[Ann] CintaNotes 1.7 Beta 2

[CintaNotes Developer]

OK guys here goes the second beta, with all the fixes and even some new features!
This is the last beta before release which we plan for Monday!

Jul 6, 2012 - Version 1.7 Beta2

Differences from Beta 1:

Features:

• [Commercial] Related tag explorer mode on double-clicking a tag.
  In this mode, only tags related to the current tag selection are displayed. This mode makes it really easy to focus on what's important at the moment. To return back to normal mode, double-click on any tag again, or just select "All".

Enhancements:

• Add/Remove tags dialog: Remove tags field now only suggests tags which are present in the note.
  
• Selected notes are now more prominent.
  
• Crossed out tags are now less bright.
  
• Separator lines on tag sidebar are now tweakable with the following params in cintanotes.settings:
  "app.mainframe.tagsidebar.separators.letters" and "app.mainframe.tagsidebar.separators.topleveltags".
  
• First tag suggestion is now always autoselected, but to avoid problems while searching, accepting suggestions
  on spacebar now doesn't apply to the search box.
  
• Ctrl+DoubleClick crosses out all tags except the clicked one (to display notes having this tag ONLY)
  
• Alt +DoubleClick crosses out all children of a parent tag (to display notes having this parent tag but not having any of the child tags).

Fixes (bugs from 1.6.2)

• "Options/Startup/Run at system startup" might display wrong state

Fixes (bugs from 1.7 Beta 1)

• Crash on click in blank area of tag sidebar
  
• Tag search: wrong hierarchical tag highlighting
  
• Tag search: child tags were not found if "search inside words" was not set
  
• Accepting tag suggestion in the searchbox didn't update view
  
• Tag properties were not exported and imported via XML and .db
  
• Add/Remove tags dialog: Only bottom-level tags were removed
  
• Alt+Enter to open the properties window now works in editor
  
• Middle click on a tag on tag sidebar worked wrong (didn't toggle parent tags)
  
• Tag sidebar: Un-crossing-out child tags of crossed-out parent tags didn't work correctly
  
• Ctrl+BkSp didn't properly scroll selected tags into view on tag sidebar.

Huge thanks to all who have tried Beta 1, and even more - to those who have reported bugs!
Hope you'll enjoy the new version!
Thanks

[hey]

Not specific to 1.7 but I installed CN to C:\Program Files (x86)\SubFolder\CintaNotes , and noticed that although the licence key goes to

%APPDATA%\CintaNotes

the default database, settings and backup folder end up in:

%APPDATA%\SubFolder\CintaNotes

Is this a bug as I'd expect them to be in ?

%APPDATA%\CintaNotes

[Thomas Lohrum]

Alex,

here's my first impressions:

[Commercial] Related tag explorer mode on double-clicking a tag.
In this mode, only tags related to the current tag selection are displayed. This mode makes it really easy to focus on what's important at the moment. To return back to normal mode, double-click on any tag again, or just select "All".

Alex, is this a kind of relations explorer that i suggested? Whatever it is, it feels strange seeing the tag list jumping around, when you click on another tag. The list varies, when you click on another tag, but you cannot move back either, e.g. using ctrl+backspace. Yes, it shows related tags, but they're not presented as an hierarchical list. My first impression is mixed. It's nice to see the relations, but the presentation puzzles me.

Separator lines on tag sidebar are now tweakable with the following params in cintanotes.settings: "app.mainframe.tagsidebar.separators.letters" and app.mainframe.tagsidebar.separators.topleveltags".

WARNING: When i set app.mainframe.tagsidebar.separators.letters = 1 all my settings were broken. A desaster. Restoring the settings file didn't help. Luckily i was able to restore my database and settings file from a backup.

First tag suggestion is now always autoselected, but to avoid problems while searching, accepting suggestions on spacebar now doesn't apply to the search box.

Works fine for me.

Ctrl+DoubleClick crosses out all tags except the clicked one (to display notes having this tag ONLY)

Is there a bug? For example i ctrl+double-click a tag, that has four notes, but only one note is shown.

"Options/Startup/Run at system startup" might display wrong state

I confirm it's fine now. However, the same issue still is true for "start minimized". Though i use this option, the menu item is unchecked.

Alt+Enter to open the properties window now works in editor

I confirm Alt+Enter can now be used inside the notes editor and in the list view. Shift+Enter now opens a note and minimizes the main window.

Huge thanks to all who have tried Beta 1, and even more - to those who have reported bugs!

You're welcome.

Thomas

[Thomas Lohrum]

Bug: After you double-click a tag and then return to normal view, e.g. using ESC, the separator lines are gone.

