What's New in Version 5.9.2 (1/23/2010) 

• There were a couple of bugs in the way ROW pulled titles in the new GCD fixes
  • It was repeating chunks of titles when more than one page existed.  That's been fixed.
  • If only two pages of titles existed, it kept going forever (or until you clicked the cancel button).  That's been fixed
  • If you search for a title with spaces between the wrds (like "Green Lantern"), GCD used to put a "+" between the words.   Now, they want a space.  That has been fixed as well.

What's New in Version 5.9.1 (1/8/2010) 

• I think I got the final GCD update fixes complete.  Some of the creative team was not formatting properly.  I believe that's now fixed.  Also, sometimes the editor would show up twice.  That too should be fixed.  All the testing I've done looks pretty good, so please let me know if anything still looks incorrect.

What's New in Version 5.9.0 (1/2/2010) 

• GCD changed the structure of their design, so I had to adapt ROW to match the new format.  This is complete in version 5.9.0.  I do expect some issues around the data, so please notify me of anything that doesn't look correct.  It should work mostly as it always did with a few enhancements:
  • GCD made it fairly easy to identify covers versus the actual story (or stories) in the issue.  So, I assign the first cover to the comic.  All other covers are listed in the comments, where it will say "Variant Covers Exist: " and then list the cover name, the credits for the cover and any notes related to that cover
  • GCD also identifies other "sections" (not covers or stories) - forwards, afterwords, letters, etc.  Those are listed in the comments as well, following the line "Additional info exists".
  • The anthology issues now do assign assign the creative team to the correct story.   In the past, you had to do that yourself after the download finished.
• Looks like the version numbers where not up to date so the version detector wouldn't let you know when a new version was available.  I'll try to make sure that's up to date.

What's New in Version 5.8.6 (3/31/2009)

• The new "Update Image Locations" changes were causing the old image files to be deleted if there was a problem while copying the old file to the new name.  I changed that so it will only delete the old file if it was successful in copying it to the new name.  It will only change the name of the file in the ROW record to the new name in that case as well.

What's New in Version 5.8.5 (6/24/2008)

• There's been a bit of an Easter Egg in ROW since 5.8.2.  Some functionality mentioned below was not entirely removed.  The un-removed functionality wasn't working quite right, but now is.  I'll leave the rest up to you.
• The Issue Price and number of pages were not being downloaded from GCD.   That should be fixed now.
• I changed the "Update Image Locations" on the Title Maintenance window to actually do something now.  Originally, I wrote this feature before the GCD download was built in, and the idea was that you would download a bunch of images independent of ROW, and this would just change the name on the ROW record, not the name of the image itself.  Now, it will format all the existing image locations as requested and rename the images to the new formatted name.  I'm still not sure how useful this is, but, at least it does something <g>.

What's New in Version 5.8.3 (4/4/2007)

• Just a fix - I had the wrong field name for one field on the download window

What's New in Version 5.8.2 (4/2/2007)

• Sadly, ComicbooksDb.com won't give us permission to download data from their site, so I have to remove that functionality.  If that ever changes, I'll put it back in.
• Added a fix to GCD so the publisher is correct.  Please let me know if their are any problems with that.
• I added the ability to look for various image type (jpg, jpeg, gif, bmp) when doing the batch image update from the title menu.  Please let me know if you run into any issues there.

What's New in Version 5.8.1 (3/23/2007)

• One pretty big thing - the ability to download data from ComicbooksDb.com - this is very much in beta, so any help is greatly appreciated.  There are a couple of check boxes on the bottom of the web window where you can indicate the data source (GCD or ComicsDB).   You may have to enlarge the window a little to see them.  You can also set it using the DataSource menu on the window.
  
  Please let me know if you run into problems - either errors, or missing information.   Please give me specific titles and issues when you run into problems.  Right now, the help has not been enhanced.  I'll fix that shortly
• There's a more compact version of the Missing Issues report and the Collection report - puts all the issues on one line.

Thanks very much for any help reviewing the version!!!

What's New in Version 5.7.8 (12/18/2005)

• On GCD, for some indexed only issues, the creative team is somethimes set to "[".  This causes an error in ROW.  I updated ROW to ignore this situation.

What's New in Version 5.7.7 (12/06/2005)

• GCD made a recent change to try to protect "stolen" bandwidth, which happened when people linked directly to cover image files.  A side effect of that change made it impossible for ROW to download the cover images.  This version should fix that.
• The urls for the GCD title and issue on the web download window are now active.  Click on them, and it will bring up that page in Internet Explorer.

What's New in Version 5.7.6 (4/16/2005)

• A very simple upgrade - the web download from GCD wasn't pulling the issue title.   This should fix that.  Let me know if otherwise.

What's New in Version 5.7.5 (2/06/2005)

• When GCD has more than 50 title matches, there is an option on the GCD window to show all title matches, not just the first 50.  GCD changed the way that worked so everything after the first page was incorrect.  That should now be fixed.  Both the multi-page view, and the show exact matches only should work properly.
• I added a GCD Indexed Only field to the Issue Detail window.   ROW now checks to see if the GCD record is "complete" or "indexed only" (just minimum info - like issue number and that's it).  It then uses this field to decide which issue records have not yet been downloaded from GCD.  
• ROW now has a report for the Print option on the Collection Properties window.  I did not really previously that it was not yet implemented.  It just shows the same info that's on the Collection Properties window.  It does show all collections, not just the active one.  I thought that made sense since there are usually very few collections per user.
• The Tax, Discount and Net Paid totals on the Summary Window were not taking the number of issues into account.   I fixed that.
• The Collection List by Publisher report gives you the option to page break after the publisher (as it always was) or not (that's the new part).
• I enhanced the Backup feature in several ways:

It now backs up 4 files:

Realms50.mdb (your data)
Realms50.ini (your settings)
Crossref32.mdb (your FWIW title match file, assuming it exists)
Collections.mdb (your collection info, especially helpful if you have multiple collections)

The zip process backs them up including their directory structure.  I think that makes sense as that will show you where they were on your machine.

You can have ROW backup your data based on how many issues you've added (same as it used to be) or by date (number of days since last backup).

You can automate the above process so ROW backs up your data, either way, by date or number of issues, without confirming it.  It just backs up the data without the confirmation window popping up.  It always writes the backup to a new file.  So, if ROWDATA.ZIP exists, it will change the name to ROWDATA_001.ZIP, ROWDATA_002.ZIP, etc.

You can view the Backup History (when the backups occurred and where they are) by selecting Backup History from the File Menu, or Show Backup History from the Backup window

• ROW now has a Title Summary Report on the Reports Menu.  This displays the following info:

It also includes totals that list the total number of titles that have at least 1 Owned issue

What's New in Version 5.7.2 (8/02/2004)

• GCD made  a very minor change to their search window.   Unfortunately, it happened to be on a line that ROW uses to determine how many records matched.  Because of this, when you click the title search button in ROW, everything was coming back as 0 matches found on GCD.   This fixes that.  Please let me know if you run into any other GCD issues.

