New TreeSheets BETA! (windows)
Wouter
release for all you adventurous people:
http://treesheets.com/Treesheets_Setup_BETA.exe
This has been tested a fair amount, but some features are brand new,
so crashes are not impossible. This version also writes files that
cannot be loaded by older versions, so please backup your treesheets
files before trying it out.
There's a LOT of new functionality, have a look at the history below,
or at the newly overhauled tutorial which should cover most of them
(in the advanced features section).
Feedback on bugs, but also on usability issues are greatly
appreciated!
Builds for the other platforms will follow as soon as this BETA is
declared stable.
Wouter
-------------------
2010-02-21:
- Grid borders can now be rendered with round corners. The "roundness"
can be set in the options menu.
- Added "tags". Tags make cell texts that are used repeatedly easier
to assign, recognize, and keep consistent. See menu edit/tags.
- Added "Toggle Grid Below/Next to Text" (F7) for yet more flexible
layout possibilities
- Added "Hierarchify" and "Flatten" operations that simplify data
portability between TreeSheets and spreadsheets
- Added export to "CSV" format.
- Added "Hierarchy Swap" (F8) operation (see tutorial)
- Added "Wrap in new parent" (F9) operation to easily create new
hierarchy (works on any selection)
- Added "filters" (see View menu). A filter forces all cells not
included to be shown as 1 pixel characters in lighter grey,
so its easy to focus visually on whats important in really large
TreeSheets files. Currently, there's filters for the search
results, and for a % percent of last edited cells. This feature
works because TreeSheets now records the last edit time for
each cell. Since older TreeSheets files do not have this
information, it may take a while of editing before this feature
becomes useful.
- Completely reworked how columns are sized. Now every column in a
grid simply has a character width which can be resized by
SHIFT+mousewheel as before, instead of the clumsy per cell
linecount. Column width is shown in the statusbar.
Resizing affects the column(s) spanning the current selection, and
any grids inside of it. Layout is quicker and more
predictable. Default column width is 80 characters, so you may have
to resize some old treesheets files.
- When zooming in, now shows you the "context" of what you're looking
at in light grey text (the text of all the parent cells)
- Added "Open File" (F4), which loads a filename in the associated
application (paths relative to where the .cts is stored).
- Improved the UI to be more like other applications and more
consistent. Primarily, the scrollwheel and PgUp/PgDn now
always work the same, without modifiers they scroll, with CTRL they
zoom, with SHIFT they change text size, and with
ALT they change column size.
- Support for scrollwheel scrolling horizontally (on mice that support
it) has been added (NOT TESTED).
- fixed bug where "replace" could loop indefinitely if the replacement
string contained an occurrence of the search string :)
- Tabs are shown on the left by default (change in options)
- small improvements to the builtin programming language
- Option for faster line rendering (useful if you have very complex
sheets, or lots of 1 pixel text)
- text rendering is lots faster on windows now
- linux bug related to unicode keystrokes workaround
- linux now has wxwidgets 2.9 statically linked, so doesn't require
that to be installed anymore
hrizzy
features!
hrizzy
I've uploaded my remarks in New version test.cts
Waiting for the Linux version :)
Regards,
Anton
Wouter van Oortmerssen
Anton,
> I've uploaded my remarks in New version test.cts
> Waiting for the Linux version :)
Thanks :)
Sadly, TreeSheets is not that well integrated with email
conversation yet, so I will reply in text, for the benefit of
others:
> Highlighting the cell while moving the cursor
That has always been in there, but only works correctly on windows, sadly.
> F9 (Wrap in parent) - simply great!
> F7 (Layout alternative)!
> Column size change works great.
Glad to hear :)
> Highlighting the line while moving cursor around - this disturbs
greatly on large number of cells
I wonder if anyone else has that experience?
> The right button context menu becomes tooooo long to be used as
a context menu
I may need to put some items in sub menus, yes. TreeSheets has too many
features!
