[Ann] CintaNotes 2.5 Beta 1

[CintaNotes Developer]

Hi all,
finally we've got a new beta for you It's a little rough on the edges, but still usable and thanks in advance
for helping us get it up to release-grade!

Nov 29, 2013 - Version 2.5 Beta 1

In this version:

Features:

• "Remarks" field
  Notes now have a new field "Remarks", intended to collect additional data on what is written in the main
  note body (which quite often is clipped from somewhere). The initial idea was just to rename the Link field,
  however after some careful consideration we've decided to leave the Link field as it was (save some
  cosmetic changes), because we consider it important to have one "main" note URL. The Remarks field
  adjusts its height automatically to accommodate multi-line remarks, however you also can increase its
  height manually with your mouse.
  The search filter now supports the new field, and also a new search mode has appeared: "Any Text Field",
  which includes Title, Text and Remarks.

Enhancements:

• XML import now supports XML files with UTF-8 encoding
  
• Upgraded internal DB engine to SQLite 3.8.1
  
• Notes list: Clickable link icons in note preview
  
• Notes list: Improved display of long hierarchical tags
  Now only the last part of the tag name is displayed by default, the full name is
  displayed in a tooltip when you hover the mouse over the tag.
  
• Tag deletion: provide option to also delete notes with selected tags
  
• New option in internet connection setting: "Use system proxy settings"

Fixes:

• Crash on linking notes
  
• Crash on trying to edit a certain note
  
• Intranet URLs were not recognized
  
• Program failed to respond to rapid mousewheel events
  
• Simplenote sync: constant "not completed, try later" when moving remote note to recycle bin
  
• Simplenote sync: deleted synced section appeared again after sync
  
• Simplenote sync: synchronization could constantly fail
  
• Sorting order could be lost for main section
  
• Text and paragraph formats could get corrupted on merging notes
  
• Unable to import XML with more than 3 sections even when "Import sections" was unchecked

Download:
Installable: CintaNotes_2_5_Beta1_Setup.exe
Portable: CintaNotes_2_5_Beta1.zip

[ChrisCN]

Thanks for the new beta.

I can confirm, that the bug which I reported here
http://roadmap.cintanotes.com/topic/302578-simplenotes-synchronisation-move-note-to-other-section-doubles-entry/
now seems to be fixed.

Best Regrads
Chris

[ChrisCN]

The Remarks field
adjusts its height automatically to accommodate multi-line remarks, however you also can increase its height manually with your mouse.

I didn't find a way to increase its height manually with the mouse!?

[CintaNotes Developer]

Hi Chris,

Thanks for the new beta.
I can confirm, that the bug which I reported [..] now seems to be fixed.

Great, thanks for checking this!

I didn't find a way to increase its height manually with the mouse!?

The lower edge of the note body field is movable.
Probably it would be better to make the upper edge of the Remarks field movable instead, or even both..

[Thomas Lohrum]

Hi Alex,

great to have a new version at our hands!

Some remarks to the new remarks-field

• Context-menu is missing, should be identical to "Link:"-menu
• insert time stamp (F5) should be usable
• a shortcut should be added
• though the TAB-order (tags->link->remarks) is correct, i'd prefer tags->remarks
• actually i'd like to have an option (ini setting) to hide/disable the link field entirely
• as for search scope i'll stick to "anywhere", because it does include tags, whereas "any text field" does not

However, most of all i need some advise on how to migrate my data! I've added remarks to the link field over the last year. Now, that a remarks-field is available as an entity on its own, i need to transfer this information to it. Any ideas?

Other aspects

• The changed display of hierarchical tags in the notes preview list is interesting. Still i need to get used to it. I didn't notice a change in the sidebar though. Maybe my tags are just to short.
• Alt+Arrow-down can be used to select the scope filter. This functions when used from the search field. It is not available, when the notes list has the focus. Not sure, if this is a bug in the beta. I thought i was able to use the key from there as well.

kind regards,

Thomas

[Thomas Lohrum]

I didn't find a way to increase its height manually with the mouse!?

The lower edge of the note body field is movable.
Probably it would be better to make the upper edge of the Remarks field movable instead, or even both..

I gave it a test. I confirm the height gets adjusted automatically when you open a note. Its height will not be saved, which is ok. Imo, the resizing feature does not need to get changed. It's fine to select the panel height by dragging it at the lower edge of the notes body.

Thomas

[Thomas Lohrum]

HTML Export

• The outer frame is a bit thicker for the remarks-field, which does not look smooth. The dividing rule between the notes body and the remarks field is all it takes.
• Another option could be to display remarks in italic, since formatting is not supported for remarks anyway.
• I'd like to have an option, not to export remarks, since they are private information most of the times. Having this option would allow me to export notes to provide to other people, without publishing my private thoughts (HTML export only).

Thomas

[Thomas Lohrum]

Export to Unicode-Text

Some remarks after running a test. Nothing of which is actually important to me right now.

• modification does not get exported
• remarks field does not get exported

I realized, that export to RTF could support formatting contained in the notes.