What's New in Version 5.7.1 (7/26/2004)

• GCD changed its format slightly.  Anytime this happens, there's a good chance it will create problems with the ROW download.  In this case, it did.  This version should fix those problems.  Please let me know if anything else doesn't seem correct.
• Added an option to the "Options" menu on the download page where you can have the title lookup match the keywords exactly.  This helps when looking up a common name.  For example, if you're looking for the original "Batman", turning this option on will only show you the titles called "Batman", instead of all 250+ titles with "Batman" in the name.

What's New in Version 5.7.0 (4/30/2004)

• Another very minor update.  The Batch Dup on the Subscription List Report was working incorrectly, adding issues to one title instead of all the selected titles to dup.  This was a side effect of the earlier title lookup change (that seems to have created more problems than it fixed).  This should now be fixed and working properly.

What's New in Version 5.6.9 (4/16/2004)

• Very minor update.  This should remove error messages that were popping up when you clicked the web button as ROW fills the list of titles for the multi-title update.  Please let me know if you still get this error.

What's New in Version 5.6.8 (4/5/2004)

• ROW will allow you to download all the issues for multiple titles linked to GCD, that have not yet been downloaded.  Click here for details on how this works (click the Multi Title tab).
• There are several new options on the issue download window - the option to turn the log file on or off, ability to treat "nn" issues as #1, ability to show all matching titles - click here for more info.
• Added the ability to run Title Labels on the Labels tab of the Print Collection window.  This gives you the ability to print labels for individual titles.
• Fixed a couple of cases where issues for multiple titles could show up - Summary window (Open button), Expenses report
• Fixed a bug where fields where being disabled incorrectly on the Enable/Disable tab of the Preferences window
• Changed the GCD keyword lookup so ROW doesn't drop all the "little" words.  Until GCD gets their advanced search up again, this seems a better way to do it.

What's New in Version 5.6.6 (3/16/2004)

• There was an error when ROW tried to update the value of an issue based on the FWIW database.  ROW was updating the value and then setting it back to what it was.  Hopefully, that is now fixed.
• On GCD, there are two ways to find an individual issue.  ROW was using only one, assuming they were the same.  They are not.  Now, ROW looks for an issue one way, and, if it can't find it, uses the other method (looks at the index matrix).

What's New in Version 5.6.4 (3/10/2004)

• Ok, one more fix related to the title lookups that I originally attempted to "improve" in 5.6.2.  If you use the Find window, or the Title dropdown, and you select a title by typing in letters (instead of using the mouse to pick a title), in the previous version, you would still see the issues from the previous title in the list.  That should now be fixed.
• I added *.jpeg to the list of image types for which ROW will look.
• I corrected the Changes window - for some XP color schemes, the background on the table turned black (kind of hard to read considering the text is black also).  This also occured on the version checker which is now 1.3.1, and fixes this.

What's New in Version 5.6.3 (3/01/2004)

• There was an error similar to that in 5.6.2 when you entered a new issue without duping or copying.  This version should fix that.

What's New in Version 5.6.2 (2/24/2004)

• This fixes an error where clicking on the Issues button from the Title Maintenance window, or double-clicking on a title in the list brought up more than just that title - it also included the previously active title data also.

What's New in Version 5.6.1 (2/18/2004)

• The format of the GCD (www.comics.org) web pages have changed somewhat.   This version should handle the download properly now.  Please check this as you use it and let me know if anything appears incorrect.
• The Verify Data Links in the Utilities menu will fix cases where the comic book title on the issue is different than the comic book title on the title record.  This was a side effect of the GCD download that I fixed in the last release.  It doesn't hurt to run this if you're not sure.

What's New in Version 5.6.0 (12/19/2003)

• All the beta changes have been added to the Issue Properties window.   Now it should work the same as the Issue Detail window with no errors.  One exception - there is no web button to access the web download from the Issue Properties window.  Due to the way it works behind the scenes, that's a bit more complex.
• Fixed the web download where, if you over-write the title, the issues should now stay linked to the title.  That should work properly.  Please let me know if otherwise.
• Added an option to use the currency conversion factor on the Cover Price during web download.  This is only active if you're conversion rate is other than 1
• Added the ability to remove question marks from Image names, so you can save cover images for titles like "What If?"

What's New in Version 5.5.92 (11/06/2003)

Sorry for the quick update on this, but there were a couple of errors that needed fixing

• Updating title information on the Web Download window could result in error 438.  That should now be fixed.
• Fixed another potential error on the Title Maintenance window
• Fixed an error message on the Contacts/Comicons window for international users.

What's New in Version 5.5.9 (11/04/2003)

• On the Web Download window, I added a check box to the Status field so you can choose to over-write or not.  If the Status field on the existing record is blank, or the check box is on, the status will be over-written on the downloaded records with whatever is in the status combo box.  If you don't want to change the status on the record, uncheck this box.
• In the past, if there was a value in the Primary Image field, ROW would not over-write that, even if you choose to download images.  I changed that.   Now, if you choose to download images, ROW will over-write whatever is there.  That seems to make more sense to me.
• I added a new explanations in the help file about error 429 and error 3051
• I made sure that Batch Edit should allow you to replace values with a blank value.  Just leave the New Value combo box blank.
• I made the Quick Search window sizeable just to fix an alignment problem in XP.  The buttons don't re-size, so, just make the window the correct size, and ROW will remember from there.

What's New in Version 5.5.8 (10/28/2003)

• Once again, I've proven that I spend a great deal of my time with no functional brain cells.  In the previous version, I accidentally reversed the append and replace comments switches.  That should now be fixed.
• I added a "comments separator" field on the Web Download window.   By default, I set it to "; " ( a semi-colon and a space).  Whenever ROW builds comments, it will use the value in this field to separate the old from the new.
• For international users, if the Web Download is inflating the cover price due to the comma and decimal being used differently in your currency, you can enter a number to divide the downloaded price so it sets it back to normal.
• I fixed an error in the title comments where the comments were not being properly filled during the download.  This was a side effect of a change in version 5.5.7

What's New in Version 5.5.7 (10/24/2003)

• Added the ability to append or replace issue comments on the Web Download window
• You can assign the Ownership Status of the issues being downloaded from the web.  It defaults to "Owned", but you can change that.
• You can turn the Wish List indicator on for issues being downloaded
• Fixed the Web Title search so it ignores question marks.  In the past, that caused it to get no matches.
• Fixed a bug when FWIW updated values where an error was generated
• Changed the For Sale report so it does not include issues with a for sale price of 0.
• Fixed the lengths on a bunch of the fields on the Contact / Convention window.   They were set to be too short.

