PIV started building custom real estate web sites using Jon Roig's OpenRealty software and our own PHP concoctions in 2001. That same year, the National Association of Realtors® mandated that all US MLS services must provide their membership with Internet Data Exchange (IDX) no later than January of 2002. In spring of 2002 we released the world's first commercially available integrated MLS IDX import/syncronization client and website solution written in PHP. Our PManager™ real estate website software was based around a very heavily modified version of Jon Roig's OpenRealty PHP software and later, incorporated features from Transparent Technologies' Open-Realty® (OR) v1.0 software. PManager was licensed as a complete turnkey product that enabled small development firms or even single developers to enter into the same playing field to compete with the larger MLS services "vendors". Our PManager software was harnessed by web site developers and their customers to create and deploy powerful IDX-enabled real estate websites at a fraction of the costs normally required. We eventually ported the IDX import/syncronization portion of PManager to be licensed for use with Transparent Technologies' OR software v1.1 through v1.1.5 with some limited success.
In late 2004, Transparent Technologies began finalizing an alpha version of their new entirely re-written OR v2.0 software which would use a new XHTML/CSS2 templating engine, and more importantly an add-on system so that developers would no longer need to edit the application's source code to extend or enhance functionality. Seeing an opportunity to leverage our experience with MLS services and IDX, and to further OR's development, we entered into negotiations with Transparent Technologies to provide them exclusive distribution rights to our new IDXManager™ add-on software and support for licensing with their upcoming release of OR v2 and beyond. Our IDXManager add-on software was well accepted by developers using OR v2, as well as their customers, and it continues to enjoy widespread usage. During this time PIV created many custom OR add-ons for various developers and their customers, and became more active in providing OR installation and configuration services.
In 2006 Transparent Technologies released their RETS MLS import client for OR - TransparentRETS™ which is a rapidly growing alternative to the IDX FTP method our IDXManager add-on software uses. Shortly afterward, PIV began providing consulting services for developers wanting to integrate RETS information with OR. We later dedicated a developer/support representive to Transparent Tech in 2007 to assist with day-to-day sales and support of our IDXManager software, and to assist with any other MLS import support issues.
In late 2009 Transparent Technologies announced to its development partners it would be releasing OR v3.0 to replace its aging OR v2.x software and would be further expanding its developer's interface by adding hooks and an API system. We continued to work closely with Transparent Technologies during OR v3's development and we released an updated version of our IDXManager add-on software in tandem with OR v3 in June of 2010.
Open-Realty's popularity, user-base, and feature set is increasing with every new release and we remain committed to providing competent and professional OR consulting, development, and configuration services.