> Really need the ability to jump to parent cell from child (or
visa versa) from keyboard
See ESC and SHIFT+ENTER in the selection sub menu.
> A button to add/remove filter near search textbox would be great!
I agree... though not sure I want to clutter up the toolbar more?
> Would like something like Goto Tag... then select a tag from
list then go to the first occurence of tag
Try F6... it should work great on tags.
> Any possibility of Copy and Apply Format (like in OOO Writer or
MS Word) feature? So I could copy format from one cell and apply it to
another
Format painter... noted.
> Hierarchy Swap feature could be useful for somebody, but too
many constraints. For example it doesn't work on Features or UI cell if
AAA cell is in place
Indeed, it tells you that it needs a 1xN or Nx1 grid. On NxN there's no
clear
sense on how you'd like the reorganization to happen: its important for the
usefulness of the feature that information doesn't get lost.
> Options -> Roundness of grid... - no checkmark on current value
Noted
> F8 (Hierarchy Swap). This crashes on the swap of the top cell in
hierarchy or the swapped cell is dissapeared.
Really? Not so for me. Can you give me an exact description of keys to press
on a certain sheet to reproduce this?
> Flatten doesn't work for a cell in a cell. For ex. I can't
flatten if I select Features (parent) cell here
if I select "These things I didn't... understand or I need" an do
flatten, it works
as expected. is that the cell you mean?
> Hierarchify is not working on this cell as well
Hierarchify is only supposed to work on cells that contain NxN grids.
TreeSheets gives hints about the use of features in the status bar, both
before
you use the action (when hovering over it in the menu) and if there was
any problem. I find this less intrusive than constant popups. But maybe
people are missing these?
> Autosave adds + sign to the file name on the window description
and tab description and breaks both. For ex.: I have two files opened
now. tutorial and this one. After some changes autosave feature saves
file, adds + to the tab description and window description but... now I
suddenly have two tutorial files in both opened tabs.
That should not be possible... can you be more precise about what happens?
are the actual contents of the window both the tutorial, or just the name on
the tab? What exact sequence of steps produces this?
> Can't scroll with mouse or PGUp/PGDown after applied filter.
Have to drag scroll bar or choose another cell.
Not happening here. Again, an exact sequence of actions on a particular
treesheet
(with a particular window size, selection, and scrollbar location) would
help.
> Edit -> Tag -> Set Cell Text to tag menu item doesn't work.
It says "Use CTRL+RMB".. Should I make that "Right Mouse Button" for
clarity?
> If the are cells on the right , using Hierarchy Swap for
Features tag will put a new "Hierarchy Vew" to the most right, leaving
all this cells in between. It could be better if a new cell will be
inserted right after this
Where to insert the new cell is indeed a matter of debate, and I would love
to hear more opinions about it. Currently its always at the end, I am
personally
thinking it should be at the front, since it is your new "focus". I am
not sure
putting close to the current selection makes sense, as it pulls the
contents for
"Features" from thruout the grid, and often which one is selected is
just whichever
was closest, and not necessarily meaningfull.
If those in-between cells are not part of this structure, they should
maybe be
in a separate grid?
Wouter
David Lynch
JennyB
On Feb 28, 6:37 pm, Wouter van Oortmerssen <aardap...@gmail.com>
wrote:
> Anton,
>
> > Autosave adds + sign to the file name on the window description
> and tab description and breaks both. For ex.: I have two files opened
> now. tutorial and this one. After some changes autosave feature saves
> file, adds + to the tab description and window description but... now I
> suddenly have two tutorial files in both opened tabs.
>
I've had this problem too, but have not been able to reproduce it
reliably. Here is a reproducible bug that may be related:
Open two files and make changes to both.
Click on the X to close the entire program.
Choose 'Discard Changes' in the first dialog box shown
Chose 'Cancel' in the second
The cursor now seems to follow the structure of the closed file, not
the one still displayed.
Wouter van Oortmerssen
Thanks. Though I am not sure if it is "simple", as it involves a
completely new
language concept beyond what is already in TreeSheets :)
But yeah, something along the lines of XSLT would be cool.
