XStudio Release Notes

Release notes include changes, enhancements and corrections by date and version number of XStudio. For information on less-recent changes and enhancements, see the Revision History.

Version 2.5.1.145 - 10/11/2008

1. Enhancement. An updated XEngine is included in this version, which adds support for .DAF file Analog Gain Trim. XEngine now adjusts the playback level of a cart according to the Analog Gain Trim value for the audio file.

2. Enhancement. Pending audit records are now persistent between sessions in XStudio. If XStudio is closed and there are pending audit records (like an audio item that is still playing), they are saved to a data file and restored the next time XStudio is launched. As an example, if XStudio is closed while a song is playing and then restarted before the song finishes playing, the audit data file will contain a record confirming successful airplay of the item when the song completes play. In addition, if the item came from the log, the expected check mark is displayed.

3. Enhancement. A number of dialogs have been updated to be more visually consistent in the XP and Vista operating systems. Included are the log item edit, registration, machine ID, password and about XStudio dialogs.

4. Enhancement. The Jump to Current Log Time button now uses the estimated airplay time rather than the next directive time when repositioning.

5. Change. When a log item is dragged and dropped to a different position the selected row is not changed, which conforms to common behavior among most applications. Previously, the moved item remained selected.

6. Fix. Under certain circumstances, a user editing the log by moving log items around could result in XStudio incorrectly playing the currently playing item twice. This problem could be triggered if the user dragged a log item located prior to an playing item and dropped it on the active item or if the user dragged the next-to-play item and dropped it on an active item. XStudio now makes additional checks to prevent the active item from becoming the next-to-play item in this situation. In addition, a new log status indicator (!!N+O!!) is now displayed if a user manually marks an active item as next-to-play to serve as a warning to the user that an active item has been marked as the next item to play from the log.

7. Fix. Improvements have been made to better handle stream error conditions when a user repeatedly attempts to play items on a playback deck that already has three items playing

8. Fix. A problem that occurred when running XStudio on newer Athlon dual-core processor machines has been corrected. On these types of machines, a log directive could be triggered and processed twice within 25 milliseconds. If the processed directive was a cast-off directive and the next directive on the log was also a cast-off directive, the effect was XStudio would skip the content between the two directives.

9. Fix. When appending an item to a log and the last item on the log had a time of 23:59, XStudio would allow an attempt to add a log record that requires a log time one minute later than the last item, creating an invalid log time of 24:00. Now, only items that can be appended to the log after 23:59 are allowed. These items are spot (cart) records and open avails.

10. Fix. If a user-defined log type was entered in dialogs that contain a log type, the manually-entered log type was not being limited to the 4-character maximum. Now, a user's manual entry is truncated to 4 characters if it is longer than is allowed.

11. Fix. A Play Cart Directive's product code and customer number information is now properly displayed on the log, if present in the log record.

12. Fix. When copying and pasting log items, the next-to-play item was not always updated properly. This has been corrected.

13. Fix. If a user manually edited the XStudio preferences file and changed a station number to a single-digit value or a value of more than 2 digits, XStudio would not correctly find a log file for a given station date. This scenario is now correctly handled, although manual entries of more than 2 digits are truncated to the first two characters.

14. Fix. If the host PC has more than 2GB RAM installed, the reported amount of available RAM was incorrect. On PC's running Windows 2000, XP and Vista, the correct amount of RAM is now displayed.

15. Fix. When previewing a printed report on-screen, context help would be inadvertently triggered if the user used [Right-Click] to reduce the size of the previewed information. Context help is now suppressed in the print preview displays.

16. Fix. When displaying the About window, context help was inadvertently triggered when attempting to open the pop-up menu that allows for printing and saving the application information to a file. Context help is now suppressed in the About display.

Version 2.5.0.140 - 07/21/2008

1. Change. A new installation program is now used that reduces the installer "footprint" and is simpler to use. When the new installation program is run and the previous XStudio installer is detected, it is uninstalled (after user confirmation), removing files that are no longer needed.

2. Enhancement. This version of XStudio introduces an all-new Preferences dialog. The preferences area has been completely redesigned, featuring a more logical organization of settings that is easier to use and understand. Some additional properties have been introduced, including a start-up Action, additional control over system event logging, back-up audio path and control over the frequency of inventory scanning when using a network drive as the primary audio path. See the Configuration section of the documentation for details.

3. Enhancement. The documentation has been completely re-written and is now up-to-date with current version XStudio features and functionality. The help documentation is now supplied as a compiled HTML file (*.CHM), replacing the older Windows Help format (.HLP).

4. Enhancement. The option to execute an Action at system start-up has been added. This Action is executed after XStudio has completed system initialization at start-up, right before attempting to play the log (if the feature is enabled and the operating mode supports auto-play at start-up). The start-up Action is set in Preferences on the General properties page.

5. Enhancement. Real-time cart number macro character conversion has been added. Cart number are checked for macro characters and automatically converted when playing a log element, executing a directive that includes cart playback, and in the Start Play and Stop Play tasks.

6. Enhancement. The Edit Spot Record and Edit Play Cart Directive dialogs now check the entered cart number to ensure that each character is valid for use in the cart number. Valid characters include: A..Z, 0..9, {, }, !, ##, %, ^, @, =, +.

7. Enhancement. Support has been added for the Load Window directive to set the current voice number. The relay number for setting the current voice is 99. Entry syntax in the Description field is "$xx". The entered voice number must be two digits and can be any combination of letters or numbers. Suggested Description entry for clarity is "Set Voice $xx".

8. Enhancement. The main display title bar now includes the current station in addition to the current mode of operation.

9. Enhancement. When importing cart categories (cart masks), the imported categories can now be optionally appended to the existing categories.

10. Enhancement. The hot button configuration dialog has been updated to allow using virtually any color combination for button background and text. Previously, colors were limited to a group of common colors.

11. Enhancement. Music database information can now be exported to the dcsTools Generic Format or Comma-Separated Values (CSV). All displayed song title and artist information is exported to the selected format.

12. Enhancement. The Open Log dialog has been updated for better performance. A number of other dialogs have also been updated for a more appealing appearance.

13. Enhancement. The inventory pop-up menu now has items for immediate playback of a selected cart to decks 2 and 3 (channels 2 and 3) in addition to the original deck 1 menu item. These additions make it easier to quickly audition a cart from within the inventory.

14. Fix. An error condition that could occur under certain circumstances when performing a log times fix-up has been corrected.

15. Fix. If the PC on which XStudio is running shut down unexpectedly as a result of a power outage or similar event, XStudio could fail to complete system start-up initialization when the system is restarted due to corrupted data that resulted from the unexpected shutdown. XStudio now properly completes system initialization if such an error occurs. However, depending on the type of data that was corrupted by the unexpected shutdown, the current log snapshot may not be available and the restoration of previous check marks for air play and time of air play might be incomplete.

16. Fix. When exporting a Log Validation report to file, the text had very narrow margins, resulting in a less-than-readable report. The exported report now formats properly when saved to file.

For information on less-recent changes and enhancements, see the Revision History.