Thomas

[Thomas Lohrum]

Remarks-field

• Editing has a bug. When you delete all text from the field and exit the field, it will not be resized. It should be restored to display one line only.
• When i actually edited some multiline text, i automatically used Ctrl+Home/End. However, they are used as shortcuts already. This can be irritating. Still, i don't think it's worth a change, since i personally don't expect to use multiline remarks. Usually i have one line only.

Thomas

[Thomas Lohrum]

Export to XML

I exported all notes to XML, created a new database file and imported all notes back. I exported a second time. This time to another file. I compared the two files. I happily can report, that they are identical, except some minor formatting issues.

Thomas

[CintaNotes Developer]

Hi Thomas,
thanks for checking out the beta and for your comments!

• Context-menu is missing, should be identical to "Link:"-menu
• insert time stamp (F5) should be usable
• a shortcut should be added

Yes, all this will be fixed in the final version.

[*]though the TAB-order (tags->link->remarks) is correct, i'd prefer tags->remarks

I'm afraid this will violate UI guidelines. But we'll do it if there is someone else who'd vouch for this.

[*]actually i'd like to have an option (ini setting) to hide/disable the link field entirely

Making all link-related code conditional would be a bit too much for us now. There's quite a lot of it, especially in search. And the idea of a yet another option doesn't really strike the chord with me - that's going a bit into the 'bloatware-land'.
As it is now, it's quite inobtrusive, isn't it? Let's just let it be

[*]as for search scope i'll stick to "anywhere", because it does include tags, whereas "any text field" does not[/list]

Probably we should include Tags as well. Anyone against it?

However, most of all i need some advise on how to migrate my data! I've added remarks to the link field over the last year. Now, that a remarks-field is available as an entity on its own, i need to transfer this information to it. Any ideas?

That's actually not that hard to do using some SQL:
Open your db file in SQLite admin tool, then write:

Code: Select all

UPDATE NotesData_content NDC
SET c2remarks = (SELECT link FROM Notes where id = NDC.docid AND link NOT LIKE 'http://%')
WHERE c2remarks IS NULL;
UPDATE Notes SET link='' WHERE link NOT LIKE 'http://%';


But please backup your db first, as I haven't tested the above code all too rigorously.
Also instead of 'http://%' you can write any codition for which kind of links you'd like to remain in the Link field (if any).
If you just want to move the Link field to Remarks (thus losing ability to quickly navigate to the link using F7 or via clicking on the
link icon), just remove the condition altogether.

The changed display of hierarchical tags in the notes preview list is interesting. Still i need to get used to it. I didn't notice a change in the sidebar though. Maybe my tags are just to short.

There's been no change in the sidebar. The only change was in note previews. Especially tricky were tag search highlights, when part of the parent tag path matched..

Alt+Arrow-down can be used to select the scope filter. This functions when used from the search field. It is not available, when the notes list has the focus. Not sure, if this is a bug in the beta. I thought i was able to use the key from there as well.

Are you sure about this? I've just tested in versions 2.1 and 2.4 - it was not working (and there's no reason why it should, it was never programmed to work).

[CintaNotes Developer]

I gave it a test. I confirm the height gets adjusted automatically when you open a note. Its height will not be saved, which is ok. Imo, the resizing feature does not need to get changed. It's fine to select the panel height by dragging it at the lower edge of the notes body.

Thanks for your opinion!

HTML Export

• The outer frame is a bit thicker for the remarks-field, which does not look smooth. The dividing rule between the notes body and the remarks field is all it takes.
• Another option could be to display remarks in italic, since formatting is not supported for remarks anyway.
• I'd like to have an option, not to export remarks, since they are private information most of the times. Having this option would allow me to export notes to provide to other people, without publishing my private thoughts (HTML export only).

We'll fix the visuals, thanks. As for an option to not export remarks - this will require more work, but I'll think how to do it. Probably it will have to wait till 2.6 though.

[Thomas Lohrum]

• as for search scope i'll stick to "anywhere", because it does include tags, whereas "any text field" does not

Probably we should include Tags as well. Anyone against it?

To the user the tags-field is shown as a plain text-field anyway. Hence it makes sense to include it in the "Any Text Field" search scope. For performance considerations, one can control the behaviour through the "Search across field-boundaries" anyway. Yes, i agree. Include the tags field in the "Any Text Field" search.

However, most of all i need some advise on how to migrate my data! I've added remarks to the link field over the last year. Now, that a remarks-field is available as an entity on its own, i need to transfer this information to it. Any ideas?

That's actually not that hard to do using some SQL: Open your db file in SQLite admin tool, then write:

Thanks Alex. The code to actually make this work looks like this:

Code: Select all

UPDATE NotesData_content
SET c2remarks = (SELECT link FROM Notes where id = NotesData_content.docid AND link <> '' and link NOT LIKE 'http://%')
WHERE c2remarks='';
UPDATE notes SET link = '' where link <> '' and link not like 'http://%';


Maybe this migration step should be included in the next CN build, since it does affect other users as well.


