Panorama X 10.2.0 b31 Build 4223 Release Notes

[admin]

A new Panorama X version is now available. If you’ve already installed 10.2 b30 (and I sure hope you have), you can simply choose Panorama>Check for Updates to install this update. If Panorama isn’t currently running, it will automatically offer to download b31 when you launch PanoramaX. If you haven’t installed b30 yet, you can simply go to www.provue.com and download it and install it manually (just download the trial).

The big news in this release is a major makeover for the Help window. Be sure to visit the revised Panorama Help Wizard help page to see the exciting new features, including searching within a help page.

This release also includes a major change to the Web Browser object (which is used by Help, Video Training, Charts, and Check for Updates), several changes to help manage a Panorama X Server, and of course a variety of small bug fixes and enhancements.

• The Help window has a major makeover in this release. Each page now has an interactive table of contents that makes it easy to jump directly to any section, even for very long help topics. You can also search within the content of a help page to find a word or phrase. It’s now possible to use a full formula search to filter the topic list to find the exact help page you need. To accommodate long formulas, the search area can be expanded to the full width of the page. The Help window also now displays estimated page counts of the selected help topics, to help you judge whether you need to further filter the topic list.
• The Video Training wizard now plays back video correctly when running macOS 13 Ventura.
• The Web Browser object now supports Apple’s modern WKWebView framework when Panorama is running on a version of macOS that supports that framework. This enables faster web browsing, and protects Panorama itself from malformed web content (Panorama won’t crash even if the web browser does). Note: This change to WKWebView fixed the video playback issue and also enabled several of the new features in the Help window.)
• The Web Browser object now supports enhanced customization and bridging between Panorama and JavaScript. The Panorama/JavaScript bridge is now fully documented, please see the new Web Browser Programming help page.
• Use of the objectaction statement with Text Editor, Text List and Matrix objects is now fully documented. See the help pages for Text Editor Programming, Text List Programming and Matrix Programming.
• The new containsword operator checks for the existence of a word. This is sImilar to the contains operator but only matches complete (not partial) words.
• A form object with no Data item specified no longer creates an empty fileglobal variable. This would cause assigning to «» to fail.
• The Preferences window has a new Favorites panel. This provides an alternate way to modify the favorites, and also allows you to copy and save the favorites as text (for backup).
• Panorama X Server now includes a built in jsonstatus url that is designed for use with a monitoring service like UptimeRobot. See the Installing and Launching Panorama Server help page to learn more.
• The Site License Payment panel now has a Current Account Usage button that displays a dialog showing the usage of Panorama during the current period, including server usage. This can help with predicting when a payment is needed to replenish your Panorama X account.
• Panorama X Server now has a 3 day grace period for web publishing. If the account balance falls to or below zero, web publishing will continue to work for an additional 3 days.
• Web developers can now customize the error pages that appear when various types of errors occur. This includes code errors as well as problems with the Panorama account (low balance, etc.) See the Web Error Pages help page for details.
• The new function serverstatus( returns a dictionary describing the current status of Panorama X Server. The status includes the up time, server name, and account status (whether or not a payment is required). The intended use for this function is to create a custom monitoring URL.
• The Join statement is now allowed in a shared database if serverupdate is set to OFF.
• Text List objects have a new NoFocusRing option. When this option is enabled, no focus ring will appear around the Text List object when it is active for keyboard input.
• The new tweakobject statement modifies the dimensions of an object (or multiple objects).
• The new FormulaTokenCount( function returns the number of tokens in a formula (or zero if there is a syntax error).
• Panorama will never create a variable with an empty name. Previous versions would do this, in particular if the field/variable associated with a form object wasn’t specified. The symptom was that «»=value assignments would not work, nor would the cell statement.
• The sum( function now works correctly in arraybuild, formulafill, select, etc.
• Fixed use of ENTER as a hot key. This also fixes the ENTER key in dialogs.
• Fixed the ability to change the font size in GetSuperText dialog.
• Fixed SuperGetText so that it will correctly terminate when the Return key is pressed if the text area is 1 line height.
• Fixed the SuperGetText vertical scroll bar option.
• MatrixClick no longer bounces out with an error if you click on a matrix that is not in a foreground window.
• New info(“activeobjectid”) function (does the same thing as the info(“focusobjectid”) function.
• The selectreverse statement now sets info(“empty”) to true if the database had all records selected.
• The menu( and submenu( functions no longer output extraneous tabs and ¬ characters.
• Updated the list of Panorama 6 statements and functions that are not implemented in Panorama X.
• Documentation corrections from Peter Newble, David Thompson and Jim Cook.

