DramaQueen 1.8 – Update-Report

This update contains new features, numerous improvements, as well as bugfixes:

NEW FEATURES

• DramaQueen now supports MORE & CONT’D for page breaks within dialogue. The setting can be found in the Layout settings for the script in the Extra -> MORE & CONTINUED section.

IMPROVEMENTS

• Scene headings can be freely edited. This has several advantages:
  • All elements of a scene heading can be navigated and edited with the keyboard. Using the mouse is no longer necessary.
  • Field contents are completely free, for example the time of day.

  At the same time, the advantages of the old drop-down menus remain:

  • There are still pre-configured time of day options, which are offered via auto-completion (Smart-Type).
  • When using TAB to cycle to the next field of a scene heading, punctuation is automatically inserted.
  • The order and layout of the scene headings can still be configured and converted in the Layout settings (in „Extra“) between ‚Left-aligned‘ and ‚Split left and right‘.
• Text can now be inserted before the first step or first scene (i.e. for a prologue, a dedication, a prepended quote or character description or for the initial “FADE IN”). The cursor has to be placed in the first line of the first page.
• The new program settings allow to configure two global settings:
  • The program interface language (English or German) can be manually selected. (Previously, DramaQueen
    selected the language according to the system language.) Changing the language takes effect after restarting DramaQueen.
  • The tool tips, which are shown when hovering many interface elements, can be globally activated or deactivated. (Tool tips above tool bar icons are currently always shown.)

  The progam settings can be reached from the menu View -> Program settings… (in Windows, Linux) resp. DramaQueen -> Preferences… (in Mac OS X).

• The program launch has been reworked, unified for all platforms, and the included Java version has been updated. This brings the following improvements:
  • DramaQueen launches more quickly.
  • In Windows DramaQueen can be pinned to the Taskbar.
  • The Windows installer has become smaller by about 20 MiB.
  • The Mac version now also includes Java (as recommended by Apple). Up to now, the old Apple Java 6 had to be installed manually for Mac OS 10.8 and later.
  • For Mac OS older than 10.7 we still offer a 32-Bit version of DramaQueen that uses the system installed Java.
• In Windows and Linux DramaQueen uses high resolution icons, if the display has an appropriate resolution. The maximum text zoom has been adjusted accordingly.
• Command-M is a shortcut for minimizing a main window.
• When renaming a character in the Characters panel to a name which is already taken, there is now the option to merge the two profiles. The same is possible for locations and ideas.
• Trailing white space in character names no longer prevents the automatic character detection from finding these names.
• When deactivating and re-activating a text level, there is now an additional option to just delete the existing synopsis, treatment or script (without transfering the text from another level).
• Support videos are no longer embedded, but linked instead. The reason for this change is that under Windows and Linux, depending on the system configuration, there could be problems with the embedded Browser component. Another advantage of the new solution is that the Help panel opens more quickly.

BUG FIXES

• A display glitch in the Texts panel, when the length of paragraphs changed such that they moved to the next page, or back to the previous page.
• A crash during text editing with activated auto-formatting, when the notification had been shown that reminds about auto-formatting being turned on, after hitting ENTER three times in a row.
• The notification mentioned in the previous item opened more often than intended after an initial delay of 20 minutes (but could be de-actived permanently with the checkmark “Do no show again”).
• Jumping to text notes from the note editor list has not always worked: Notes on the title page could not always be navigated, and some notes have been covered by the note editor itself.
• In the Outline panel, the separate configuration of element type and numbering has not worked anymore since locked and automatic numbers are shown differently.