[CintaNotes Developer]

Is this a bug as I'd expect them to be in ?
%APPDATA%\CintaNotes

Well actually this is a feature to allow multiple instances of CN to be installed into the Program Files folder and have individual settings. This however does not apply to the license, which in this case is shared, because otherwise instances located outside of Program Files won't find the license key.

[CintaNotes Developer]

Thomas, thanks for your comments!

Alex, is this a kind of relations explorer that i suggested? Whatever it is, it feels strange seeing the tag list jumping around, when you click on another tag. The list varies, when you click on another tag, but you cannot move back either, e.g. using ctrl+backspace. Yes, it shows related tags, but they're not presented as an hierarchical list. My first impression is mixed. It's nice to see the relations, but the presentation puzzles me.

Well, this is an attempt to mix your suggestion and this request. I found this to be a convenient feature, although you are right that the jumping tags are not good. Probably in the future some additional controls will be displayed, to 1) indicate that not all tags are displayed; 2) give ability to move back; 3) do a better job for keeping clicked tag on its place, so that at least the selection wouldn't jump when it's possible.
A simple question: is this feature useful as it is? Or should it be removed?

WARNING: When i set app.mainframe.tagsidebar.separators.letters = 1 all my settings were broken. A desaster. Restoring the settings file didn't help. Luckily i was able to restore my database and settings file from a backup.

I can think of nothing that could bring This looks like an encoding or Unix/Windows line ending issue.. Which editor have you used?

Is there a bug? For example i ctrl+double-click a tag, that has four notes, but only one note is shown.

It probably means that the other 3 notes also have other tags, but with Ctrl+DblClick you have crossed them out.

I confirm it's fine now. However, the same issue still is true for "start minimized". Though i use this option, the menu item is unchecked.

Could you tell how exactly do you use this option?
The "run at system startup" always uses the -m command line switch and is completely independent of this option. It only matters when you start CN by hand.

[CintaNotes Developer]

Bug: After you double-click a tag and then return to normal view, e.g. using ESC, the separator lines are gone.

I confirm, will be fixed in the release. Thx

[ChrisCN]

A simple question: is this feature useful as it is? Or should it be removed?

PLEASE keep it in - it is extremely useful for me as it is.
I see it as a 'drill down' possibility to get a fast overview. E.g. I double-click on the task/open tag and the tag-sidebar is reduced to all those projects that still have open tasks.

WARNING: When i set app.mainframe.tagsidebar.separators.letters = 1 all my settings were broken. A desaster.

This didn't happen when I played around with this setting!?

[Thomas Lohrum]

Well, this is an attempt to mix your suggestion and this request. I found this to be a convenient feature, although you are right that the jumping tags are not good. Probably in the future some additional controls will be displayed, to 1) indicate that not all tags are displayed; 2) give ability to move back; 3) do a better job for keeping clicked tag on its place, so that at least the selection wouldn't jump when it's possible.
A simple question: is this feature useful as it is? Or should it be removed?

Imo, this feature comes in hot. Introduced three days before public release. The feature is interesting, but the implementation is not matured. For example a double-click switches the view-mode, whereas ctrl+click, etc. affect filters. What if a user accidentally double-clicks? Will he understand what suddenly happened to his tags? There's no visual clue either, that a different mode was activated, e.g. using a caption. I'd prefer a shortcut to change view, e.g. Alt+F5 and an item in the views-menu. Your suggestions 1-3 surely would help to mature the feature.

As for hiding non-related tags, this should be a general option for the tag-sidebar.

As for my request of a "tag relations explorer" my suggestion is to show tags in a hierarchical tree, such as when explicit child tags are used.

Example:

• customer-A
  __project-A
  __project-B
  __projects
  __software
• projects
  __project-A
  __project-B
  __customer-A
  __software
• software
  __project-A
  __project-B
  __projects
  __customer-A

WARNING: When i set app.mainframe.tagsidebar.separators.letters = 1 all my settings were broken. A desaster. Restoring the settings file didn't help. Luckily i was able to restore my database and settings file from a backup.

I can think of nothing that could bring This looks like an encoding or Unix/Windows line ending issue.. Which editor have you used?

Both notepad and wordpad! Never had problems editing the settings file before. I closed my cn instance before editing the file.

I confirm it's fine now. However, the same issue still is true for "start minimized". Though i use this option, the menu item is unchecked.

Could you tell how exactly do you use this option?
The "run at system startup" always uses the -m command line switch and is completely independent of this option. It only matters when you start CN by hand.

I always start cn with windows start. In the registry "run" key, the "-m" switch is used. When i do a test, exit and restart cn it is not minimized. So i guess you are correct. It's WAD (works as designed).

