“The Engineering Search Engine”
DrawingSearcher™ (by Docupoint)
Index, Search, & Find: Technical Documents, CAD Drawings, PDF's, MS Office files, Unstructured Database elements and more!
| File formats | 100+ File Formats |
|---|---|
| Live Demo! | Securely hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS) |
| Price | $27/month per “Simultaneous User” (billed on an annual basis at $324/year USD) |
| Purchase | 30-day no-questions-asked return policy |
| Company | Docupoint LLC |
| Location | Silicon Valley, California, USA |
Customer and Industry Testimonials
| Customer | Figure | Testimonial |
|---|---|---|
| ChevronRichmond, CA refinery | 110,000+“over 110,000 AutoCAD drawings” | DrawingSearcher saves us time and money and allows us to search AutoCAD drawings as easily as if we were using Google or Bing. Dana Kearney, Senior Systems Analyst, Chevron |
| Sierra Pacific Industries | 14 million“close to 14 million such CAD drawings” | What used to take close to a week now takes minutes. David Miesbauer, Systems Analyst, and Steve Gaston, CIO, Sierra Pacific Industries |
| Harmac Pacifica division of Nanaimo Forest Products Ltd. | < 1 hour“in less than an hour” | We were up-and-running with DrawingSearcher in less than an hour Steve Twarog, Harmac Pacific, a division of Nanaimo Forest Products Ltd. |
Problem and Solution
Problem:
Large corporations and organizations have an impossible task of finding information stored in their own HUGE archives of technical documents stored within their I.T. warehouses and/or in the Cloud. Employees cannot “Google” to find internal drawings. Microsoft doesn't have a way to “search” multi-format design files. Oracle isn't a source for querying within CAD files across the major software tools (think: AutoCAD, Microstation, PTC, BricsCAD, SolidWorks, Adobe PDF, CATIA, etc.).
Solution:
Docupoint's DrawingSearcher does it. Any employee can search any part number, within any CAD drawing, anywhere within an organization's thousands (millions!) of internally stored documents … secure, fast, and advanced.
Video Describing DrawingSearcher (1min-45sec)
Then use “Live Demo!”: TRY using DrawingSearcher
Securely hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Start by searching for 316 5e 600V 30A pump steel CAT5e, etc. … then try other common words and part numbers.
Try the Online Demo now
Try the Online Demo now, where YOU do Searches using a LIVE version of our DrawingSearcher. Search Hundreds of DWG, PDF, and XLS files for: Architecture, Manufacturing, Civil, Agriculture, HVAC, Entertainment, etc. Your search results immediately display preview images of the files found. Click a preview image for full screen viewing and printing in PDF format.
[We thank our customers who graciously provided us with these sample technical documents]
Functionality
Features Supported:
- SEARCH any alpha or numeric text anywhere in any AutoCAD drawing
- SEARCH any alpha or numeric text anywhere in any Filename
- SEARCH by Extracted Title Block Data
- Indexing of DWG, DWF, or DXF files
- SmartZoom® to view “found” text strings
- Built-in high-performance web server
- Automatic DWF file generation
- Automatic PNG preview image generation
- User-customizable HTML interface
- Directory Browse with Preview Image Display
- Indexing of Microstation DGN files
- Indexing of Microsoft Office files (e.g. .DOC, .XLS, .PPT)
- Indexing of Adobe PDF documents
Powerful Search Capabilities
DrawingSearcher provides the most advanced AutoCAD and MicroStation search capability available in the world. Unlike legacy document management applications that are limited to searching on a few fields in a database table, DrawingSearcher can find drawings by any text or number string inside the drawing. Need to find all drawings that contain references to a particular part number? No problem! With DrawingSearcher's Thesaurus feature you even find drawings when they contain abbreviations and synonyms. For example, a Search on 'building' also finds 'bldg' and Searching for equipment by its number can also find the equipment by name!
DrawingSearcher contains an easy-to-use browse function. The user can browse file directories through the web browser interface and view the preview images associated with each file. At any time within the Browse function, users may add a Search term and view all the drawings containing the term. Combining Browse and Search provides a powerful means to locate files containing a particular text string while limiting the search results to only directories of interest.
