It took less than a week for the first bug to show up. I have some UI changes that I’d like to make over the weekend, but I wanted to take the time to close this particular issue. The first bug was found in the field dedup option in the Add/Delete Field function. This option was rewritten to allow field deletion preference. The issue occurred when some data was left empty. This update corrects that issue, as well as adds one feature that I’ve been interested in having since starting the revisions — window transparency in MarcEditor functions.
So what do I mean by Windows Transparency? When you open MarcEdit 6 or 7 and load a file into the MarcEditor — if you select an option like the Add/Delete field tool — the tool window covers the Editor. Since the Editor is the owner, the tool window needs to be moved to see the data underneath. That bothers me. Here’s what this looks like today:
To get at the data under the window — I have to move the Add/Delete Field window — and if I use a smaller screen (and I do), this can mean moving to the edges of my PC. So, I added a new option to the Ease of Access section in the Preferences. You can enable window transparency, and when a window has an owner (not Modal — there is a difference — messageboxes are modal and stay on-top until some input occurs), the window will become transparent when not active. This allows you to see the underlying data. So, let’s look at this same example with transparency enabled.
Not that I can now see the underlying window data in the MarcEditor. Select the Add/Delete Field box again, and the window becomes active and solid. I can now shift between the two windows without having to move my dialogs, and that makes me happy.
To enable this new function, you simply need to go to the preferences, and select the ease of access section. There you will find the new transparency options.
Hopefully other users will find this feature useful as well.
You can download the new update at: http://marcedit.reeset.net/downloads or the program will automatically prompt and download the update for you.
This weekend, I’ll be addressing a couple UI issues I’ve encountered and will likely add a couple features that didn’t make it into the initial release.
Questions, let me know.
–tr