What's New in Version 5.5.6 (10/15/2003)

• For those of you that use the scroll mouse, I've tried to fix the Issue Detail window on existing records.  The fix in 5.5.4 didn't seem to work.   Now, for existing records and dups, the title shows up as a non-editable field.   If you right mouse click on the issue list, you can have the focus go to the list by selecting that option from the pop-up menu.  If not, focus will go to the Issue Number field.  On new issues, the title shows up as a dropdown list.  Please let me know if this seems to work.
• I've added two options to the Web Download window under the options menu. 
  • The first - Search as Form Loads - will perform the search for matching titles as the form is loading if this is turned on.  If there already is a GCD link to this title, it will not perform the search, even if it is turned on.
  • The second option takes you immediately to the Issue Download tab after you do a title update, instead of forcing you to click OK, and then click the tab.
• Ive added the ability to select which title data can be overwritten on the download.
• The window should now remember if you had the Web Title Details window turned on or off.
• I've corrected the issue where you could have more than one row highlighted on the title list of the Download window
• I've added a Web button to the Issue Detail window so you can trigger the process from there.
• I've changed the image path defaults to use what's set up for the title.  This may cause problems on some OS where they don't like spaces.  If so, you'll have to adjust those.

The Issue Detail changes are only on the Issue Detail window at this point, not the Explorer View version.  I'll add it there once all the bugs are worked out.

What's New in Version 5.5.5 (10/01/2003)

• There was a bug in the Primary Image default described below in 5.5.4.   For New and Duped records, you'd get an invalid use of null error that wouldn't ever go away.  This should fix that.

What's New in Version 5.5.4 (09/24/2003)

• I've attempted to switch the focus on the Issue Detail window to the list for existing records, if you prefer that.  Right mouse click on the list and select that option from the popup menu.  This should make it easier for those of you that use the scroll mouse.
• When you enter the Primary Image location, if the field is blank, it will now default to a name derived from the values in the Title Maintenance window.   This should save you a little clicking around.

What's New in Version 5.5.31 and 5.5.3 (09/10/2003)

• Prior to 5.5.31, the help files and cue cards had not been updated to explain the Web button on the Title Maintenance window.  This made it difficult for new users to find where to download data from the web.
• There were a few fields on the Issue Detail window that were not clearing on new records (Major Arc Parts, TPB Parts, etc.).  Those are fixed.
• Added the update of the High and Low value percents to the Batch Entry process.
• Fixed a problem with selecting multiple publishers on the Collection List report.   That should be OK.
• Moved the backup reminder.  That was getting skipped if you turned off the Exit window confirmation.  If anyone still has problems where this reminder doesn't seem to appear, please let me know.

What's New in Version 5.5.2 (08/22/2003)

• I finally (should have done it some time ago) added an image view to the Explorer window, so you can see all the cover images, instead of a list.  I think it looks good, and it makes finding which issues are missing covers very simple.  Click here for more info on how to use this feature.
• Fixed a bug in the Collection List by Creative Team report.   Formerly, if you chose a Creative Team Member with an apostrophe (single quote) in their name, the report didn't work.  Now it should.
• Minor error on the Image List window where new team member names (not already in the dropdown list) didn't stay in the entry field when entered.  Now, it should be OK.

What's New in Version 5.5.1 (08/15/2003)

• Fixing the XP display problems created a couple of small bugs - the Find Profiles and Creative Team Members report were coming up blank.   That should now be fixed.
• When printing a grid, even if you changed the page setup to Landscape, it stayed Portrait.  Now, when printing a grid (like the Summary window), a page setup window will appear where you can assign the orientation.

Version 5.5.0 is now the official release.  There's not a lot new from 5.4.7, but I wanted a nice, round version number <g>.  There is A LOT that is new from the previous, official version (5.3.1).

For those of you moving up to 5.5.0, please review all the What's New entries, all the way back to your current version (5.3.1, or whatever).  That will give you a pretty complete overview of everything that's been added.

What's New in Version 5.5.0 (08/06/2003)

• Fixed a couple other XP display issues
• Fixed a couple of errors when using Views

What's New in Version 5.4.7 (07/29/2003)

• When downloading data from GCD, if there was no image on file, ROW was also skipping the Cover Credits.  That should be fixed
• The cover image at the bottom of the Issue Detail window was remaining visible when you start  a new issue.  That's fixed.
• The tab order on the image list window has been fixed.

What's New in Version 5.4.6 (07/22/2003)

• Just a few minor fixes - hopefully I got the last of the XP display problems.  On some windows, multiple fields would be highlighted (the text selected) when you bring it up the first time.  That should now be corrected.
• I changed the Status window which comes up during image updates, etc., so it won't automatically resize your other open windows if you had them maximized.

What's New in Version 5.4.5 (07/11/2003)

• Fixed the GCD window so it assigns the Image Path to each title.  Prior to this, it just kept track of the last path used.  Now, as you switch titles, it should display the appropriate path for each title.
• Fixed the Batch Edit window so the Replace button is now visible.  This was a side effect of the fixed "display" problems from version 5.4.4
• There are two places in ROW, on the Title Maintenance window, and on the GCD window, where you are asked to select a directory (not a file).  I fixed that so it now pops up a directory window.  Note:   This window is driven by the version of SHELL32.DLL on your machine, which will be in WINDOWS/SYSTEM32 directory, or the equivalent, based on your OS.   If you have version 5.0 or better, you will have a New Directory option on the window.  Earlier than that, you won't.
• Some people where getting an error 438 when clicking an image on the Issue Detail window.  This should be fixed.  Please let me know if otherwise.
• Some people were getting an error 13 when the Summary window opened.  This should now be fixed.  Please let me know if otherwise.
• The Find window off the Summary window allows you know to search by Last Updated date.  Just enter the date.  In the past, you had to actually enter the exact seconds.
• The Creative Team window had two Trash icons.  One was supposed to be a Print icon.  That's fixed.

What's New in Version 5.4.4 (07/01/2003)

• There are a lot of "display" problems that arose in XP.  I've attempted to address them in this release
  • The icons should be all consistent, and look correct, both when enabled, and disabled
  • I've tried to fix the background colors.  XP changed the standard background to "eggshell" white.  This created a lot of windows where controls where in different colors.  Hopefully that is resolved.
  • XP changed the margins around the windows.  This resulted in the bottom of many windows, especially those with tables, being cut a bit short.  You can now adjust this on the Preferences window
• The Missing Issues report has a strange bug where it drops the last title.  I've added the ability for you to put a "timing loop" into the report.  This seems to eliminate the problem.  If you have this problem with the MI report, increase the timer at the bottom of the MI report window to by 1 until the report works properly.  On my XP machine, I had to set it to 3.
• On the Exit window, you can turn off the Exit confirmation.  Once you do that, when you click the Exit button, or close the parent window, ROW will close without asking you to confirm it.
• Some people are getting an "invalid row number" error on the GCD Title window.  I have not been able to make this occur, but I put an error catcher in there, so it won't close ROW.  Please let me know if you get this error.
• Fixed an error on the Wish List report.  If you ran another report first, sometimes you would get an invalid formula error.
• Changed the reports so that the Print Preview window comes up maximized.\
• Fairly significant bug when splitting your collection - the issue record was not picking up the appropriate title id.  That is now fixed.
• If an issue has a primary image, it now appears on the bottom of the Issue Detail window.  If you are using 800 x 600 resolution, you won't see it, but anything larger will see it by making the window bigger.