Thomas

[Thomas Lohrum]

Alt+Arrow-down can be used to select the scope filter. This functions when used from the search field. It is not available, when the notes list has the focus. Not sure, if this is a bug in the beta. I thought i was able to use the key from there as well.

Are you sure about this? I've just tested in versions 2.1 and 2.4 - it was not working (and there's no reason why it should, it was never programmed to work).

Thanks for clarifying the issue. While running my latest tests i realized i am not able to search for non-empty fields. For example: show me all notes containing a remark, no matter what that remarks looks like. Actually this feature could be implemented by automatically limiting the search scope to non-empty values, when i select the appropriate filter. This would affect "Any Text field", "Text+Title", "Text only", "Title only", "Remarks" and "Link". In other words, if i select "Remarks", the result list would show me all notes where remarks has some value. A special filter is applied only, when i start typing some value.

Thomas

[Thomas Lohrum]

Search for "Anywhere" and "Any Text Field" does not find some old notes of mine. For example a search for "TEST" will not find a note, which contains "TEST" in the title. If i create a new note with "TEST" in title, it will be found. I exported to XML and checked the content, but nothing special i could consider the cause of this. It does work for other search scopes, such as "Text and Title".

After doing some more tests, it appears, that "Search inside words" is broken. If i turn it off, my note will be found again.

[01.12.2013 23:25]After editing/saving the note, it will be found again, even when "Search inside words" is turned on.

[02.12.2013 13:12]After exporting, creating a new database file and re-importing my data, the issue is fixed.

Thomas

[gunars]

Hi Alex

Here are a few comments that I came up with while trying out the beta (I'm still a new user to CN, so these may be known suggestions):

• Strip the revision markup from the license.rtf included with the beta (the one on the website is ok).

• I'd prefer the Tags and Link fields to be on separate lines as before even though it takes up a bit more room. I like to see as much of a link as possible.

• Add ctrl-O shortcut to open databases. In general, as much flexibility as possible in assigning shortcuts and hotkeys is always welcome.

• Add the 'All' message count to the section name in the tabs (e.g. "Clips (12)"). This would give a quick overview of how many items are in each section without having to visit each one.

• Make the confirmation box on a note delete optional (check box?). Since the note is going to the recycle bin, there's little risk.

• I know a more flexible color scheme is in the works. For now, is it possible to tweak the difference between a selected and unselected note? I have a hard time distinguishing them, especially when selecting multiple items.

Despite these suggestions, I very much like the simple, focused and well thought out interface of CN.

Thanks
Gunars

[Thomas Lohrum]

For now, is it possible to tweak the difference between a selected and unselected note? I have a hard time distinguishing them, especially when selecting multiple items.

I second this. I too have a hard time, recoginzing the active/selected note. I keep opening the wrong one by a 50/50 chance.

Thomas

[CintaNotes Developer]

To the user the tags-field is shown as a plain text-field anyway. Hence it makes sense to include it in the "Any Text Field" search scope. For performance considerations, one can control the behaviour through the "Search across field-boundaries" anyway. Yes, i agree. Include the tags field in the "Any Text Field" search.

I agree this makes sense. Will do.

Thanks Alex. The code to actually make this work looks like this:

Thanks for fixing the code. I was in a hurry and didn't test it well enough.

Maybe this migration step should be included in the next CN build, since it does affect other users as well.

We have already implemented this, however I've found that when URLs weren't recognized correctly, they were moved to Remarks, which was not what was needed. So for the time being, we move to Remarks only those Links which don't contain any URLs.

[CintaNotes Developer]

Actually this feature could be implemented by automatically limiting the search scope to non-empty values, when i select the appropriate filter. This would affect "Any Text field", "Text+Title", "Text only", "Title only", "Remarks" and "Link". In other words, if i select "Remarks", the result list would show me all notes where remarks has some value. A special filter is applied only, when i start typing some value.

I agree that the function to "display only having some value" is currently missing. However, there is one problem with your suggestion:
the negative queries will get broken. E.g. when limiting the search to links and entering "-cintanotes.com" I'd expect to see all notes coming NOT from cintanotes.com, including those without any URL.

An alternative would be to introduce some special symbol like "*" or "?" to mean "any non-empty content". This actually plays well with the planned Wilcard-based search.

[CintaNotes Developer]

Search for "Anywhere" and "Any Text Field" does not find some old notes of mine. For example a search for "TEST" will not find a note, which contains "TEST" in the title. If i create a new note with "TEST" in title, it will be found. I exported to XML and checked the content, but nothing special i could consider the cause of this. It does work for other search scopes, such as "Text and Title".

After doing some more tests, it appears, that "Search inside words" is broken. If i turn it off, my note will be found again.

[01.12.2013 23:25]After editing/saving the note, it will be found again, even when "Search inside words" is turned on.

[02.12.2013 13:12]After exporting, creating a new database file and re-importing my data, the issue is fixed.

That's strange because if SIW was off, it would be easy to guess that the FTS index wasn't updated.
But with SIW on, FTS is not used, a simple LIKE operator is used instead.
Could you maybe give me some stripped-down notebook to demonstrate the issue?