[ChrisCN]

I noticed that if you are in 'related tag explorer double-click' mode an additional CTRL+doubleclick and ALT+doucleclick do not work as expected.
ALT+doubleclick -> also strikes out the parent
CTRL+doubleclick -> ends the 'related tag explorer' mode

[jaroet]

I like the tag explorer but I do think the hotkey is a bad one.
In every piece of software using some kind of tree (outliners, MS Word, TreeProjects, TreePad, Windows Explorer) the double-click means folding-unfolding the branch you are on ...

I agree that something like ALT-F5 or mayby a small icon at the end of the tagname would be a better solution for this.

[jaroet]

BUG : search is not working correctly ...

I have a person note about "Peggy". Searching for her starting with "Pe" does show the two tags that contain the "pe" but not the Peggy note. When I keep typing and add the g like "Peg" only Peggy is found and the two tags are gone (like they should becaus they do not contain "peg"). It looks like the search only searches for tags and when none are found only then also in the notes itself ... seems to me like strange behaviour.

Can anybody confirm this?

[ChrisCN]

BUG : search is not working correctly ...
Can anybody confirm this?

I can't.

I made three new notes:
1) peggy in the title
2) pergula as tag
3) pelaflora as tag

If I enter pe all three notes show up!?

Can you reproduce the problem with 2 or 3 simple new notes - if yes which one?
What are your options for the search? (Anywhere, Search inside words,...?)

[jaroet]

Never mind ...

Chris, thanks for testing this.
The tags are not really notes in my DB and I was expecing the "Peggy" note to show in the drop-down in the search field while it is presented in the list itself.

That is the problem with using different types of software that work just a little bit different. Sorry for waisting everbody's time ...

Jeroen.

[ChrisCN]

That is the problem with using different types of software that work just a little bit different. Sorry for waisting everbody's time ...

The main thing is, we could solve the puzzle.

[CintaNotes Developer]

Imo, this feature comes in hot. Introduced three days before public release. The feature is interesting, but the implementation is not matured. For example a double-click switches the view-mode, whereas ctrl+click, etc. affect filters. What if a user accidentally double-clicks? Will he understand what suddenly happened to his tags? There's no visual clue either, that a different mode was activated, e.g. using a caption. I'd prefer a shortcut to change view, e.g. Alt+F5 and an item in the views-menu. Your suggestions 1-3 surely would help to mature the feature.

I agree this was a kind of a hasty implementation, but the temptation was just too big, it being simple to implement and me knowing that another release will be only in September in the best case scenario..

For now, I've decided to do the following - the best what I can given the circumstances:
1) Add an item to the tag sidebar's context menu that would reflect the current mode.
2) Double-click won't switch the mode by default any more, it will be given back the meaning to unfold/fold the tree.
However an option will be added in the settings file to enable switching modes on double-click. Chris is right, this drill-down effect is just too convenient to leave out.
3) Implement keeping clicked tag on its place, so that at least the selection wouldn't jump when it's possible. (It could be done even better if
we would allow listing tags not from the top, but this is too complex to implement now).
4) Change shortcuts for strict tag selection, so that they don't involve double click: Alt+DblClick will become Shift+Alt+Click, and Ctrl+DblClick will be Ctrl+Alt+Click.

All in all, this seems to me to be a good and solid approach for introducing the feature in a relatively safe manner.

As for hiding non-related tags, this should be a general option for the tag-sidebar.

Do you mean that this mode should be remembered as a setting?

As for my request of a "tag relations explorer" my suggestion is to show tags in a hierarchical tree, such as when explicit child tags are used.

Yes, I know that.

Both notepad and wordpad! Never had problems editing the settings file before. I closed my cn instance before editing the file.

Can you reproduce this?

I always start cn with windows start. In the registry "run" key, the "-m" switch is used. When i do a test, exit and restart cn it is not minimized. So i guess you are correct. It's WAD (works as designed).

Good!)

[CintaNotes Developer]

I noticed that if you are in 'related tag explorer double-click' mode an additional CTRL+doubleclick and ALT+doucleclick do not work as expected.
ALT+doubleclick -> also strikes out the parent
CTRL+doubleclick -> ends the 'related tag explorer' mode

Chris, please see the message above where I talk about changing these shortcuts.

[CintaNotes Developer]

I like the tag explorer but I do think the hotkey is a bad one.
In every piece of software using some kind of tree (outliners, MS Word, TreeProjects, TreePad, Windows Explorer) the double-click means folding-unfolding the branch you are on ...

I agree that something like ALT-F5 or mayby a small icon at the end of the tagname would be a better solution for this.

Thanks for the comments! Please see my message above on the changes I intend to make.

[CintaNotes Developer]

The main thing is, we could solve the puzzle.

Nice, I like when problems get solved like this ) thanks Chris!

[ChrisCN]

Nice, I like when problems get solved like this ) thanks Chris!

Your welcome.

Chris, please see the message above where I talk about changing these shortcuts.

Seems reasonable to me.