And of course, DrawingSearcher provides text search on extracted Title Block attribute values, database information extracted via the database linking tools, and File Names. There is no need for the user to specify a Field to search upon - all searches are done across all fields, making it easy for users to find the drawings they need.
View AutoCAD drawings in DWF or PDF!
After SEARCHING/FINDING relevant AutoCAD drawing files, DrawingSearcher displays a preview of the AutoCAD files on the user's web-capable computer screen via PDF, or DWF, Autodesk's industry-standard format. As such, companies no longer need to send files via email or FTP or links to other employees. Instead, ANY employee who has access to files inside of an organization's intranet (within their own firewalls), can SEARCH/FIND/VIEW and Print their AutoCAD drawings without requiring an AutoCAD user to get involved with finding, and sending the file. And, DrawingSearcher also SEARCHES and FINDS typical office documents, so legacy files are not skipped over or missed during a SEARCH.
Responsive, Easy-to-Use Interface
The DrawingSearcher interface is designed to be very simple and highly responsive to user input. The highly optimized, lightweight web pages are returned almost instantaneously after a SEARCH is submitted. And, the highly accurate preview image allows users to easily discern the file's contents, without the need to fully open each drawing in the viewer.
Customization
DrawingSearcher is fully customizable to meet your organization's unique needs. All web pages displayed are built from a series of open HTML files that can be customized by the system administrator.
Built Around Autodesk Core Technologies
DrawingSearcher was originally built around Autodesk's core technologies, including: RealDWG, the DWF Toolkit, Design Review and i-Drop. As an early member of the Autodesk Developer Network (ADN), Docupoint licensed technologies directly from Autodesk. Early use of Autodesk-provided development tools ensured that DWG files were reproduced with the highest fidelity. This enables us today to develop DrawingSearcher to be compatible with customer-created Autodesk file formats.
Easy to Install, Configure and Maintain
Many users report getting DrawingSearcher completely up and running, with all drawings on-line, in a matter of hours. DrawingSearcher is packaged into a single download and the functionality is enabled with an Authorization Code upon purchase. As DrawingSearcher is a server-based product, it is installed on just one computer to provide the indexing and search services.
Client computer setup is dependent on your choice of drawing output of PDF or DWF. PDF is a zero client install on all devices including; PCs, iPad, tablet, or smart phone via a web browser. DWF client computers must use the Microsoft OS and requires the installation of the Design Review viewing application (free from Autodesk).
DrawingSearcher is typically configured to run as a service with 24x7x365 availability. Indexing of DWG file archives is pre-scheduled to process incremental additions, changes and deletions … then indexing occurs automatically.
DrawingSearcher uses “American Innovation” to search these 100+ File Formats
DrawingSearcher is typically purchased to search across ALL of your company's/organization's AutoCAD drawing files AND all other technical data saved in all of the popular “office” documents, including Microsoft Office (.DOC, .XLS, .PPT) and Adobe PDF, as well as all of the file formats listed below.
- Autodesk's AutoCAD files (.dwg, .dwf, .dxf)
- Microstation files (*.dgn)
- Adobe Acrobat (*.pdf)
- Microsoft Word for Windows (*.doc)
- Microsoft Excel (*.xls & *.xlsx)
- Microsoft PowerPoint (*.ppt)
- Microsoft SQL (MS SQL)
- Oracle SQL
- Microsoft Outlook data files (*.PST)
- TIFF (*.tif)
DrawingSearcher can search ALL of these document formats:
- Adobe Acrobat (*.pdf)
- Adobe Framemaker MIF (*.mif)
- Ami Pro (*.sam)
- Ansi Text (*.txt)
- ASCII Text
- ASF media files (metadata only) (*.asf)
- Autodesk's AutoCAD files (.dwg, .dwf, .dxf, Vault (non-proprietary/intermediate files), etc.)