What's New in Version 5.4.3 (06/13/2003)

• There was a slight change in the formatting of the GCD data on the web.  Therefore, I had to make changes to handle this.  In addition, I attempted to correct a few other download problems.  Please let me know if anything looks incorrect.

What's New in Version 5.4.2 (05/30/2003)

• For XP users, some of the toolbar icons looked lousy, to be blunt.  That should be fixed.  If you see anything else that looks strange, please let me know.
• There were a number of bugs in the FWIW update.  That should now be working properly, and updating all the related fields.  Please let me know if you see otherwise.
• All of the new enhancements - GCD and FWIW related - should now work on the explorer windows as well.
• Fixed a couple of bugs in the Collection List by Creative Team report

What's New in Version 5.4.1 (05/16/2003)

• I finally added the ability to change Conditions in Batch Edit on the Summary window.  You can change either the Condition Code (MT, NM, etc.) or the Condition (Mint (MT), Near Mint (NM), etc.) and ROW will make all the related corrections.
• If you use FWIW, you will see a small button with a question mark next to the Title field on the Title Maintenance window.   Click this button to bring up the list of FWIW titles.  Click here for details.

What's New in Version 5.4.0 (05/07/2003)

• I added the ability to split your collection into multiples - basically exporting the data of your choice to another ROW database.  Click here for details.
• If you choose to, you can have ROW lookup the value of an issue in FWIW, as you enter, update data.  Click here for details.
• I put in a counter on the Web Download window where you can enter the limit for the number of retries when trying to access GCD

What's New in Version 5.3.97 (04/11/2003)

• Not much really - the major fix is putting the ability to pull ranges of issues down from the web.  An earlier "fix" made that stop working
• Fixed enabling of the Web button on the Title window - sometimes it was staying disabled
• Fixed a couple of web download data errors

What's New in Version 5.3.96 (04/04/2003)

• Fixed the Print button on the Notes window so it stayed where it belongs when you resize the window (sorry about that).
• Fixed the Summary window so that when you refresh views that hide a lot of columns, it doesn't add columns to the left of the grid.
• Fixed an error when saving views where the field keeping track of what's visible was not big enough.

What's New in Version 5.3.95 (04/03/2003)

• I made the GCD title on the Web Window a text field, which will allow you to copy it if you want to overlay your Series Title, or Display Title (which would then change related issues when you save the record).
• I've attempted to fix the issue date for the remaining international users who've still been having a problem.  Please let me know if this works, as I can't test it.  I think this affects users whose language is set to other than English.
• The issue frequency should work properly with batch entry and dups.  Please express frequency in Years, Months or Weeks.   In other words, enter a Quarterly series as 4 times per year.  Weekly series should work either as 1 per week or 4 per month.  For monthly series, set up the template record with the issue date on the first.  For twice a month, set them up with either the 1st or the 15th.  For weekly, set it up with the date on the 1, 8, 15 or 22.
• Added a print option to the Notes window
• Added the ability to assign appearances to different stories the same way you do on the Creative Team window
• Fixed a couple of reported download errors

What's New in Version 5.3.91 (03/24/2003)

• Fixed the issue date for international users so it appears in the correct format, based on your regional settings
• Fixed a couple of reported download errors
• Changed the way the image path works so ROW checks to see if the directory exists after you enter the data.  If it does, you can leave spaces, etc. in the name.  If ROW has to create the directory, it will change all "special" characters to underscores.

What's New in Version 5.3.9 (03/21/2003)

• Hopefully, Anthology Issues should now work properly.  FYI:   GCD records many different "parts" of a book as a "sequence".   That's how I make the call - if there is more than one sequence, then it's an anthology.  I do some checking to not count variants and letter pages in making the determination.  However, once it is made, I show everything (except variants).   The final result is that some issues will be listed as anthologies though I might not consider them as such.  Please give me your feedback on this as you see what happens.  Also, please keep an eye on the "non-anthology" books to make sure this continues to work properly.  This anthology process was actually fairly complex.
• I've added indicators for determining which fields to over-write when downloading.
• When downloading images, ROW should create the image directory, if it doesn't exist.
• ROW adds a back slash to the image path, just in case, so it won't right the image to the root drive by mistake
• Fixed any other reported errors I had received
• Fixed the Pop-up tips when holding the mouse over a button.  A number of them had incorrect messages
• Radically changed the way that ROW now connects to the web.  You shouldn't notice any difference, but let me know if otherwise.  I had to do this to eliminate some problems a few users were having.
• Added the use of the Frequency and Time Period from the Title Maintenance window which tells how often a title is published to the Dup and Batch Entry features to attempt to more accurately estimate the issue date.
• In the previous release, the Summary window columns were accidentally converted to read only.  I changed those back to editable.

What's New in Version 5.3.8 and 5.3.7 beta (02/25/2003)

• Greatly enhanced the Creative Team and Appearances to take care of all the situations of which I am aware.  Please let me know about any formats (specific title and issue) that still cause problems.
• Error 52 - bad file name, should be eliminated.  Let me know if otherwise.
• Should now handle issues on GCD with an alpha-numeric number like "nn", "Prologue", etc., as well as "-1" issues.  Note:  You have to actually enter the correct issue number for it to work, for example, "nn" in the issue list.
• Added a Remove Link button to the Web Download window
• Added the web issue id to the Summary Window so you can easily find issues that have been updated, and those that have not.
• Added several columns to the grid on the issue detail window - Major Arc info and Net Paid

Important: The download process, at this point, only gets info for the first story from GCD. It will not get all the other story data for anthologies yet. I will do that next, but it's fairly complex, and I want to get this working as close to perfectly first.

So, DO NOT OVERWRITE your Creative Team and Appearances data for anthology issues you entered, if you entered all the story info. At this point, you'll lose the Creative Teams and Appearances for all the stories other than the first.  Of course, if you didn't enter the anthology info, go ahead and overwrite.

In general, I would not overwrite anything I entered for Creative Teams. I only overwrite previous downloads, but it's up to you.  I will let everyone know when ROW can handle the anthologies also.

