Doug Aaberg previewed this new Carlson Software Learning Management System (LMS) at our workshops last year and Carlson has finally released it! And, the best part is that Carlson Academy will be available right from the Help menu in Carlson 2020 programs and is free for up-to-date users.

Carlson Academy is a collection of modules and training courses for most of the Carlson desktop software programs. The lessons include both written and video tutorials covering features of the software and also many command-specific tips and tricks.

Doug provides a great introduction to Carlson Academy here and the rest of his blog is fantastic as well!

As mentioned above, you do need to be current on your software in order to access this fantastic portal. You can call 919-417-8351 or send an email to request pricing to renew your maintenance or upgrade to the latest release.

It’s been several years working with the same general format so we’re changing it up in 2019!

We are once again going to have western NC workshops in Hendersonville and Statesville in November and will visit eastern NC in Raleigh in December; but, we’ll have 3 days on each end of the state! Click here to see the whole lineup of software training for surveyors & engineers.

Day 1 – 2019 Carlson Workshops for Surveyors & Engineers – This is a full-day of demonstration and presentation type training for $99. All attendees will be in one room with presenters rotating in and out for different topics. Attendees will receive 8 PDH credit hours.

Topics will include:

• Overview of SurvCE
• Avoiding Pitfalls with Data Processing in Carlson Software
• Network Least Squares traverse adjustment with SurvNet
• Surface Modeling with P3D Topo
• CadNet 101
• Carlson Tips & Tricks

♦ Tuesday Nov 12^th in Hendersonville NC ♦ View Announcement ♦ Register Here

♦ Tuesday Dec 10^th in Raleigh NC ♦ View Announcement ♦ Register Here

Day 2 – 2019 Carlson Workshops for Surveyors & Engineers – This is another full-day of demonstration and presentation type training for $99. All attendees will be in one room with presenters rotating in and out for different topics. Attendees will receive 8 PDH credit hours.

Topics will include:

• Overview of Carlson GIS
• Down & Dirty Data Transfer
• Processing Drone Data with Carlson’s Photo Capture and Point Cloud Basic software
• CadNet 101
• Surface Models, Profiles & Utility Networks with Carlson Civil & Hydrology

♦ Wednesday Nov 13^th in Statesville NC ♦ View Announcement ♦ Register Here

♦ Wednesday Dec 11^th in Raleigh NC ♦ View Announcement ♦ Register Here

Day 3 – 2019 Hands-On Carlson Workshops for Surveyors & Engineers – This is a full-day of hands-on training for $250. There will be 3 rooms with different instructors and different topics to be covered. Seating is limited to 15 max per room and you will be reserving one seat in a particular room – you will not be able to move from one room to another during the day.

Attendees will receive 8 PDH credit hours.

You will need to provide your own laptop computer with Windows 10 installed. We will provide a 30 day trial serial number for you to use. See announcement for further details.

• Room 1: Jennifer DiBona will teach Surface Modeling, Basics to Advanced
• Room 2: Mark Long will teach Subdivision Design, layout and roadway grading
• Room 3: Doug Aaberg will teach Survey Processing with Carlson Survey, traverse adjustment and field to finish

♦ Thursday Nov 14^th in Statesville NC ♦ View Announcement ♦ Register Here

♦ Thursday Dec 12^th in Raleigh NC ♦ View Announcement ♦ Register Here

I’m late posting this but, several months ago, Carlson announced a welcome addition to their desktop software “bundling” options.

Prior to this announcement, users only had options of buying individual modules or one of two different Carlson Software bundles: Carlson Civil Suite which includes Survey, Civil, GIS and Hydrology or Takeoff Suite which includes Construction, CadNet, GeoTech and Trench.

But, now? Now you can create your own Select Suite of 2, 3, 4, 5 or 6 different modules and receive discounted pricing for the original purchase and the annual maintenance. The modules available in the Select Suite are: Survey, Civil, GIS, Hydrology, Point Cloud Basic and CadNet.

All the modules come with an included license of IntelliCAD or can be installed on top of your own, separately purchased license of AutoCAD. The modules can also be shared as a network license if needed.

Psssttt… All Carlson products still include a perpetual license agreement so, if you like your software, you can keep it!

REGISTRATION is now open for Carlson’s next user conference in Portland Oregon in April 2020!

Carlson’s user conferences are truly about the users and offer rare opportunities to meet, greet, eat (and drink!) with Carlson’s development and support staff. Looking forward to seeing you there at Go West 2020!

The Bad News: Carlson Software announced last week that they will be increasing the cost of maintenance renewals as of 9/1/2019. The Carlson Software price for maintenance is going up! (View this as PDF)

The Good News: The increases will only apply to licenses for which the maintenance has expired.

Putting your licenses on maintenance is still completely optional (and won’t affect access to Carlson’s free tech support) and the annual cost to renew CURRENT maintenance will still be 10% of the retail price of the software. But, after Sept 1, the cost to renew EXPIRED maintenance will increase from 5% to 10% for each year that license is out-of-date.

