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This document lists all the releases of OS4XL in reverse chronological order – most recent at the top.

This document basically lists the “What’s New” and “Known Limitations” for each release

What's New

There are many significant new features, enhancements and defect fixes included in this release. For this reason and to reflect the fact that we probably should have pushed out some minor releases in the period since the last release, we have bumped up a couple of minor version numbers.

There are many new features and defect fixes included in this release. Please refer to the below for the main changes. There may be other changes that are not listed below.

· New “Configuration Wizard” will run at first application execution and guide the user through the initial setup of the Application Options so that the application will work correctly. This Wizard can also be run at any time from the “Tools” main menu

· New “Application Tips Wizard” will run (when configured) to show a new tip at random.

· New “eMail Protocols” – now both SMTP and MAPI eMail protocols are now supported, meaning those with direct access to internet (outside Firewalls) and SMTP server credentials can fully-utilise all email functions. The email properties are set from the “Tools-Options” menu. Look at the “eMail Config” tab. Note that your password is encrypted when stored on the local hard drive as part of the configuration file.

· Improved Communications Functions: Numerous information “Communication”enhancements: there have been significant changes to the three functions under the “File->Communicate” menu.

o “Smart Email DataSheet” and new functions and/or options are implemented (NOTE: the ColorCombo editor does not render correctly in HTML output just yet)

o New options and functionality implemented in the previous “Publish GridView to Webpage” which is now renamed “Smart Publish GridView”. Refer to AppSheet User Functions Reference Manual Part 2A

o The “Send by Email” function is now removed and its functionality is now merged with “Smart Email DataSheet”, or provided by the new function “Email FileList”

o New function “Email FileList” provides one-step emailing of all files referenced by a FileList via email, in one of a number of modes. Also refer to the New ListSheet functions provide easy methods to merging FileList information with email addresses.

· Developer Capabilities (Enterprise Edition Only)

o Fully documented Script commands in both Command Helper and Developer’s Manual

o All Script commands are included in the Help file.

· File Management

o Simpler functionality in the “File->Open” process: all available file types are now in the main “File->Open” function. The “MsExcel Files” submenu still exists and works, but it is now redundant and will be phased out

· Tools:

o New “Integrated eMail Client” has been introduced to support the numerous eMail functions implemented in this version. Refer to the User Interface Overview Manual or the OS4XL Help File. More documentation and functionality in this Dialog will be released separately in the near future.

· DataSheet View: extensive updates and minor improvements including:

o New “DataSheet Join Filter” filter that works similarly to a DataSheet join. This function “slaves” the filtered rows in one datasheet to the filtered values in a column in a different datasheet.

o New “Color Combo” editor for representing Colors as data, for example RAG Status “Traffic Lights” that are common in reporting and project management applications.

· ListSheet UIView: extensive updates and additions to this view including:

o Numerous List functions including a whole suite of “Set” operator functions like Join, Difference, Intersection, Superset etc

o New List Management functions such as “Merge Lists” and “Split List” enable rapid evolution and pruning of List contents

o Rapid data tagging and mapping using the “Map Entry Values by ListSheet” and “Map List Values by DataSheet” functions.

o ListEntry Grid improvements, including

§ GridColumn Popup menu for “Search and Replace”

§ New Selection function: “Power Column Selector”

§ Grouping of the ListEntry grid by List Entry properties, as per DataSheet GridView

§ Filtering of the ListEntry grid by List Entry properties, as per DataSheet GridView

§ New or improved Column Functions:

· “Copy Down this Column”: to copy values from the current ListEntry to the end of filtered or selected entries (or all entries if not selected or filtered)

· “Fill Down this Column”: to fill down values, as above.

· “Clear Down this Column”: to fill down values, as above.

· “Compare Column References”: compare what values are in what list.

· “Copy ListEntry Properties”: to fill down values, as above.

· “Split ListEntries”: to parse values in the selected ListEntry property for a defined delimiter string, and create new entries for each parsed value

§ List Editor Options for Variant Properties: The “Value” property and the “Min” and “Max” value properties are defined as “Variant” properties, in that they can store any value. Now you can select the editor for these properties to suit your application. Available editors are:

· Date/Time

· String

· Integer

· Float (Extended)

§ Simple DataView selection: you can now select from a variety of pre-defined DataItem Views (i.e. selecting which properties are visible in the Entry and Properties Views. Or you can choose to display all properties.

§ List Properties editor: as with DataSheets, you now have an editor in which you can view or change the persistent properties that are stored with each ListSheet.

o Many defect fixes and other tune-ups

o Quick create of html-formatted lists, both Ordered Lists (<OL> tag) and Unordered Lists (<UL> tag) which are copied to the clipboard, for paste to other editors such as MsWord. Creation of plain text lists is available for pasting into Web pages and forms and other editors.

· New or Improved DataSheet Functions:

o New “Shift Stacked Category” function that can help when data and categories are contained in the same column, as is often found in formatted reports. This function enables you to identify the categories in a number of ways, such as blank values in another column (e.g. another data column), or particular text values. The category values are shifted to another column so that they can be used for grouping and other purposes.

o New option for “Join DataSheets” is the Cartesian Join, where a full cross product join is performed on selected values.

o New “UnPivot” DataSheet function combines many steps to convert column-based periodic data into a transaction sheet, including removing the artefacts of static Pivot Tables from excel (i.e. Pivot Tables that are distributed without their underlying data). You can use this function to convert a static Pivot Table back into the underlying transaction data that was used to generate it in the first place.

o Improvements to the “Create New List from Column Data” in the DataSheet UIView: now this function can create simple lists of values from the selected column, either as text lines followed by Carriage Return or as a single-line of values separated by an arbitrary (user selected) delimiter.

