Release notes for MECCA 2000 version 3.08. Aug/23/2004 Fixed: 1. The following printing problems related to choke & spread, have been corrected (typdrv): a. for a spot color part, printing all seps produced the effect, but printing one sep other than the last (highest numbered) sep, did not. b. for a process color part, choke & spread effect did not always occur for each sep. c. choke & spread effect was produced even for composite printing (part per page). 2. Changed raster image output position and dimension values to real values (from integers), to improve accuracy and avoid possible gaps that may occur between image bands (typdrv). 3. Text input box had a minor problem where the text area did not expand to fill available vertical space, when the user expands the dialog (text.tcl). 4. Auto-fraction displayed incorrectly on screen (m2kbin). 5. In certain applications where a graphic file is printed but not by MECCA 2000, typdrv 3.07 did not compensate for older separation specs where per-sep notes were absent, so the Title/jobname strings in the PostScript file contained garbage characters (typdrv). 6. Corrected start-up sequence with a local X11 server which was run with the "-nolisten tcp" option (m2kbin). 7. Text rotated at fractional degrees, have been output in PostScript with the fraction dropped -- e.g., 60.1 through 60.9 all were printed at 60. This problem is now fixed, but any existing files containing rotated text at such fractional degrees, will still print differently (typdrv). 8. Fixed a minor erratic behavior: components were combined, perhaps more than once, then grouped and certain operations applied to the group (e.g., check spelling); the software automatically un-groups everything, but subsequent Group functions may omit some or all components in a combined association, until the drawing is saved and reloaded (m2kbin). 9. When a PPD-menu entry sets PSTRAY, that value is set until changed by another PPD-menu entry (one that sets PSTRAY to something else). This was incorrect, because non-PPD-menu printer selections do not set PSTRAY (print.tcl). 10. Corrected a Process-sep printing problem: color primaries in graduated text (via GRS & GRE mark-up commands) were not properly looked up, so if this text was the only component providing color (perhaps with other components but they are all black), then the CMYK seps were produced incorrectly (typdrv). 11. Corrected EAN bar-code display problem (m2kbin). 12. Made text compose processing to fold mark-up commands to lowercase letters (galeyc, m2kbin). 13. Corrected a problem in loading graphic file: when large elements were inside an association (combined geometry), subsequent components were not loaded correctly (m2kbin, typdrv). 14. When typdrv scans for fonts in a merged-in drawing file, it did not handle color raster images properly (typdrv). 15. Corrected the problem when combining a PNG image, user supplied resolution (DPI) value was ignored (combinefile.tcl). 16. Corrected a typdrv problem in generating composite (CMYK) graduation, where the screen settings were omitted (typdrv, PSbasic.ps). 17. Corrected a problem in Batch-with-specs: when no drawing is loaded, printing to a printer incorrectly referenced tiled-printing settings (print.tcl). Changed/New: 1. Due to changed internal definitions in FreeBSD 4.9 (and 4.10), a new dongle watcher, built on a FreeBSD 4.9 system, has been added (adgld4_9). 2. Circle Text has been re-worked (m2kbin, circtext.tcl, text.tcl). Now it can run along circles, ellipses, as well as circular or elliptical arcs (open ended). Such text is till restricted to one line, but can now be edited or changed afterward, like an ordinary text paragraph, and all immediate mark-up commands except RV (reverse) can be applied. Also, for open-ended arcs, composition modes (flush left, center, flush right, justified) are applicable. To customers who still maintain MECCA III: the new style circle text is not backward compatible with MECCA III. 3. In addition (to the new Circle Text), "Text along a Path" has been added (m2kbin, text.tcl, mictext.tcl, tclIndex). Most of it works similarly to Circle Text, except: * HR, underscore and Fill are not supported (they work with Circle Text). * Where Circle Text directions are Clockwise and Counter-Clockwise, "Text along Path" has no such concept. 4. Minor addition to display functionality: color graduated text (GRS and GRE commands) now displays on screen. Please note that for 0- and 180-degree graduation angles, each letter on screen is rendered with a simulated solid color, instead of true graduation across the letter itself. Also, for micro-text, graduation angles other than 0- or 180-degree are still displayed as non-graduated (m2kbin). 5. In text input box, characters can now be selected, then Control-u folds all letters to uppercase, Control-l (lowercase L) folds to lowercase (tk.options). 6. In release v3.07, horizontal scrollbar was added to text input box, and the text lines then do not word-wrap. Although this change was made by request, some customers deemed the new behavior "unacceptable". Thusly, a per-user option (~/.m2ktxt.tcl or ~/.m2k.tcl) is now added: set txtData(h_scroll) 0 will go back to the old behavior: no h-scroll, line wraps on word. Please note if this is not set in each user's options file, the default is the same as v3.07 (text.tcl). 7. Added control parameters for open-arcs and ellipses, to Point-Shaker dialog (xform2.tcl). Point-Shaker now will randomly turn (rotate) open-arcs and ellipses. However, user can limit the minimum arc span (there is an absolute limit of 1 degree for this), or maintain the original arc span. Such arcs can also be turned without any displacement. 8. When using Ghostscript to generate PDF file, the dialog now contains a new check-button to disallow automatic page rotation (portrait or landscape) on a page-by-page basis (print.tcl). When this is not set (as was the case prior to this release), the PDF generator is free to set the page orientation based on page content. For example, if a page contains more 90-degree text than upright ones, it can set the output page to landscape orientation (and not rotate those text characters). While this may be handy for viewers of, say, a single page having lots of rotated text, this behavior is undesirable when it occurs in the middle of a multi-page document. The default now is to not permit such automatic rotation. Thusly the checkbutton needs be turned off if landscape orientation is desired. Also, monochrome (black-and-white) raster image downsampling is now at 150 dpi (was 120 dpi before).