Changes from DFA V1.2 to DFA V2.x ================================= DFA V2.0 took longer to complete than I expected by myself! First I planned to publish it in September 1993, then I noticed that some features were lacking (i.e. Prefs program:-)) and I delayed it to end of 1993 (i.e. December). Well --- even if all features had been implemented until this date, the program was not tested at all until then and even worse, the documentation was just nonexistant. So I decided to delay the release still further to be able to do a good beta testing job and to have the time to write the documentation. Until the release I implemented (nearly) no new features and were able to concentrate on bugfixing and minor enhancements. A list of the most important features may be found below. The documentation was not such an easy job as I'd have liked it! First I thought it would be possible to use large parts of DFA V1.2x and add only the preferences program. It turned out however that I could only reuse very small parts of the old documentation and most of it had to be written from scratch. This was even worse as the documentation should come not only in german but in english as well! After hours (well let's say dozends of hours or even more!) I completed the german documentation (took several weeks of non continuous work) and noticed that the size of it has doubled compared to V1.2, so it is about 100 pages (TeX) now! The translation into english was not so much a hard but quite a boring job. I managed it to make it a bit shorter than the german documentation, but it's still about 90 pages. As you can see, the functionality and amount of features must have been increased quite a lot in DFA V2.0. All features are discribed in detail in the documentation! A very short summary is given here: - Extended client server mechanism. DFA consists of a server, an editor and a preferences program. - All program parts that are used by more than one of the programs mentioned above have been exported into a shared library, the 'dfa.library'. - Every address can get up to 8 group flags, which makes it possible to select the addresses you want to get displayed. - The Arexx port has been rewritten from scratch, using the Arexxbox V1.12 by M. Balzer. Several new functions have been added and some of the existing ones have been improved. - The main window is no longer closed and opened again, if you resize it. The layout calculation in this window has been optimized as well, so it looks much better now. - The buttons at the right side of the main window (V1.2x) have been put into a tool icon row (V2.1). - The listview that displayes the address list can be configured in several ways: You can not only tell DFA which fields you want to get displayed, but you may even tell how much of the available space you want to use for this field AND and in which of the up to 8 columns this field has to be displayed - The text gadgets near the buttom of the main window (V1.2x) have been replaced with a listview, called the panel listview. This solution is much more flexible than the text gadgets. You can not only tell DFA which fields you want to see within the up to 16 lines, you may even change the lines' title to fit your needs. - Two new fields have been added: c/o and state. Especially the state field may be very useful in countries that either need this particular information OR are used to place their ZIP/PC behind the city name. - Every address item now may have one external file attached to it! This may be used to store additional information that would not have enough space within the usual address fields. - The search function got improved funtionality: Now you may toggle each field to be searched through. - The dial function was rewritten from scratch and has much better functionality now: You may dial the active or all marked entries, you may use programs like the 'getty' at the same time, as DFA now supports the 'OwnDevUnit' library, The dial function got its own window (no longer a simple requester) that give you much more information. You may set the number of retries and a redial delay. The modem status as e.g. 'BUSY', 'NO DIALTOME', etc. is detected as well. - The load and most of all the save routine have been rewritten from scratch and are much faster now. - The internal memory usage for the storage of address data has been optimzed, which means that you now need less RAM to store your addresses than in DFA V1.2x, in spite of the new address fields! - The usage of memory pools sped up some parts of DFA noticably and decreases memory fragmentation. - DFA is able to supply a simple network mechanism that makes sure that several people that use the same address file within a LAN do not overwrite each other's changes of the address file. - The one preferences window of DFA V1.2 was replaced by a separate DFA preferences program (10 windows). This does not only mean that you may start this program seperately (even if no other part of DFA is running), but there are much more settings you may change: - Autosave behaviour - Icon generation can be toggled - The address listview (see above) - The panel listview (see above) - The groups' names and shortcuts - The fonts, i.e. you may either use the system's default fonts or select the fonts of your choice. - Additional modem settings, incl. the possiblility to toggle the usage of the 'OwnDevUnit' library. - Important path and file names used by DFA: I.e. the default address file, the directory for the external files as well as the ASCII editor and the ASCII viewer used for the external files. - The arexx commands that are bound to the function keys. - The sorting. I.e. your address can be sorted by any field you wish now. - Last but not least the complete DFA distribution comes along with 8-color MagicWB icons by Martin 'XEN' Huttenloher. DFA V2.1 ======== - DFA is an SASG product now. According to this fact you may enjoy all advantages that come along with the SASG. For detailed information, please see the registration/information programm that comes along with this distribution. - The quite ugly, seperate toolbox is gone. Instead of this you'll find a beautiful gadget panel inside the DFAEditor main window. - New "secret" mode for the status texts of the DFAEditor. - French locale support - Several bugfixes, especially the "bug" that caused DFA to crash on some systems (68000/Kickstart 37.xxx) is removed. By the way this problem was caused by a bug in the gadtools.library!