- CALS files
- CSV (Comma-separated values) (*.csv)
- DBF (*.dbf)
- Databases (file-based databases) (see SQL, below, too)
- EBCDIC
- EML files (emails saved by Outlook Express) (*.eml)
- Enhanced Metafile Format (*.emf)
- Eudora MBX message files (*.mbx)
- Flash (*.swf)
- GZIP (*.gz)
- HTML (*.htm, *.html)
- JPEG (*.jpg)
- Lotus 1-2-3 (*.123, *.wk?)
- MBOX email archives (including Thunderbird) (*.mbx)
- MHT archives (HTML archives saved by Internet Explorer) (*.mht)
- MIME messages
- MSG files (emails saved by Outlook) (*.msg)
- Microsoft Access MDB files (We no longer use ODBC or any Microsoft database drivers to index Microsoft Access files. Earlier versions relied on ODBC to parse Access files. Each record of a database is indexed as a separate document.) (*.mdb, *.accdb, including Access 2007 and Access 2010)
- Microsoft Document Imaging (*.mdi)
- Microsoft Excel (*.xls & *.xlsx)
- Microsoft Excel 2003 XML (*.xml)
- Microsoft Excel 2007 and 2010 (*.xlsx)
- Microsoft Outlook data files (*.PST)
- Microsoft Outlook/Exchange Messages, Notes, Contacts, Appointments, and Tasks (We can index Outlook and Exchange message stores using MAPI. We can also index Outlook PST files directly, without using Outlook or MAPI.)
- Microsoft Outlook Express 5 and 6 (*.dbx) message stores
- Microsoft PowerPoint (*.ppt)
- Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 and 2010 (*.pptx)
- Microsoft Rich Text Format (*.rtf)
- Microsoft Searchable Tiff (*.tiff)
- Microsoft SQL (MS SQL)
- Microsoft Word for DOS (*.doc)
- Microsoft Word for Windows (*.doc)
- Microsoft Word 2003 XML (*.xml)
- Microsoft Word 2007 2010 and 2012 (*.docx)
- Microsoft Works (*.wks)
- Microstation files (*.dgn)
- MP3 (metadata only) (*.mp3)
- Multimate Advantage II (*.dox)
- Multimate version 4 (*.doc)
- OpenOffice versions 1, 2, and 3 documents, spreadsheets, and presentations (*.sxc, *.sxd, *.sxi, *.sxw, *.sxg, *.stc, *.sti, *.stw, *.stm, *.odt, *.ott, *.odg, *.otg, *.odp, *.otp, *.ods, *.ots, *.odf) (includes OASIS Open Document Format for Office Applications)
- Oracle SQL
- PNG (*.png)
- Quattro Pro (*.wb1, *.wb2, *.wb3, *.qpw)
- QuickTime (*.mov, *.m4a, *.m4v)
- SQL (e.g. Microsoft SQL, Oracle, etc.)
- TAR (*.tar)
- TIFF (*.tif)
- TNEF (winmail.dat files)
- Treepad HJT files (*.hjt)
- Unicode (UCS16, Mac or Windows byte order, or UTF-8)
- Visio XML files (*.vdx)
- Windows Metafile Format (*.wmf)
- WMA media files (metadata only) (*.wma)
- WMV video files (metadata only) (*.wmv)
- WordPerfect 4.2 (*.wpd, *.wpf)
- WordPerfect (5.0 and later) (*.wpd, *.wpf)
- WordStar version 1, 2, 3 (*.ws)
- WordStar versions 4, 5, 6 (*.ws)
- WordStar 2000
- Write (*.wri)
- XBase (including FoxPro, dBase, and other XBase-compatible formats) (*.dbf)
- XML (*.xml)
- XML Paper Specification (*.xps)
- XSL
- XyWrite
- ZIP (*.zip)
Licensing
Licensing is a software-based system. Hardware locks are not used.
Each DrawingSearcher license is a “Floating License” available to anyone with access to the DrawingSearcher Server.
Multiple licenses are limited by the number of available authorized licenses for concurrent access to the DrawingSearcher Server.
IP address licensing is also available.
Large installations can be served by either:
- increasing the number of concurrent user licenses, or
- by purchasing additional DrawingSearcher products and installing them on additional computer Servers throughout an organization
- … or … contact Docupoint for additional options.
