Datatid 1998 #4/4-98 datatid cd-rom.iso/nyt/almanac/WHATSNEW.TXT

Text File | 1996-10-21 | 14KB | 330 lines

August 26, 1996

Version 3.5e of Almanac is distributeded as a maintenance
update to the 3.5 release.  It includes updates specifically
designed for the latest Windows platforms including Windows
NT 4.0.

            *    *    *


Welcome to Almanac 3.5!  This major update provides significant
new features to Almanac together with a host of improvements
and enhancements.  We've been delighted with the enourmous
reaction to Almanac from customers all over the world, and are
extremely happy to continue improving Almanac as the world of
computing advances.

We hope that you will enjoy this release just as much as all of
us at Impact have enjoyed producing it.  Please allow us to
take this opportunity to thank all of our customers for showing
their support by voting with their pocketbooks.  These
customers deserve our thanks and more, because without them,
updates like Almanac 3.5 would not be possible.  Our hats off
to you!

The rest of this document describes the additions and
enhancements to Almanac since version 3.1.  We hope that this
will help our current users identify the changes in order to
begin exploiting the new capabilities of this release as soon
as possible.


   Sincerly,

   The Impact Team

--------------------------------------------------------------


General Changes
===============

At first glance you will notice that Almanac's Tool Bar has
been upgraded with full-color tool buttons.  Open any dialog
box and you will see a 3 dimensional 'chisel' look provided by
Kyle Marsh at Microsoft.

Function key accelerators have been added for easy keyboard
access to most of the selections on the Window menu.  For
example, F5 will activate the Schedule Window, and F10 will
reset Almanac's window arrangement to the settings stored in
your calendar file.

A significant across-the-board enhancement to Almanac is the
addition of time zone information to all time-of-day events.
Whenever you enter a time-of-day in the definition of a
Schedule, To Do, or Overlay event, by default it will be
recorded as occurring in the time zone of your current Point
Of Reference (set via Options.Location...).  You have the
ability to select a time zone when you define or edit any
entry.  This provides several new possibilities.  You can
change your location in Almanac as you travel and always have
the correct local time for all of your events.  Perhaps you
work at a company that has offices in more than one time zone.
Almanac will allow common schedules to be distributed to all
locations without any need for manual adjustments to consider
local time differences.

New custom controls have been created to accept the entry of
dates and times.  These controls appear in the dialogs that
define overlays, appointments, and to do items.  They are
designed after the popular drop-down combo controls.  Each
control includes and 'edit control' component which acts
exactly as the previous edit controls for these fields.  A
drop-down pushbutton allows access to a graphical data entry
panel that can be used by both keyboard and mouse users to
navigate to the date or time they desire.

And last but not least, we have significantly improved and
enhanced Almanac's online Help.  We hope that you will find it
to be one of the most informative and useful sources of online
assistance found in any Windows application.

Here is a list of many of the specific areas that have been
improved or added in Almanac version 3.5:


New Overlay Features
====================

1. Overlay entries may now optionally have a time-of-day
associated with them.  The information is used primarily for
display - the time values cannot be used to set alarms or
reminders or such.  They are used to format the display of the
event just as a schedule item would be displayed, as well as
to insert the event into a display list in the appropriate
sequence designated by its time-of-day.

2. When a time-of-day is assigned to an overlay event, the
user can also specifiy the time zone that the event occurs in.

3. Overlay entries may now be assigned a Listing Priority.
This information is used to give the user control over the
order that events will be displayed should multiple items fall
on the same day.  The listing priority is a value that is used
as a 'weight' when displaying multiple events.  Entries which
have a time-of-day assigned to them are always sorted by time
in the display list, however the Listing Priority still
provides a way to control the order of multiple events which
have the exact same time-of-day assignment.

4. Appropriate types of overlay definitions now include
special weekend processing allowing the event to be placed on
the Friday before or the Monday after a weekend.

5. The operation of the Options.Overlays... dialog has been
updated to execute requests immediately while remaining open
to process as many requests as are desired.  The 'Create',
'Add', and 'Remove' pushbuttons have been replaced with the
more familiar 'New', 'Open', and 'Close' operations.


New Scheduler Features
======================

1. Time zone support has been added to the Scheduler tool.
Appointments that you entered with an earlier version of
Almanac that did not support time zone tracking will be
calculated as occurring in the time zone that you specify for
your system clock (set in Options.Locations...) unless they
are updated (edited) using the new version.

2. The Scheduler tool window scroll is no longer limited to
midnight-to-midnight scrolling.  The scrollbar will provide
normal scrolling action throughout the hours of the day.  When
the scrollbar elevator box reaches its topmost or bottommost
position, a subsequent tap on the appropriate scrollbar arrow
will reset the scroll bar to the previous/next day and
continue scrolling.

3. Events may now be defined across midnight.


New Phonebook Features
======================

1. The drop-down combo control used to select an entry in the
Phonebook has been enhanced with scanning logic that will
position the Phonebook to the first matching entry as you type.

2. The individual address fields (street, city, etc...) are
now combined into one, complete address entry.  This will
allow the entry of any address format around the world.
Existing phonebook records will display their address
information as before in the Phonebook tool window.  If
required, the address may be edited and reformatted to a style
appropriate to a location outside of North America.