Wouter
Wouter van Oortmerssen
Just found this one, which was rather odd. For some reason wxWidgets
can keep a pointer to the old tab around, and sends mouse/keyboards
messages to it... fixed.
Unrelated to the other bug.
Thanks for reporting.
Wouter
Wouter van Oortmerssen
Also found this bug:
>> > Autosave adds + sign to the file name on the window description
>> and tab description and breaks both. For ex.: I have two files opened
>> now. tutorial and this one. After some changes autosave feature saves
>> file, adds + to the tab description and window description but... now I
>> suddenly have two tutorial files in both opened tabs.
It was luckily benign, i.e. the names on the tabs/window would get confused,
but the contents of the document was not affected, and it would still save
under the original name.
Should be fixed now.
Wouter
JennyB
On Feb 25, 4:24 am, Wouter <aardap...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Another major release is coming up, but first, I have a BETA of this
> release for all you adventurous people:
>
Some quick thoughts:
Rounded corners look good, and make it easier to select a cell that
has a grid but no text (it took a while to discover the "double-click
on a line" feature). I'm not sure if 6 levels of roundness are really
necessary.
Tags, Hierarchify, Flatten etc. are all welcome additions, but what I
really need is the ability to tag structure by colour rather than by
text, so that it is visible at a glance. Rather like the "Mark as" on
the Program menu, but with the ability to define your own. (More on
this some other time).
I'm not convinced by filters. I think to be useful they will need to
be more dynamic. One idea might be to have a filter to show only the
first line of children of the currently selected cell. That might
provide some of the function of a standard tree view without a lot of
unnecessary state.
At present, if you filter on current search, and then change the
search text, the filter does not change. Is it possible to have it
change as the text changes, instead of the red highlight? If not, then
a button next the search box.
I don't find the filter on edits to be helpful at all. Some programs
put up a list of undoable actions, but that doesn't fit Treesheets
well. Since you are maintaining a list of edit times, why not just a
variant of Control-Z that steps back to the previously edited cell,
but does not undo any other action? Control-Z at that point would undo
the action on that cell, while leaving latter edits intact.
The new column width control is a great improvement. I can now load
large text files into Treesheets and work with them straight away.
Thanks!
The new controls are a much more consistent too. Unfortunately,
horizontal scrolling doesn't seem to work. :( perhaps for those that
don't have it Alt-Mouse should work like Alt-cursor?
- Added "Open File" (F4), which loads a filename in the associated
application (paths relative to where the .cts is stored).
Hmm. Use Treesheets to tag and annotate your archives? Interesting....
Wouter van Oortmerssen
> Rounded corners look good, and make it easier to select a cell that
> has a grid but no text (it took a while to discover the "double-click
> on a line" feature). I'm not sure if 6 levels of roundness are really
> necessary.
Probably not. Making it an option was just a quick way to allow
people to experiment with visual look, if we all agree the default
looks best (which I think it does), I can remove it.
> Tags, Hierarchify, Flatten etc. are all welcome additions, but what I
> really need is the ability to tag structure by colour rather than by
> text, so that it is visible at a glance. Rather like the "Mark as" on
> the Program menu, but with the ability to define your own. (More on
> this some other time).
Would this be like having a preset color style for a cell? I am not sure
how exactly you envision this.
> I'm not convinced by filters. I think to be useful they will need to
> be more dynamic. One idea might be to have a filter to show only the
> first line of children of the currently selected cell. That might
> provide some of the function of a standard tree view without a lot of
> unnecessary state.
True, they are not that great yet. I put them in there in a future
looking way: I was interested in having this functionality, but for this
functionality to work, treesheets needs to first collect edit dates, so
that in the future this functionality has something to work on.
It can be expanded. Like some other new features this release, they are
in there so people can start playing with them, and see what works
and what doesn't.