· MsExcel Get Data enhancements:

o The MsExcel “Get Data” function handles the new “Color Combo” column editor, automatically detecting cells that have been given a colour but no value. The detection and acquisition of Color values as data in the “Color Combo” editor is selected by default, but can be disabled.

· MsExcel Put Data enhancements and defect fixes:

o “Put Data” also handles the new “Color Combo” column editor, so that cells are formatted with the Background color of the Color Combo Cell

o Corrected an existing defect related to Long Strings during the “put” process. Previously, strings longer than approx 910 characters had to be truncated or else the “put” would terminate due to an OLE error. A fix has been implemented that now enables strings to be output up to the maximum length for your version of MsExcel.

o Optimisation and simplification of a number of the “Put Data” options

· New “Paste Grid Elements” function available in the “Edit” menu, which pastes the current content of the clipboard and attempts to parse the value into either a ListSheet or a DataSheet. Currently parses plain delimited text and Html-formatted content as would be obtained by the “Ctrl-C” function in most applications. In cases where the data can be parsed, it is a simpler function to import data to a ListSheet or DataSheet than some other methods.

· Improvements to the FileList Builder Dialog:

o File List zip/compressed format: the FileList now supports zipped archive files and will decompress these to a temporary directory before processing

o “Quick Search” you can perform a quick search of the Windows Shell for files using a popup dialog from the FileList Builder

o “Expand FileList” function so that you can test the expansion of the FileList configuration on the fly.

o New Patterns – several new dynamic FileList patterns have been implemented along the lines of “All Except xxxx” where xxx is a condition such as “Most Recently Modified”. This is useful

o Windows “Shell Notifier” can be instantiated for FileLists. For example, you can initiate an Shell Notifier to alert you when new directories are created, files are saved etc. There are 20 event types that can be instantiated. This is useful if your FileList is configured to collate the most recently saved files in a set of directories and you want to see when files have been saved.

o Windows “File Operations” can be performed on all files in a FileList expansion in one hit, for example you could copy all but the most recently saved file from a directory to an archive directory as soon as it is saved, by combining a Shell Notifier with a File Operation.

· Improvements to the Documentation:

o Many additions to the documentation have been made to provide more insight and explanation on key features.

o A complete restructure of the documentation set has been made to decompose a number of large manuals into their functional elements as separate manuals. This will make it easier in the future to update and distribute only changed manuals, as well as introduce new documentation in a modular fashion.

Please refer to the included application help and documentation.

Known Problems and Limitations

This version of the software contains the following known problems and limitations:

· “Smart eMail GridView” Color editor limitation: the “Smart eMail GridView” function currently does not export the background color for the published HTML page, but exports the color value instead. As a workaround, use the “Smart Publish GridView” function and then email the resulting pages via the “eMail FileList” function.

· Loading: occasionally a runtime exception can occur when first running the program. A “Loading” box shows whilst this is happening, followed by an error message. The cause of this problem is unknown, but it can be cleared by restarting the application.

Other defects will be listed in the Online Support Center: Support Central: https://d9.fogbugz.com/

What's New

· Additional shortcuts to help, support and multi-media instructional information

· Updated AppSheet Scripts command helper file

Known Problems and Limitations

This version of the software contains the following known problems and limitations:

· File List zip/compressed format: the FileList does not currently support zipped archive files, even though these files can be referenced in the configuration screen.

· Loading: occasionally a runtime exception can occur when first running the program. A “Loading” box shows whilst this is happening, followed by an error message. The cause of this problem is unknown, but it can be cleared by restarting the application.

· Developer Manual and Support: the documentation for the AppSheet and OS4XL specific VBScript command extensions is not yet completed. The documentation is distributed by way of a small Xml file that is installed in the main application directory, plus an updated Developer Reference Manual. This will be completed within a few days.

What's New

This version of the software is the base version of the software, so users should approach this as a completely new package, even if you have been using the beta version.

Please refer to the included application help and documentation.

Known Problems and Limitations

This version of the software contains the following known problems and limitations:

· File List zip/compressed format: the FileList does not currently support zipped archive files, even though these files can be referenced in the configuration screen.

· Loading: occasionally a runtime exception can occur when first running the program. A “Loading” box shows whilst this is happening, followed by an error message. The cause of this problem is unknown, but it can be cleared by restarting the application.

What's New

This version of the software contains many new features.

· Licence Protected - this is the first version that includes licence protection.

· Numerous updates and additions.

Please refer to the included application help and documentation.

Known Problems and Limitations

This version of the software contains the following known problems and limitations:

· Beta Software: this version is a Beta release and therefore will contain some incomplete functionality and may not have been tested fully to remove obvious defects. This version has been used in pre-release live operational scenarios but may still have defects that affect execution reliability or data integrity. It is recommended that backups of data be kept.

· File List zip/compressed format: the FileList does not currently support zipped archive files, even though these files can be referenced in the configuration screen.

· Loading: occasionally a runtime exception can occur when first running the program. A “Loading” box shows whilst this is happening, followed by an error message. The cause of this problem is unknown, but it can be cleared by restarting the application.