3. Labels appropriate for each phone number entered are now
available. Existing phone entries will default to the old
Office, Home, Fax, and Other labels.  You can insert any label
p to 11 characters in length for each phone number.

4. Several modes of phone dialing are now available.  The
Options.Phonebook dialog now allows you to choose a DEFAULT
dialing style.  The choices are Dial Using SmartDial, Dial
Exactly As Entered, and Preview Numbers Before Dialing.  Each
phone number entered into the Phonebook can be set to use your
current default dialing mode, or you may select a specific
dialing mode as described above.  SmartDial can be used in may
locations in North America that use 3 digit area codes that
must be dialed for long distance calls and cannot be used for
local call.  It logically strips the area code before dialing
a phone number in your own area code.  Dial Exactly As Entered
does just that.  It dials a number without any type of editing
for outside line or long distance access codes or area codes.
Preview Numbers Before Dialing will provide a popup dialog box
when you request Almanac to dial.  It allows you to select
either of the first two dialing modes, or edit the number as
required before dialing.

5. The Phonebook now attempts to remember which entry to
position itself at when you switch between Individuals and
Organizations, and when you close and reopen it.


New To Do Features
==================

The To Do tool has been updated to support the same time zone
capabilities described for Overlays and the Schedule tool.


New Notes Features
==================

Depressing Shift-F5 while the cursor is positioned in the text
area of the Notes window will insert the current time and date
into the text.


New Search Tool
===============

A new tool window has been added to allow all the searching of
any information stored within Almanac.  A tool bar button with
a familiar picture of a magnifying glass provides easy access
for mouse users. The Search window has four pushbuttons to
control the search operation. Selecting Where... invokes a
dialog that is used to specify the scope of the search.  You
can select which areas of information to scan, and include a
time range for limiting the scan of events that occur on
specific dates.  The Find button will initiate the scan of
information, looking for the text that you enter in the Query
edit control.  Two checkboxes next to the Query field allow
you to control the case sensitivity and whether you would like
to match on complete words only.

When a Find operation is performed, information that is found
during the search is entered into the bottom listbox.
Selecting a 'found' item and either double-clicking or
pressing Enter will cause Almanac to proceed to that entry.
When this occurs, the Search tool window will be moved away
from the found item and collapsed to show just the pushbuttons
and allow you more viewing area.  Selecting the Reopen button
will re-expand the Search window to its original size.

The time range that is entered into the Where... dialog will
be saved between sessions, and will 'float' as time
progresses.  So for example, if you perform a search across
information from two weeks ago through three months in the
future, and then you return to do another search after a week
has passed, the search range will reflect appropriate dates
for a period that is two weeks in the past through three
months in the future.


New Export/Import
=================

An Export/Import... selection is now available on Almanac's
File menu.  This ivokes a dialog that will allow you to select
what data you wish to work with and whether you want to import
or export the information. Once a data type and operation are
selected, a dialog will be presented to you displaying all of
the available data fields associated with your selection.  You
may choose the fields that you would like to work with and the
order you want them to appear in the CSV file that is being
imported or exported.


Enhanced Day View
=================

The calendar day view now displays the current 'focus' that
can be moved from the date at the top of the display through
the Scheduler and To Do areas of the display.  This allows
keyboard access to all items when using the day view.
Pressing the spacebar will recall the current item for
editing.  If the focus is set to the current date displayed
at the very top of the day view, a new overlay event can be
entered by pressing the spacebar.

The Almanac section of the day view now includes the local
time and azimuth of moonrise and moonset.


Enhanced Month View
===================

1. Any event that is displayed on the month view may now be
accessed for editing by simply double-clicking on the text of
the event.

2. Clicking the right mouse button over a date cell on the
month menu will invoke a popup menu that contains the
selections Enlarge Cell, Day View, and QuickEdit.  When the
Enlarge Cell option is selected, the date cell will be
expanded to four times its normal area, similar to
depressing the action provided by the keyboard SHIFT key.
The date cell will remain expanded until the mouse cursor
is moved outside its boundary.


Enhanced Location Handling
==========================

1. Almanac includes up-to-date information for over 50 world
time zones.

2. Pushbuttons for New, Edit, and Delete operations have been
added to the Options.Locations... dialog.  Customizing your
location data base is a snap.  All you need to supply is the
location name, its latitude and longitude, and select the
time zone!


New Metafile Generation
=======================

A "Print To Metafile" selection now appears on Almanac's File
menu.  Selecting this option and Almanac can print either a
month or year calendar to a Windows meta file on disk or to
the clipboard.  The output is targeted towards your current
printer and page layout settings, allowing presentation
quality calendars to be inserted into your word processing
or page layout application.


New Jewish Calendar Features
============================

1. A pushbutton on the Oprions.Calendar... dialog labeled
Jewish Setup... provides access to a second dialog for
configuration to individual tastes and observances.
Currently, the names of the months may be edited, and you may
select to display the candlelighting times on Friday and
Saturday evenings.  The times are displayed in the top of the
monthly date cells with appropriate candle symbols.

2. A new overlay event type now provides the option to display
Rosh Chodesh on the calendar.  This type of event only needs
to be defined one time for any given calendar.  It will cause
Rosh Chodesh to be calculated and displayed for every month.

3. The Birthday and Yahrzeit event types have been enhanced to
designate if the event took place after sunset, and will cause
the original event and all subsequent observances to be
displayed on the correct day of the week.