Customer and Industry Testimonials
“I would hate to lose this tool it has proved to be an invaluable resource for us.”
“Having a software tool like DrawingSearcher means that the right drawing can be found easily and the issue – whether a large transformer or a small meter – can be resolved quickly.”
“When I produce an obscure drawing in a matter of seconds the reaction is nothing short of amazement on the part of the person looking for the drawing.” “The installation … did go without any hitches.”
Read more Customer Testimonials
“We're impressed by the innovative solution that Docupoint's DrawingSearcher provides for managing large archives of AutoCAD drawings. Your web-based search engine offers a 21st-century approach to handling the challenges associated with these files, and your ability to provide full-text search capabilities within AutoCAD drawings is truly remarkable.”
“DrawingSearcher is an extremely beneficial and useful tool for Chevron's Richmond, CA refinery. With its 1,700 workers and over 110,000 AutoCAD drawings, DrawingSearcher saves us time and money and allows us to search AutoCAD drawings as easily as if we were using Google or Bing.”
“We may push your software to the limits but we are convinced that this software is poised to be used by anyone/everyone who needs a document retrieval system and can't afford a full blown document management system. In order to do that it needs to be head and shoulders above the rest, which it is.”
“We were up-and-running with DrawingSearcher in less than an hour” …
“I wish ALL [our] users had DrawingSearcher so that they would have the ability to SEARCH thousands of existing drawings to retrieve and locate items such as: manufacturers, model numbers, quantities, etc.”
“Maintaining a Competitive Advantage: Using an AutoCAD Search Tool to Improve Customer Service.”
David Miesbauer, Systems Analyst, and Steve Gaston, CIO, Sierra Pacific Industries
“At Sierra Pacific Industries, we pride ourselves on both the quality of the products we make, as well as the service we offer to our customers. …”
Read more
“At Sierra Pacific Industries, we pride ourselves on both the quality of the products we make, as well as the service we offer to our customers. This is never truer than during periods of economic recession or stagnation. As anyone in the housing, construction and home improvement industries can attest to, the past few years have been among the most challenging in recent history. When there aren't as many new orders coming in, if construction companies choose not to go with customized products, and homeowners choose to put off home renovations, existing customers become even more important to a business' success. Providing them with exemplary, timely and professional service goes a long way to keeping current customers satisfied and a business' doors open.
For a company that makes custom doors and windows – highly detailed and specialized doors and windows – Sierra Pacific is fortunate to not only have great people meeting the needs of our customers, but to also have sophisticated technology on hand that helps our service centers improve service by reducing the search time it takes to find a specific blueprint from our AutoCAD archive.
Every product Sierra Pacific makes starts with a highly detailed computer-aided drawing (CAD) blueprint of the precise measurements, shape, size and design of the doors or windows the customer has requested. With close to 14 million such CAD drawings and 11 different service locations throughout the western United States, Sierra Pacific's service team needs to be able to access and locate specific drawings quickly and effectively. If they aren't able to, our service – and our reputation – are negatively affected. Given the need to quickly identify the right CAD drawing, Sierra Pacific utilized an AutoCAD search program, allowing a search that would otherwise take days - if not weeks – to take just a few minutes.
Before Sierra Pacific had an AutoCAD search program, someone from one of our service centers would have to physically search through each and every blueprint in the company's archive until they found the specific drawing that the customer needed. Finding this preverbal needle in a haystack was a cumbersome, timely and expensive prospect for Sierra Pacific, and our customer service suffered because of it.
By utilizing an AutoCAD search tool, our service team is a more nimble, responsive and effective department – one that is better suited to meet and address the needs of our customers and answer their specific questions about their Sierra Pacific products in a professional and timely manner.
Sierra Pacific has been using an AutoCAD search tool for close to 10 years, and continues to see enormous benefits from utilizing such a system. After examining all the different options that were on the market, we chose DrawingSearcher from Docupoint because of its functionality, ease of use and ability to quickly search and find AutoCAD drawings. Anyone who uses an Internet search engine like Google, Bing or Yahoo!, is able to use DrawingSearcher, which is accessible from any computer with an Internet connection. It lets us search for specific words or codes within our AutoCAD drawings so the service team can identify specific drawings for specific customers quickly and effectively. Docupoint has made accessing our AutoCAD archive of 14 million drawings much easier, enabling superior customer service by allowing us to better meet the needs of our customers.