What's New in Version 5.3.6 beta (02/14/2003)

• Fixed the number of pages so the number of pages to the issue shows up on the Issue Detail window, not the number of pages to the story (unless the issue pages is blank)
• When you close the message that says the update process is complete, the default is now on the Close button to the download window, so pressing the Enter key will close the window

What's New in Version 5.3.5 beta (02/13/2003)

I've fixed all the bugs of which I am aware.  In addition, I've greatly enhanced the Creative Team download to handle a number of variations in the GCD data.  Please keep an eye on the error messages and let me know anything that still looks incorrect.

Here's the Download Overview

Here are some tips for creative team entry

What's New in Version 5.3.4 beta (02/09/2003)

This fixes a lot of the initial bugs, especially around creative teams and appearances.   I haven't updated the help, but it's fairly obvious.  Please let me know if anything still looks incorrect.

• Option to add Title Comments to existing comments
• Option to Overwrite Creative Team and/or Appearances
• Option to make Creative Team names Last, First
• Improved enabling of buttons so you shouldn't be able to kick off the web search twice.
• Improved highlighting on grid
• Option to turn off images actually works

What's New in Version 5.3.3 beta (02/06/2003)

This beta features the ability to pull Title and Issue data from the web - (GCD database).  Click here for details.

I changed the GCD export to use the Series Title, not the Display Title.

What's New in Version 5.3.1 (10/17/2002)

Fixed a bug on the Issue Detail window where if you mistakenly entered something in the CGC field and then cleared the field, when you save the record, you get a type mismatch error.

On the Explorer View window, you can now delete a collection from the list by right clicking and choosing Delete Collection from the pop-up window.  There were some invalid collection names accidentally included in an earlier version of ROW.  You'll get an error 3044 first, and then you can delete the invalid collection from the list.

What's New in Version 5.2.9 & 5.3.0 (10/02/2002)

Added optional version checking to ROW so that it will check for the latest version, if you wish, and notify you if there is a newer version available.  If you keep this turned off (Misc Tab of the Preferences window), or have no internet connection, ROW will behave as it always did and you'll notice no difference.  This version also includes the version checker utility that will automatically download and install the latest version for you.  Click here if you want more info on how the version checker works.  BTW, since this is the latest version, you won't see any notification until the next version is available.

Fixed a bug in the Net Paid calculation that resulted from a previous change to the Net Paid calculation.  Important:  to be sure that your Net Paids are accurate, go into the Contacts window and run the Batch Net Paid update for each of the sources that have a discount and/or tax amount filled in.  Click here for details.

Made some minor changes to the Missing Issues report to fix some fairly obscure bugs.

What's New in Version 5.2.8 (08/28/2002)

Changed (somewhat) the way the Exclude from Missing Issues Report indicator works - click here for details

• Added a label on the Image tab of the Issue Detail window that will let you know how many additional images you have on file for the currently active issue.
• Fixed an error in the Missing Issues Report which occurred if you elected to Include TPB contents and you selected one or more publishers from the publisher list on the Print window.

What's New in Version 5.2.5 (08/01/2002)

Added a Notepad / Reminders window - click here for details

Added a window to more easily correct Creative Team Members accidentally assigned to the incorrect story on Anthology Issues - click here for details

When duplicating issues, you now have the option to duplicate the Creative Team, Anthology and/or Appearance data.  These are set on the Miscellaneous tab of the Preferences window, which can be selected from the Options menu.  Note:  if you Copy an issue, all of this information is copied, regardless of these settings.  The settings apply only to Duped records.  Copied records are exactly what they sound like, an exact copy.

Fixed a bug so that if you clear the Purchase Price, the Tax, Discount and Net Paid fields are cleared.

I changed the Tax, Discount and Net Price fields so they only automatically re-calculate if the fields are blank.  In the past, if you filled in these fields yourself, or if TAO did it, and then you tabbed through the Purchase Price field, ROW would re-calculate them based on what was set up for the Source for this issue.   Now, it will only do that if these fields are blank.

I've tried to standardize the way the Delete key works in tables where you can also edit data.  Basically, if there is any data selected in a specific cell, ROW assumes you want to clear the data, not delete the record.  If no data is selected, ROW assumes you want to delete the record.

• If you click on an individual column, and that column contains data, ROW will highlight the data.  If you press the Delete key, the data in that cell will be cleared, but that's all.
• If you click on an individual column, and that column contains no data (and therefore, ROW cannot highlight any data), if you press the Delete key, ROW will assume you want to delete the record, and will pop up the normal Delete Confirmation window.
• If you click one of the Record Selector buttons in the leftmost column, so that no specific cell is highlighted, and therefore no data is highlighted, and then press the Delete key, ROW will assume you want to delete the record, and will pop up the normal Delete Confirmation window.

Because there are so many columns on the Summary window now, it was possible to get an error saying that the data being saved was too big, when exiting the Summary window.  It actually refers to the column settings that are saved as a view.   I've fixed that so you don't get the error.

If you ran a Collection List report, and then ran a Title List report, you'd get an error, and the Title List report wouldn't run unless you closed ROW and came back in and ran it without first running the Collection List report.  That should be fixed now.

A number of the fields on the Profiles window did not allow long enough entries.   These have all been changed to unlimited length.  Here is a list of all the Profile fields that have unlimited length:

• Origin
• Key Issues / Highlights
• Additional Information
• Powers
• Source of Powers
• Occupation
• Base of Operation
• Special Skills
• Weapons
• Weaknesses

There is now a Zoom (expand) button on the Profile window (just like on the Issue Detail window).  If you move to any of these fields, the button will be enabled.  If you click the button, it will display the contents of the field in its own window.  This makes reading / editing much easier.

What's New in Version 5.2.3 (06/06/2002)

    Miscellaneous fixes:

• Thank you Joe Kaufman for pointing out that the Net Paid calculation was incorrect.  Prior to this version, the tax was being incorrectly applied to purchase price prior to the discount being taken.  That has now been fixed.
• Related to the above, the Net Paid Amount now displays with the other totals at the bottom of the Summary window.  It has also been added to the Collection List reports.
• Also related, the Expense Reports now give you the option to base the report either on the Cost (Purchase Price - no tax or discount applied) or on the Net Paid (purchase price - discount + tax).
• The Image Viewer window that shows all images for an individual issue, has been enhanced somewhat.  There is a technical limitation as to how many images can be shown on the window, based on their size.  At full size, only seven or so can be seen.  So, if you have a lot of images for each issue, display them on the viewer at one of the thumbnail sizes.  Then, single click on any thumbnail to display that image full size.
• There was a bug in the Missing Issues report if you ran it by Publisher or if you selected to Show excluded titles.  That should now be fixed.
• The Cover Name is now being written to the GCD export format, or those of you that use it.
• There was a bug in the Starting Subscription issue on the Title Maintenance window where if you entered a value, and then tried to clear it, you'd get an error.  That has been fixed.