> At present, if you filter on current search, and then change the
> search text, the filter does not change. Is it possible to have it
> change as the text changes, instead of the red highlight? If not, then
> a button next the search box.
Automatic re-filtering on search query change would be a logical one,
yes.
> I don't find the filter on edits to be helpful at all. Some programs
> put up a list of undoable actions, but that doesn't fit Treesheets
> well. Since you are maintaining a list of edit times, why not just a
> variant of Control-Z that steps back to the previously edited cell,
> but does not undo any other action? Control-Z at that point would undo
> the action on that cell, while leaving latter edits intact.
Applying undo actions out of order gets complicated (e.g. if the last undo
action was to delete a grid, and the one before that was to edit a cell
inside
that grid, treesheets would have to detect that, and any permutation of
operations). I am not convinced that this is a common enough situation
to be worth it.
> The new column width control is a great improvement. I can now load
> large text files into Treesheets and work with them straight away.
> Thanks!
Good to hear, I was hoping that.
> The new controls are a much more consistent too. Unfortunately,
> horizontal scrolling doesn't seem to work. :( perhaps for those that
> don't have it Alt-Mouse should work like Alt-cursor?
ALT + left/right scrolls horizontally for me. Does that not work for
you? or do you have a 4-way scrollwheel and that doesn't work?
> - Added "Open File" (F4), which loads a filename in the associated
> application (paths relative to where the .cts is stored).
>
> Hmm. Use Treesheets to tag and annotate your archives? Interesting....
Yup, any collection of files can now be organized and viewed from
treesheets.. I was thinking it be most useful to have large images that
you don't want inside the sheet, but who knows what it can be used
for?
I actually have fantasies of making treesheets into a windows explorer
replacement, with a folder pane, and treesheets automatically building
a hierarchy out of all the files/folders you have visited to the side of it,
but maybe that is stretching the concept too far :)
Wouter
David Lynch
Wouter van Oortmerssen
On 3/9/2010 6:25 PM, David Lynch wrote:
> When I add an image, I cannot delete the image without deleting all of
> the subchildren.
Good point. Will add a remove image operation.
Wouter
JennyB
On Mar 9, 12:40 am, Wouter van Oortmerssen <aardap...@gmail.com>
wrote:
> > Tags, Hierarchify, Flatten etc. are all welcome additions, but what I
> > really need is the ability to tag structure by colour rather than by
> > text, so that it is visible at a glance. Rather like the "Mark as" on
> > the Program menu, but with the ability to define your own. (More on
> > this some other time).
>
> Would this be like having a preset color style for a cell? I am not sure
> how exactly you envision this.
I've just noticed the "Set Custom Color From Cell BG" Option, which is
a partial workaround, but generally:
When I set a cell to a particular colour, it is to show that it
belongs to a particular type. The text and grid contain the details of
that particular example. In any single sheet I am working with several
different cell types, and I want to be able to apply them quickly,
preferably by using a list containing only those defined colours. I
often include a key grid to show what each colour means, and if this
is visible when I go to mark a cell, I find myself clicking there
instead of on the toolbar.
Perhaps this will suffice:
Add Cell to Tags - works as now, but if the cell backround is coloured
it is also coloured in the Control-RMB tag list.
Better yet, make it work on an array of cells by setting them all as
tags at once. If you have a key that explains what the tags mean, just
select them all at once, or put a tag set in a separate treesheet, and
select all of that to use the tags in a new document.
Tag Cell (Control-RMB) - if the chosen tag is not coloured, set the
cell text. If it is coloured, set only the background colour.
Remove Cell from Tag List - could work by the same rules in reverse,
but if it is possible to load tags en masse, perhaps Clear Tag List
would be a better option?
A Wilder Idea - SAX-like processing.
A separate script language for processing TreeSheets. A script file is
a Treesheet containing only a tag set, and in the grid of each tag is
the script that describes how to process that tag when it is matched.
When a view is sent to a script file, a view is constructed cell by
cell. When a matching tag is found, its script is evaluated, and its
output, by default, replaces that cell in the new view. Untagged cells
are appended unchanged.