Sierra Pacific continues to grow and our customers continue to rave about our highly specialized doors and windows. With a sophisticated AutoCAD search program, we can ensure timely and efficient customer service. What used to take close to a week now takes minutes, allowing us to give our customers the same level of specialized, customized care that they have come to expect from Sierra Pacific.”
What We Do
Docupoint's flagship search-engine software, DrawingSearcher, is known as “The Engineering Search Engine”.
Customers also refer to DrawingSearcher as: “FileFinder”, “FindMyDrawing(s)”, “FindAllMyDocument(s)”, “GoToDoc(s)”, etc.
DrawingSearcher has been sold to major corporations around the world. Docupoint, LLC is a privately held company headquartered in California's Silicon Valley.
Docupoint's management team brings significant industry and financial expertise to the development of DrawingSearcher. All Officers were associated with the prior business, which was founded in 1989, and have direct connections to Autodesk and AutoCAD dating back to 1982, as well as Microstation, Microsoft, Adobe, Oracle, etc.
Achievements
- Internet 2.0 Conference - “Best Companies Award”, In Recognition of Contributions To The Field of Technology
- Product of the Year, Information Technology Services
- “Best Corporate-Wide Search Engine” presented by “New World Report”
- Adopted new tagline: “The Engineering Search Engine”
- Docupoint, Inc. was Founded
Read more Achievements
- Announced support of BIM via Autodesk Vault(R)'s non-proprietary (temp) files
- Announced support Cloud via of AWS (Amazon Web Services)
- DrawingSearcher added to Autodesk Exchange
- DrawingSearcher booth at Autodesk University in Las Vegas
- Trademarks issued to Docupoint, LLC by U.S. Patent Office
- Docupoint, LLC purchased Docupoint, Inc.
Q. How can AI (ChatGPT/OpenAI or Claude/Anthropic or Google Gemini, etc.) be attached to DrawingSearcher to improve searching technical documents?
[Note: Docupoint uses “Programmed Intelligence” (PI) in its DrawingSearcher software (not “Artificial Intelligence” (AI)]
Read more
A. SaS (Service as Software) and not SaaS (Software as a Service) is the new direction being taken by DrawingSearcher users who are savvy enough to leverage their own custom tools, using DrawingSearcher as a back-end technical search engine. One way that AI can be attached to DrawingSearcher to improve searching technical documents is by using AI's natural language processing capabilities to understand and interpret user queries. AI is a large language model trained by their developers that can generate human-like text in response to user input. By using AI, DrawingSearcher can better understand the intent behind user queries and provide more accurate and relevant search results.
For example, if a user types in a query such as “I'm looking for technical documents about Valve #376-284,” AI can help interpret this query and generate more specific search terms, such as “valve installation locations” or “valve maintenance requirements.” This can help DrawingSearcher find more relevant documents and provide the user with more accurate search results.
Additionally, AI can also be used to provide users with more detailed information about the technical documents they are searching for. For example, if a user asks a question about a specific technical document, AI can use its knowledge of the document's content to provide a detailed answer. This can help users quickly and easily find the information they need within technical documents, making DrawingSearcher a more powerful and effective tool for searching technical documents.
Buy DrawingSearcher
After testing our Online Demo (above): Download the DrawingSearcher Software Demo and try in your own environment, for 30 days with a limited number of your own files - Free
Download DrawingSearcher$27/month per “Simultaneous User” *
DrawingSearcher is $27/month per “Simultaneous User” * (billed on an annual basis at $324/year USD)
* Each “Simultaneous User” is defined as those users signed in to use the DrawingSearcher App at the same time.
Better yet, buy the full version of DrawingSearcher knowing you have our 30-day no-questions-asked return policy
Buy DrawingSearcherContact Us
Docupoint LLC
Silicon Valley, California, USA
- Phone
- +1 408.859.9299
- sales@docupoint.com
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