What's New in Version 5.2.2 (04/17/2002)

    Miscellaneous fixes:

• There was nasty bug in 5.2.1 which inadvertently wrote the Publisher to the TPB Name field, and the Value Update Matched Title field (in the value Update Program) when you had AutoSave turned on, and you closed the Title window.  This is fixed, but please run the TPB reports, and take a look at the Value Update program to see if you need to fix any data.  Sorry for the inconvenience.
• The Creative Team Sequence Number should now change to the default sequence number anytime the role is changed, regardless of if it is a new or existing record.  The only time it will not change is if you are tabbing through an existing record, and the role has not changed.
• Fixed a number of misspellings in the CueCards.
• If you get an error while running the TPB reports (Database DLL error), it means you have a blank record on your database. Realms creates blank records sometimes, and I cannot seem to prevent it.  I will fix Realms so the error doesn't come up, but, in the meantime, to get rid of it, do the following:
  • Go to the Summary window
  • If you see any blank rows, delete them (try sorting by title)
  • If no blank rows appear, click Find
  • Enter "blank" (no quotes) in the Title field
  • Click Find (And)
  • Only blank rows will appear in the list.  You can tell they are there because you can click on the record selector.
  • Delete them
  • Once all the blank rows are deleted, the report will work fine.

What's New in Version 5.2.1 (04/10/2002)

    Miscellaneous fixes:

• Changed the format of the TPB Summary tab to be consistent with the look and feel of the Creative Team and Appearances tab, since they work basically the same way.  IMPORTANT:  if you use the Summary TPB entry method, you must run the Update TPB Summary Display option once from the Utilities menu so the TPB contents will display properly on the Summary TPB tab.
• Fixed all the floating windows (Cuecards, Summary Find window, etc.) so the stay on top for windows NT, 2000 and XP
• Removed the obsolete appearance fields (First Appearances, Good Guys, Villains, etc)   from the Summary window.  These were holdovers from earlier versions of ROW before the current Appearances tab was added and are completely unnecessary.
• Added all the new fields from version 5.2.0 below to the Summary window.
• If you change a title, the related TPB contents will be changed as well.  This works for both the Summary and Detail versions of TPB entry.
• The Creative Team Members' Name  list on the Creative Team window fills properly when you change roles, and have the Include Only Selected Role option on.
• Fixed a bug on the Image tab so the proper image is displayed when you change records.

What's New in Version 5.2.0 (03/20/2002)

Trade Paperback Detail data entry - click here for details

Related to this, there are now two sets of TPB reports, those that print the TPB contents for the Summary entry, and those that print the TPB contents for the Detail entry.

New Fields:

• Major Arc Name
• Major Arc Part Number
• Major Arc Total Parts
• TPB Name
• TPB Part Number
• TPB Total Parts
• CGC Grade

Some of the fields have been moved around a bit, and two new tabs have been added to the Issue Detail window.  Look in the help file for details.

Miscellaneous fixes:

• You can now use the Batch Edit feature on the Appearances fields.  You can do this from either the Summary window, or the Batch Edit window
• When you Dup a record, the Appearances will be copied to the new record.
• The Reading Order number was being incremented incorrectly on Dups.  That should now be fixed.
• Once again, the Missing Issues report has been "tinkered with", to hopefully get it to work for all possible scenarios.  Please let me know if you find otherwise (this means you, Rob - the avatar of the Missing Issue report testers)
• Added the first attempt at an Appearances report.  based on feedback I may need to enhance this a bit, so take a look and let me know what you think.
• Some international users, when setting the conversion factor, had to reset it every time you opened Realms.  That should be OK now.
• Related to the above, the text that displayed if the Book Value is based on a different currency was displaying in the wrong spot, behind another field, so you couldn't see it.

What's New in Version 5.1.23 (10/04/2001)

Miscellaneous fixes:

• If you change the description of a condition on the Condition Maintenance window, and then update your database with the changes, the descriptions on the issues records will also be updated.
• There is an annoying "Object is Unloaded" error that I cannot reproduce that happens to some users.  I added some code that hopefully will eliminate this.

What's New in Version 5.1.20 - 5.1.22 (07/23/2001)

In a never ending effort to get the most evil of all reports to work properly, I have made changes to the Missing Issues Report.  Please click here for details and let me know if this still does not work as hoped.

Miscellaneous fixes:

• If you added a new contact on the Contact Maintenance window, it was being added to the source list whether you checked the Add to Source List box or not.
• If you selected to update all sources with the Net Paid Amount, it would tell you there were none found to update.  That has been fixed.
• There was a bug in the Batch Edit Log code that's been hanging around since version 5.0 that made it so the title and issue didn't show up in the log.  That has been fixed.
• The Creative Team changes never showed up in the log (by design, well, laziness, really).  That has been somewhat fixed in that it now shows the changed from and changed to values, though it does not yet show the issues affected.

What's New in Version 5.1.18 - 5.1.19 (06/28/2001)

Miscellaneous fixes:

• I had to change the toolbar on the parent window to plain old buttons for now.  The other toolbar was causing GPFs if your color settings were 32 bit.  At some point, I'll switch it back, but since that's purely cosmetic, that's a little lower on the list.
• You can now change a Title in Batch Edit on the Summary Window.  It is very important that you understand how this differs from changing titles from the Title Maintenance window and when you should do each.  Click here for details.
• The Missing Issues report has been fixed AGAIN to try to handle TPBs properly.  The next release of Realms will include the ability to enter contents of TPBs as individual issues which should make all this elaborate, labyrinthine coding a relic of a more primitive time.
• If you used the Batch Dup process from the Subscription list window, it was not assigning the Publisher to the record.   That's been fixed.
• If you duped a record that had an owner status other than "Owned", it did not fill in the Purchase Date (I'm not sure why I did that!).  That has been fixed.
• Enhanced the Batch Image Update to allow spaces in the path, and increased the prefix length to 80.
• If you tried to Batch Image Update a title with an apostrophe in the Display Title field, you would get a syntax error.  That has been fixed.

What's New in Version 5.1.17 (06/02/2001)

Added the ability to assign image defaults, and update image locations a title at a time.  This is actually pretty handy (IMHO), so click here for details.

Added several fields to the Contact Maintenance window, as well as the Issue Detail window that links your Sources more directly, and also allows you to enter a tax and discount percent, which Realms will use to calculate a Net Paid Amount - click here for details.

