This is our first major release for a while. The november 1998 release was slightly bugged and due to the
christmas break, there was no december 1998 release. The 4_7b release is beleived to be stable and
incorporates many useful bug-fixes and enhancements since the last official release.
Changes in this release in respect to RELEASE-981102 are as follows :
- Introduction of readlocks, which should prevent crashes with the infamous message
'blockload loaded a wrong block : xxx in place of yyy'
Readlocks prevent the destruction of data that another program is still working on.
A background script that updates the database, while a user is looking at some object,
will be prevented from clearing the outdated piece of the database that the
user process is still looking at. (by fw, rd)
More
- The busy cursor (watch symbol while program is busy) will only be set when really
needed now so this should put a a stop to the 'flickering' cursor that many people
have complained about. (by edgrif)
More
- Users will not see the hopelessly general message about "too many minor
errors" because it has been removed from the message-handler.
Such messages will now come from their point of origin (e.g. parsing ace-files)
and should be more informative. (by edgrif)
- Enhancements to the session control display and session management in general.
The new-style main window now has a 'Drop write access' option in the menu attached to the 'Save' button.
The above mentioned readlocks are now shown in the session manager display. (by fw)
- The fmap display used to crash with the mysterious message
'
graph not found in ^D »'^XC½#ð^?Þ#'
This and some more 'graph not found' bugs have been resolved. (by fw)
- Fixes in giface : (by edgrif)
display followed by quit used to crash giface.
More
- The dumping to postscript file from the gif submenu of giface now works,
probably no one has used this in the past. (
psdump command)
More
- The handling of version numbers
should have improved. (by edgrif)
Users will now see just one version string for acedb in windows and on the terminal of the form:
ACEDB Version 4_7b, compiled on: Jan 12 1999 13:41:39
A string of this format (at least the <number>_<number><letter> code)
should you need to refer to a specific version in bug reports.
The program version can also be enquired by using the unix command what
which is run on the actual executable, e.g.:
what /usr/local/acedb/bin/xace
- The developer documenation
has been given an overhaul, and cascading style sheets give a uniform structure. (by edgrif)
- Changes in AQL (not in version 4_7a) : (by fw)
- The keyword 'order_by' does no longer exist. The keyword has been split up into 'order' and 'by',
which means that 'order' can be used seperately (with asc or desc optional). This saves, having to
type out a list of columns by hand, as 'order desc' on a three column table will automatically
expand into 'order by :1 desc, :2 desc, :3 desc'.
- The object dereferencing method 'by position' is working a lot better now. It is now possible
to ask a query '
select ->1, ->2 from object ("Sequence", "AH6.1")'.
More
- The AQL error No 924 "Can't make variable copies" has been resolved. It is now possible to
ask a query like this '
select xx, yy from s1 in object(classX, objX), s2 in s1, xx in ...'.
The xx in yy iterator definition was not possible before. s1 and s2 are now two seperate iterators
over the same object.
Example
- Certain bugs can sometimes become apparent only on one operating system,
but another machine gets away with it without a crash. These bugs have been fixed
(which didn't break the code other operating systems) :
- LINUX: TableMaker used to crash in tace. (by fw)
More
- LINUX: The facility to default the print window to
colour postscript was lost in RELEASE-981102 (item 6)
to prevent a crash caused by this feature. It has been reinstated under Linux. (by fw)
More
- SUNOS: Any error-message during the initialisation would crash the system without a trace.
This was due to a difference in the C-library standards. The code now deals with it. (by fw)
This bug was introduced in september 1998.
- SOLARIS: Acedb running on solaris could potentially corrupt subclasses in a database that was created
onm a different system (ALPHA/LINUX) - fixed now (by mieg)
