The Web-based OrgPlus Live from HumanConcepts lets you design and edit org charts easily. The beta version I tried worked well despite a few minor bugs. Depending on who is charting what, however, a desktop version of OrgPlus may end up costing less.

The Flash-based OrgPlus Live works with Firefox 2.0 and with Internet Explorer 6 and 7 on the PC. It seemed happiest when running in tandem with IE (in Firefox, I experienced a couple of crashes). I made a quick 20-person chart by filling out the 13-box org-chart template, dragging and dropping the rest of the hierarchical chart boxes from the toolbar. I entered data for each chart box, which in my example was a person, in the left-side profile pane. I added data fields as needed and had little trouble moving boxes, searching for people by field criteria, and navigating a large chart by zooming and panning around the window. OrgPlus Live exports charts to Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint, and to Adobe Acrobat for hard copies.

For creating extremely large charts (OrgPlus Live currently supports up to 750 boxes), you can import data from a Microsoft Excel .xls or .csv file or the OrgPlus desktop software. The service starts at $10 per month for one person who works on a maximum of 50 boxes per chart. The cost rises as you enlarge your chart and as you increase the number of creators (or editors) participating. If one person creates large charts over a long period, the fuller-featured desktop software is more cost-effective.

OrgPlus Live does simple charting well if your needs are modest or short-term, or if you are an OrgPlus desktop user who simply needs to add a couple of remote editors.

-- Narasu Rebbapragada