Miscellaneous fixes:

• Added the ability to select a default condition from the Condition Maintenance window.  In the past, it always defaulted to Mint.  At least some users would prefer the default to be Near Mint.  Now, you can set that yourself.
• You can now update the Publisher (and, automatically update the publishers on the Title records as well) through Batch Edit on the Summary window.  This makes it MUCH easier to fix incorrect Publisher entries., in case you want to apply the same value to a whole bunch of books at once.
• You can now update the Book Value (and, automatically, all the related fields) through Batch Edit on the Summary window, in case you want to apply the same value to a whole bunch of books at once.
• Added a select all rows option to the menu that pops up on most grids when you right mouse click.  This will help if you want to delete a bunch of rows at once.
• Enhanced the Collection List report (slightly) to display the name of the currently active title on each page.  This will look repetitive on some pages, but is very helpful when the issues cross pages so you know what title they are without having to look back.
• Added a Value History report - really just a print version of the Value History window.  Select File/ Print on the Value History window, or right mouse click and select Print from the pop-up menu.
• Added a Profile List Report which lists all the profiles (and a few key fields) you have on file.  Right mouse click on the Profile window to access this report.
• If you click the Cancel button on the Find window accessed from the Issue Detail window, it will no longer force you to select a valid title from the title list first.

What's New in Version 5.1.15 (03/30/2001)

Added the ability to include multiple owner statuses in the Collection and Missing Issue Reports - click here for details.

Added a Batch Dup feature accessed from the Subscription window - click here for an explanation.

Added a Lookup Creative Team member option (the button says Find) to the Creative Team window for those of you that turn Prefill off - click here for details.

Miscellaneous fixes:

• Added a Text / Log file viewer to the Utility menu - you can use this to view any text file (whether Realms creates it or not) - it simply opens the selected file in notepad
• Added the ability to sort the Anthology Window data by any column in the list - right mouse click to access.
• After adding a new issue record, international users who use a comma instead of a decimal point for numeric entries, would get an error saying Realms could not position back to the just added record.  This should work properly for all users now.
• When using Batch Edit from the Creative Team window, the Summary window would pop up at the end, and you could get an error 91.  This is now fixed.  BTW, the update itself always worked properly, but I was accidentally referencing the Summary window right at the end, which caused the problem.
• If you used Batch Edit on the Creative Team window to change a creative team member, and that name was active on the Creative Team window, it didn't get updated to the new, corrected version.  Now, it does.
• If you ran the Produce Labels for Titles report after running the Collection List or Missing Issues List report, you would get an error 20510 - invalid formula.  This is fixed.
• On the Missing Issues report, if you had selected Include titles with no issues, it only included those titles where at least one title of the selected titles had at least one issue entered. If only titles with no issues were selected, there report would be empty.  On a related note, at this point, you get all the titles with no issues when you select this option.
• On the Multi-Title Crossovers window, if you pressed the Del key (as opposed to clicking on the Delete button, which works properly), the standard  Deletion verification - OK to delete Crossover ..., Part ... message comes up.  But, the crossover record was still deleted, even if you click Cancel - ouch!  Sorry.  That is now fixed so the Del key works the same as the Delete button
• When entering a new Crossover record, If you entered a non-numeric character (this includes a comma) in the
  Part Number field, Realms would kick you out of the application with a error 3075.  You still can't enter a non-numeric entry, but you'll get the standard Realms error, and it won't kick you out.  This is another case of a problem with number systems that use commas instead of decimal points. There are parts of the software that do not recognize this. I'm afraid you won't be able to use other than whole numbers as the part number. You could enter the actual part number (Prologue, epilogue, Part 1, etc.) in the comments.
• On the Preferences window, if you changed the User Defined Flags, they did not update related fields on the Title and Detail windows until you left Realms and came back in.  Now they update the Issue Maintenance window right away. You do have to close and re-open the Title Maintenance window (if it was open) to get it to refresh.
• Switching back and forth between the Collection List and Missing Issues List on the Print Collection window was not appropriately updating the title list based on the selections you've made.  Now it does.
• When adding a new issue record, Realms has to position to the first issue of the selected title before it goes to the just added record.  If that first record had a blank Purchase Date, Realms would fill it in with whatever the default is set to - either today's date, or the date you set.  This should now be fixed.
  

What's New in Version 5.1.12 (03/03/2001)

Miscellaneous fixes:

• The Missing Issues Report now has an option to include titles with no issues.  Prior to this, a title had to have at least one issue to show up in the report.
• Fixed a bug on the Multi-title Crossover window where sometimes it wouldn't allow you to enter a character that was less than the first entry on the list.
• For some users, the primary image on the Issue Detail window was bleeding through to the other tabs.  That is fixed.
• The Issue Date would sometimes fill in by itself if it had been left blank, and you opened the Creative Team or Appearances window

What's New in Version 5.1.1 (02/25/2001)

Added two TPB reports that give you information about the TPBs issues in your collection, and what they contain.

Added a utility that searches your machine for all the images linked to your issues, and updates any incorrect ones it finds - click here for details

Added a Image Viewer Window that allows you to see all the images associated with an issue

Added a Full Collection List by Publisher report.  Formerly, if you sorted by publisher, you only got the issue numbers.  Now, you get the same format as the Sort by Title Full report  - just select the appropriate options on the Print Collection window.

Miscellaneous fixes:

• The never ending battle to attempt to get the Missing Issues Report to work properly with TPBs, regardless of how the TPBs are entered goes on, as I made several additional corrections to this report.
• I finally came up with a workaround for the print option on the Summary window (and any other grids) which seems to work.  Just click the Print button, or, Right Mouse click, and select the Print option from the Pop-up menu, and the contents of the grid will print.  Don't forget to hide columns you don't want, and to change the page orientation if you want it to print Landscape (11 x 8.5).
• If you change the Display Title on the Title Maintenance window, any TPB records from the same title will also be changed to the new name.
• You can now sort the Creative Team entries by any column on the list.   Select the column(s), right mouse click, and select Ascending or Descending option
• I tried to standardize the pop-up menus on the grids better so they all have export and print options, as well as sorting where applicable.
• IMPORTANT: I added an Unlock column option where you can allow normally locked columns to be edited.  This is useful in cases requiring fixes to internal keys or something like that.  However, a word of warning - Please don't use this option unless you are really sure that you know what you are doing.   It might be a good idea to run what you plan to do by me first.

What's New in Version 5.0.99j (11/18/2000)

Miscellaneous fixes:

• Added a Formerly Known As and Became fields to the Title Maintenance window - click the AKA button to access them - not enough room
• Fixed another Missing Issues report bug, where, if the last issue you owned was less than the first issue in a multi-title TPB, the multi-title TPB issues wouldn't be taken into account.

What's New in Version 5.0.99i (10/16/2000)

Miscellaneous fixes:

• Fixed a bug on the Appearance window, where, for Anthology Issues, if you typed in the Story field, you received an error and it dropped you out of Realms (bad programmer!!)
• Fixed another Missing Issues report bug, where, if the first issue for a title was non-numeric, and you ran more than one title, it would look like you owned issue #1
• I had put in the option to change the Wishlist highlight color on the Issue Detail window, but never put any code behind it, so it didn't do anything (very clever on my part, I must say).  That should work now.  Right mouse click on the grid to bring up the menu.