Here’s an example… Renewing maintenance now for a license of Civil Suite 2016 that has expired will cost $987.50 (25% of retail price of $3,950) but, after 9/1/2019, will cost $1,580 (40% of retail price of $3,950). By renewing maintenance you will receive an immediate upgrade to the 2019 version of the software plus you’ll receive 2020 when it’s released in a few weeks.

So, if you have accidentally, or on-purpose, let maintenance on some licenses lapse, now’s the time to consider renewing. Please call or email to request pricing!

Carlson’s Year-End Specials were announced on November 1st and there are a couple surprises this year! You can purchase from our online store or contact us directly for a custom proposal.

Carlson Civil Suite or Pick 4 Bundle with maintenance thru 9/1/2019

Carlson Survey with embedded AutoCAD (OEM)

Carlson Takeoff Suite with maintenance thru 9/1/2019

Carlson has now released Carlson Survey 2019 with embedded Carlson AutoCAD (OEM) earlier this week. If you have recently purchased a new license of Survey 2018 OEM or upgraded to this product, you MAY be eligible for a free upgrade to 2019. Please email me to find out if your purchase qualifies.

FAQ: What are the latest improvements in Carlson Software?

Also, Survey 2019 with embedded Carlson AutoCAD (OEM) is one of the products included in our end-of-year sale! View the product in our online store

We tried something new at last year’s Carlson training workshops… having one day of “Overview” and another of “In Depth” topics. We got a lot of great feedback on the format so we’re repeating that again this year. We have the same team together but we’ll be presenting new and different topics than last year. Also, as much as possible, we will avoid showing any of the same content on day 1 and day 2 so attendees see all new information both days.

Cost is $99 per day but will have an extra $10 late fee assessed approximately a week before each event. Lunch is included and each attendee will receive a certificate showing 8 hours credit for each day of training attended.

Registration links can be found here: www.thatcadgirl.com/workshops. See below for more details…

Overview of 2018 Carlson Software Training Workshop for Surveyors, Engineers and Contractors
11/14/2018 in Statesville NC   or   12/12/2018 in Raleigh NC

Topics include:

• Overview of 2018 Carlson Desktop Software including Survey, GIS, Civil, Hydrology, CadNet & Precision 3D
• Best Practices for Surface Modeling in Carlson Software
• Processing Drone Data with Carlson’s Photo Capture & Precision 3D

In-Depth with Carlson Software
11/15/2018 in Statesville NC   or   12/13/2018 in Raleigh NC

This year we will have two concurrent sessions to choose from:

Room 1) ​In-Depth ​Carlson ​Survey ​with ​Doug ​Aaberg, Jennifer DiBona & Jeremy Taylor

• Survey Project Start to Finish
• ​Overview of Field to Finish
• Staking Tips & Tricks with Survey and SurvCE/SurvPC

Room 2) ​In-Depth ​Civil, ​Hydrology ​& ​Precision ​3D ​with ​Mark ​Long & Scott Griffin

• Subdivision design with LotNet and RoadNet
• Storm and sanitary sewer design and sheet production
• Site layout, grading and sheet production
• Overview of Precision 3D Hydrology

Carlson Software released the 2019 version of their desktop software yesterday and it is now available for download here. You can review the list of improvements here.

The following modules are included in this release: Programs of the Carlson Civil Suite 2019 (Survey, Civil, Hydrology, GIS), Basic Mining, Geology, Underground Mining, Surface Mining, Natural Regrade, Field, programs of Takeoff Suite (CADnet, GeoTech, Trench, Construction) and Point Clouds. The program can be installed on AutoCAD 2010-2019 or with included Intellicad 9.0 and will run on 32- or 64-bit Windows 10, Windows 8, Windows 7 and Vista Professional operating systems.

A Carlson 2019 Serial number is required for installation and users with an active maintenance agreement can look up your upgraded serial number here. (NOTE: Installing Carlson Civil Suite 2019 with your upgrade serial number will cause your old version to become inactive in approximately 60 days)

If you’re not a current Carlson user or would prefer to use a 30 day trial serial number, please click here to submit your request.

If your maintenance has expired or you’re not able to generate your new 2019 serial numbers, please send me an email or request a proposal for your custom pricing.

Carlson Software released the Carlson 2018 version of their desktop software about a month ago but, as I usually do with all new software upgrades, I’ve waited for the first new Build to come out before jumping into it completely.

You can click here to download the 10/4/2017 Build of 2018 and here to see the list of improvements in 2018. This is the “for CAD” version of the software that includes IntelliCAD 8.2 and can be installed on top of AutoCAD versions 2010-2018.

If you are current on your maintenance plan and Carlson training, you can visit this page and use your 2017 serial number to retrieve your 2018 serial number.

If your maintenance has expired or you’re not able to generate your new 2018 serial numbers, please send me an email or request a proposal for your custom pricing.

The 2018 version of Survey with embedded AutoCAD (OEM) can be downloaded here.

The 2018/R10 version of Takeoff with embedded AutoCAD (OEM) can be downloaded here.

Click here to download a Carlson training PDF of improvements in Takeoff T10.