[designer]

The black video screen I was getting for the free training videos (May 2022) now renders correctly.

[JohnB]

Just reading B31’s Help Wizard to learn more about its changes, no other window open, while running Ventura 13.1 I’ve had at least 4 “Panorama unexpectedly quits.” May be something unique to my system.
Nice to have objectaction documented for TLO, TEO and Matrix objects. I don’t know whether Apple makes it possible, but would be nice if for TDOs, with Allow Text Selection checked, could have objectaction within their limits. IIRC it works with copy. Would be nice if you could via code, get or set selection ranges therein similar to TEOs.

[admin]

@JohnB

Just reading B31’s Help Wizard to learn more about its changes, no other window open, while running Ventura 13.1 I’ve had at least 4 “Panorama unexpectedly quits.” May be something unique to my system.

I’m guessing you “right clicked” without realizing it, it’s now been discovered that this causes a crash.

[nanajana]

I downloaded PanoramaX_4226.app. It didn’t install - I had to drag it to the Applications folder. It is non-functional. Won’t open my main database. Please advise.
Monterey 12.6. Still have Pan v 10.2.0.b32, thank goodness.

[admin]

@nanajana

Still have Pan v 10.2.0.b32, thank goodness.

I’m pretty sure you mean you still have b31.

It didn’t install - I had to drag it to the Applications folder.

It installs automatically when the download is complete, so this probably means that it didn’t fully download for some reason. That would also explain why it wouldn’t work. You should probably throw that version in the trash. Since you still have a working copy of b31, you could try the “Check for Updates” window again, or you could simply manually download the latest version from the www.provue.com web site.

[nanajana]

Apparently the downloaded file updated the older Pan. It’s not an updated app itself. Is that what happened?

The working one says 10.2.0.b32 (4226), 130.3MB, and Panorama X Pro. I guess this is the updated version. And I should delete “PanoramaX.app” 10.2.0.b30, 127.8 MB which apparently was just an updater? Is this right? Please excuse my lack of knowledge.

[admin]

@nanajana

Is that what happened?

Unfortunately, I cannot see what is on your computer - I could not see the steps you followed and I can’t see the files on your computer. So I do not know what happened.

@nanajana

which apparently was just an updater?

I can tell you that there is no such thing as an “updater” version of Panorama. That simply sounds like an older version of the app. You should throw that in the trash.

@nanajana

The working one says 10.2.0.b32 (4226)

I don’t know what “says” means. Is that the name of the app? Did you see that in the About Panorama window? If the working one is a file named PanoramaX.app and it shows that version number in the About Panorama window, then your good to go. You should make sure that is in the Applications folder, that it is named PanoramaX.app, and that it is the only copy of PanoramaX.app on your computer. If there are any others somewhere else on the drive, you should throw them in the trash.

Here is how the Panorama updater works:

• First, it downloads the latest copy of PanoramaX.app to a temporary location.
• Then, it quits the currently running copy of the app.
• Next, it deletes the copy that was just running.
• Finally, it copies the new copy of PanoramaX.app from the temporary location to the location where the running copy was. Usually that’s the Applications folder, but if you put the previous version somewhere else, the updater will use that location instead.