What's New in Version 5.0.99f - 5.0.99h (8/21/2000)

Miscellaneous fixes:

• If you DON'T manually change the Creative Team field on the Issue Detail window after duping the record (but before saving it), when you save it, Realms will work like it used to, and not re-number the creative team sequence numbers.  Click here for more detail on this.
• If you had the Drop List Box on Focus option turned on and clicked the Issues button on the Title Maintenance window, you get all kinds of wacky events.  This should now be OK.
• If you had the Title window maximized, and then left that window, when you went back using the toolbar, the window wouldn't come up maximized.  Now it should.
• Finally (I hope), more changes to the Missing Issues Report that hopefully will be the last for a while. 

What's New in Version 5.0.99c - 5.0.99e (7/17/2000)

Multiple fixes to the Missing Issues report - please read this overview

User Defined options for Default Cover Price logic

Miscellaneous fixes:

• If you manually change the Creative Team field on the Issue Detail window after duping the record (but before saving it), when you did save it, Realms used to ignore the changes and pull the creative team from the duped record.
• After moving columns around on grids, Realms sometimes didn't "remember" their new location properly.
• Using Batch Edit with the "No Match Required" option didn't actually update anything (though it made it seem like it did).
• Using Batch Edit to change the Creative Team Sequence Numbers caused an invalid property value error.
• If you exited Realms with the Issue Detail window maximized, Realms did not start it up maximized next time
• If you enter anything in the TPB issues field, the Use in Missing Issues Report check box defaults to yes (checked).  This is for new records only.  If you add an entry to existing records, you must change it yourself.

What's New in Version 5.0.99a (6/24/2000)

• There was a typo in the TPB code that cause an error in the Missing Issues report.   That was the only thing changed for this version

What's New in Version 5.0.99 (6/21/2000)

Enhanced Support for entering Multi-Title Trade Paperbacks - now linked to the Missing Issues report

Slight difference in selecting fonts on the Preferences window

• Fixed a sorting problem with the Issue and Purchase dates on the Explorer View
• Double Clicking the image in the Profile window no longer produces an error
• Right Mouse click on Detail window and Summary window grids (column(s) must be selected on Summary window) pops up menu for easier sorting / hiding columns
• Exporting data from grids should now work - printing from grids still a problem but I suggest exporting to excel and then printing from there
• Fixed Sorting problem on Summary window - was sorting by wrong columns

What's New in Version 5.0.98 (5/25/2000)

Batch update of Genre, Group By and Cover Price field from the Title Maintenance window

Cue Cards and the Status Bar / Floating Tips are now two separate options

Support for entering Multi-Title Trade Paperbacks

What's New in Version 5.0.97a (5/10/2000)

• "Update without Add New or Edit" error when you click the Save button on the Summary window resolved
• Condition column added to the list on the Issue Detail window
• The Sequence Number on the Issue Detail window could be left blank for non-numeric issues - that's been fixed
• Creative Team and Appearance lists are refreshed when you run the Build Lookups from the File menu

What's New in Version 5.0.97 (5/7/2000)

Realms now writes an error log when errors occur - you only need to send me that if you get an error

• Character Appearance data can be changed from the batch edit window
• You can access batch edit directly from the Appearances window and the Creative Team window
• The Issue Detail Report has been enhanced to display the appearance data as well as several of the recently added fields (like Genre, Group By 1 and 2) that were not appearing on the reports.
• If you entered only a character name and nothing else on the Appearances window, you would get an invalid use of null error - that is fixed.
• New entries in the Creative Team and Appearances windows weren't showing up if you closed the window and came back - that is fixed

What's New in Version 5.0.96a (4/21/2000)   

Character Appearance conversion process fixed to pick up Cameos, First Appearances and Supporting Characters

Export to Grand Comics Database (GCD) format - IMPORTANT:  You must read this first if you plant to use it!!

Miscellaneous:

• Right mouse click on the Issue Detail List to change list options including Wish List Highlight Color
• The Missing Issues report should handle Trade Paperbacks better
• Minimizing Realms with the Summary window open should no longer produce an error
• There were a number of formatting problems when saving new views and refreshing the Summary window.  Those should now be fixed
• Related to above, the Summary window should "remember" any formatting changes (field width, position)
     

What's New in Version 5.0.95 (4/3/2000)

Character Appearance section changed to behave like the Creative Team

Entering Data Directly Into the Character Appearances Field

Entering Data Directly Into the Creative Team Field

Batch Title Change from the Title Maintenance window

Miscellaneous Fixes:

• Type Mismatch error in the Missing Issues report fixed
• Type Mismatch error in the Multi Title Crossover window fixed
• Subscription report sorted by Publisher fixed - didn't work before
• You can use single quotes in the Batch Edit function, and it will work - before it wouldn't

What's New in Version 5.0

Well, first and foremost, version 5.0 is 32 bit

Option to use an Explorer Like Interface

New Windows

More data fields

The Date Fields work a little differently

Grids (tables) work a little differently - sorting / setting the appearance

Version 5.0 is 32 bit

Ok, so, what's that mean to you as a user.

Well, the look and feel of the application should be more consistent with other 32 bit Windows applications

Support for long names comes along automatically

Out of Memory errors are less common (though still possible)

Integration with the internet is much easier

Option to use an Explorer Like Interface

This is something I think may turn out to be a big hit.  On the Toolbar, click the Explorer button and you can access your collection through "treeview" windows, the way Windows Explorer does.  This interface actually is a pretty good match for way titles and issues are related.  Click here for details on how this interface works

New Windows

Issue Images window

Comic Cons / Conventions

Multi-Title Crossovers

Super Team Entry

Filter Titles

Value History Maintenance

New Data Fields

Turn on the Cue Cards in Realms, and move the mouse over the label for any of these fields to get additional information

Title Maintenance:

• Imprint
• Genre
• Frequency of Publication ("1 per month", etc.)
• Does this title suffer from an irregular release schedule?
• Other issues outside of the Starting and ending issue range (like 1/2 issues)
• Restrict the Missing Issues report to this range of issues only
• Exclude this title from the Missing Issues Report?
• Group By 1
• Group By 2
• Formerly Called (what this title used to be called, if applicable)
• Title Became (if this title changed names)

Issue Details:

• Cover Name (not Issue Name, but the story name on the outside cover, if there is one)
• Genre (in case issues within the same title could have different genres)
• TPB Issues (if this is a TBP, what issues does it reprint?)
• Use the above issues in the Missing Issues report (as if you owned them individually)?
• Crossover Total Parts ("Part 1 of 6", for example)
• Position in Box
• Book Value 3
• Price Guide 3 (a bit of overkill, probably)
• Maximum price you will pay for this issue
• Cameo Appearances
• Supporting Characters
• Group By 1
• Group By 2
• Flag 1
• Flag 2
• Flag 3
• Flag 4
• Flag 5