Mining software major Runge has released XPAC 7.12, the latest update to its flagship scheduling software, which it says “continues a thirty-year record of expertise, leadership and trust.” Dr Ian Runge, who founded Runge in 1977 and still a non-executive director, pointed to the longevity of the company’s innovation. “XPAC is still reliable and still relevant and still compatible after all this time. How many other vendor relationships can truly be called ‘Life of Mine’?” Runge believes that it is the most sophisticated mine scheduling software available to date. XPAC 7.12 was released at the end of January 2012 and sports new 3D graphics and reporting features that Runge says “open a new world of data visualisation, along with significant user interface upgrades.”

“XPAC 7.12 has a new look, but it’s not just a facelift,” said Alun Phillips, Runge’s Product Manager for scheduling solutions. “It delivers some fundamental advances in scheduling software. The combination of accurate spatial data and powerful 3D geometry opens up some tremendous opportunities, and the new reporting tool cuts down hours of work to just minutes. XPAC has been the industry standard for some time now and it’s still the scheduling software to use when you want the job done right,” he said.” The keys to the improvement have been the inclusion of a completely new reporting engine and an injection of power and versatility to the graphics generator. The enhanced Analysis Reporting Module includes a pivot table based analysis tool that draws data directly from the mining model, including calendar databases, and via user-defined expressions. This is a significant benefit because the Analysis Reports Module understands the nature of the data and manages issues like weight averaged fields, resources and activities automatically. The updated graphics engine now associates 3-D solids with each database record, instead of the more traditional extruded polygons. The spatial accuracy of the new solids opens up many more possibilities. For example, users can now use a topographical surface or other triangulations to define the starting point of the schedule, by automatically assigning appropriate pre-schedule values.

XPAC 7.12 still retains the ability to make use of the older 2D graphics meaning users will lose none of the functionality to which they have become accustomed. The look and feel upgrade to XPAC 7.12 brings all the benefits of a modern interface, without the hassle of relearning command and function locations. Like a modern browser, XPAC 7.12 has a tabbed user interface, which gives the user greater control of more data sets. It is optimised for multiple monitors and adjusts its behaviour to make the best use of any monitor configuration. XPAC 7.12 also lets users personalise the workspace. “As XPAC has developed and more features have been introduced, we have done our best to provide a manageable collection of the most commonly used options in XPAC’s toolbars. Inevitably different users and different types of mines will use different parts of the application, so we’ve made the toolbars customisable,” said Alun Phillips. “It is now simpler for users to organise their own workspaces and focus on the data,” he said.