I have, for example, all the spring bloomers grouped
together leaving bare spots in the garden in any particular season.
There is a cost report that gives you to get a general idea of the cost of
the design you've built and an order form to order plants from White Flower
Farm.
When looking for plants, it allows you to search the database (flower,
groundcover, vine, shrub, bulb or tree) by zone, sun, water, soil, perennial
or annual, size, flowering season, color of bloom, color of foliage, fall
coloring of foliage, evergreen or deciduous.
Overall, it's OK for generally planning a bed, if you can overlook the
serious color flaws and can remember what is where so that you can replace
it once the program starts erasing things. Paper and colored pencils, IMHO,
work much better.
"Carla" <dv...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
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mintyfresh
"Carla" <dv...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:eiMh7.15821$zk4.9...@e3500-atl1.usenetserver.com...
>
> Was just surfing for a change and ran across this page of gardening
> software. I know some people have asked in the past where to find some
> software for this type stuff so I thought I'd be helpful and let everyone
>
> Not affiliated with this company, just passing along the info.
>
>
> --
> Carla Goodloe
> Zone 7 No. Alabama
>
Designer 3D v.5.0 in July of 1999 because it had garden design software and also
incorporated 3D deck design software. A major selling point was the ability to
import a deck design into a garden design. The first time I did this I tried to
reopen the garden design only to find the file corrupted. I repeated the
process, thinking I must have done something wrong. After many hours and much
frustration I wrote to Sierra describing the problem. I received a reply that
the deck import function didn't work, it corrupted the files, and they were
working on it; they advised me to periodically check back to their website for
patches.
Fast forward a year after regularly checking and never finding a patch. A visit
to their site revealed they were continuing to sell the defective software, with
no warning about the defect or any indication there was any kind of problem.
A few months later I wrote to them again after seeing they'd released v.6.0.
They sent me a copy of v.6.0, which still doesn't work the way I'd expected it
would. I'm not impressed with the pictures either. All in all it's been a big
disappointment and I'm
back to graph paper and pencils; it's put me right off Sierra software products.
Carla
software listed. I don't need any software to design stuff. I'm practical
not creative. But at least, others will know not to buy it when they come
across the special.
Thanks.
Carla
"KrisHur" <kris...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
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