When the entire view is read the new version replaces it in the
original treesheet and can be saved, copied, printed or exported. If
need be, the original view can be restored with Control-Z.
> ALT + left/right scrolls horizontally for me. Does that not work for
> you? or do you have a 4-way scrollwheel and that doesn't work?
>
The latter (HP Desktop Comfort, windows XP). I was suggesting that for
those who prefer to keep their hand on the mouse, holding down the Alt
key should cause it to pan in the same manner as Alt-cursor does.
Another oddity I've just noticed. If a cell has the same colour as its
parent, that colour is not displayed when the cell is zoomed in on.
It's not lost, just not displayed so I wouldn't call it a bug, just
odd!
Wouter van Oortmerssen
On 3/12/2010 9:41 AM, JennyB wrote:
> I've just noticed the "Set Custom Color From Cell BG" Option, which is
> a partial workaround, but generally:
>
> When I set a cell to a particular colour, it is to show that it
> belongs to a particular type. The text and grid contain the details of
> that particular example. In any single sheet I am working with several
> different cell types, and I want to be able to apply them quickly,
> preferably by using a list containing only those defined colours. I
> often include a key grid to show what each colour means, and if this
> is visible when I go to mark a cell, I find myself clicking there
> instead of on the toolbar.
>
> Perhaps this will suffice:
>
> Add Cell to Tags - works as now, but if the cell backround is coloured
> it is also coloured in the Control-RMB tag list.
> Better yet, make it work on an array of cells by setting them all as
> tags at once. If you have a key that explains what the tags mean, just
> select them all at once, or put a tag set in a separate treesheet, and
> select all of that to use the tags in a new document.
>
> Tag Cell (Control-RMB) - if the chosen tag is not coloured, set the
> cell text. If it is coloured, set only the background colour.
I see how that could work, but it would blur the definition of what a
tag is... there may be a cleaner way to do this.
For now, I added:
- "Paste Style Only" pastes only the color/style/image from the copied
cell into
the destination cells, not the text
I think this would be a very quick way to apply specific styles to cells.
> Remove Cell from Tag List - could work by the same rules in reverse,
> but if it is possible to load tags en masse, perhaps Clear Tag List
> would be a better option?
Well, tags are associated with a document. For simplicity, I'll keep it
that way for the moment.
> A Wilder Idea - SAX-like processing.
>
> A separate script language for processing TreeSheets. A script file is
> a Treesheet containing only a tag set, and in the grid of each tag is
> the script that describes how to process that tag when it is matched.
> When a view is sent to a script file, a view is constructed cell by
> cell. When a matching tag is found, its script is evaluated, and its
> output, by default, replaces that cell in the new view. Untagged cells
> are appended unchanged.
>
> When the entire view is read the new version replaces it in the
> original treesheet and can be saved, copied, printed or exported. If
> need be, the original view can be restored with Control-Z.
>
>
> > ALT + left/right scrolls horizontally for me. Does that not work for
> > you? or do you have a 4-way scrollwheel and that doesn't work?
> >
> The latter (HP Desktop Comfort, windows XP). I was suggesting that for
I cleaned up the code a bit, which MAY have fixed it... let me know.
As a side benefit, "continuous" mousewheels should now scroll more smoothly.
> those who prefer to keep their hand on the mouse, holding down the Alt
> key should cause it to pan in the same manner as Alt-cursor does.
Alt+mousewheel is already assigned to changing column width.
Instead, I added holding down the mousewheel (middle button) & drag
as panning.
> Another oddity I've just noticed. If a cell has the same colour as its
> parent, that colour is not displayed when the cell is zoomed in on.
> It's not lost, just not displayed so I wouldn't call it a bug, just
> odd!
That was a bug. For optimization, it does not color a cell when it has the
same color as it's parent... and when zoomed in, it fails to ignore the
parent that's not even on screen :) Fixed.
I am uploading a release with these fixes as we speak.
Wouter