Course Variations and Relays
Finish up support through the program. All reports now handle variations correctly. Course summary shows the length of every variation. Creating OCAD Files handles variations correctly.
IOF XML export now includes leg assignments for relays if those have been defined.
When defining relay team assignments, you can assign specific legs to specific branches. For example, if there are four branches and four legs, you could assign leg 4 to always run branch D, and have legs 1, 2, 3 vary among branches A, B, C.
White out, lines, images, text, and all special objects can now be specifically added or removed from the all controls view.
The type of flagging to the finish can now be set separately for different courses that use the same finish control.
Event Audit now shows legs run in opposite order on different courses. Event Audit also shows if the same control is used twice in a row or twice in the same score course.
Course Variations and Relays
Fix signficant bugs that cause relay courses to sometimes not appear. Better flexibility for rearranging and inserting controls in the control ordering view. Better support in reports.
64-bit Support
Purple Pen now runs in 64-bit mode on 64-bit operating systems. You do not need to select a separate 64-bit installation; the installer installs 32-bit and 64-bit support. On 64-bit operating systems, Purple Pen will be able to load larger bitmaps and PDFs (up to 500 megapixels) without running out of memory.
Open Orienteering Mapper Files
Purple Pen now allows an Open Orienteering Mapper file (.xmap or .omap) to be used as the base map for course design. You can also export your course designs to a new Open Orienteering Mapper file. All Open Orienteering Mapper maps should display as they appear in OOM. Georeferenced OOM files are supported only if they use the UTM coordinate system (this restriction may be relaxed in the final version).
Course Variations and Relays
You can now add forks or loops into courses, creating courses with variations. For example, a course might have two 2-way forks in a row, allowing four possible ways through the course. Each course variation is identified with a letter code that identifies which forks are taken. In the previous example, "AD" would indication that choice A is taken at the first fork, and choice D at the second fork. In order to view the variations more easily, the left side of the Purple Pen display (that normally shows the control descriptions), can be switched to show the control ordering, with forks displayed. Controls can be dragged around the ordering, and controls and legs can be easily selected for adding new controls. In order to create a variation, select a control, then click "Add Variation" on the toolbar. You can chose whether to add a fork or loop, and how many branches to create.
When you have a course with variations, Purple Pen can automatically assign variations to relay team members. Chose "Relay Team Variations" from the Course menu, and chose how many legs and teams you have. You can later add more teams without disrupting the assignments of existing teams, as long as the number and arrangement of forks doesn't change.
When printing (courses, description sheets, punch cards), you can chose which variations or teams to print. Click on the course with the variation, and click "Select Variations..." to chose variations for that course.
Better PDF Files
When using a PDF file as the base map for course design, Purple Pen no longer requires the download of GPL Ghostscript for reading PDF files. Purple Pen now has built in support for reading PDFs, based on the open source PDFium project used by Google Chrome. Compatibility is much better, especially for PDFs produced by OCAD.
User Interface Changes
The Item menu has been reorganized, and the entries that add items have been moved to a new "Add" menu.
Polish and Hungarian translations included.
Now supports IOF XML version 3.0 export along with version 2.0.3.
IOF XML export (both versions 2 and 3) now output real-world coordinates of controls when used with a geo-referenced OCAD map.
New support for text control descriptions to enable languages such as Polish to include nouns that change case based on modifiers in other columns.
Supports Polish as a language for textual control descriptions. Thanks to Dominik Zalewski!
Eliminates a bug where the initial language for control descriptions was sometimes set incorrectly.
Eliminates a bug drawing PDF files >200 square inches or bitmap files >72,000,000 pixels. (Thanks to Tommi Lahtonen for finding and reporting this bug.)
Supports the OCAD 12 file format. Purple Pen can load map files in the OCAD 12 file format, and can also export to the OCAD 12 file format. However, new symbol types only in OCAD 12 are not yet supported. These symbol features are rarely, if ever, used in orienteering maps, so this should not be a significant issue. If you do use these features, a warning message will appear when loading the file, and also when printing or exporting a PDF.
The handling of print areas, paper sizes, and orientation (landscape/portrait) has been substantially redone in order to make it simpler to use. Instead of setting the paper size when printing or creating a PDF, you now set the paper size when creating a new event, or when using the File/Set Print Area command. You can set different paper sizes for different courses.
The print area can now be viewed all the time using the View/Show Print Area command. When changing the print area, you can now have the print area fixed to be the same as the page size, which greatly simplifies setting the print area. Also, there is an automatic setting which automatically choses the print area based on the map and the course.
When loading files created in a previous version of Purple Pen, you should check the paper size and make sure it is set correctly.
A new option is present on the Event/Customize Appearance dialog: Use overprint effect for colors marked overprint. On an OCAD map, this causes Purple Pen to use the overprinting effect when printing (or creating a PDF) for colors in the color table that request it. This is off by default. If you don't know what this means, you probably want to leave it off.
When adding textual lines in the middle of a description using "Item/Add Text Line", you can now have multiple lines of text.
On the "Event/Customize Description Text" dialog, there is now an option for "Make this the default language for new events." This does just what it sounds like; change the language that is used for textual control descriptions on new events.
Textual control descriptions for Chinese (Traditional) are included. Thanks to Raphael Mak.
The setting of View/All Controls" is now saved between runs of the program.
The handling of print areas, paper sizes, and orientation (landscape/portrait) has been substantially redone in order to make it simpler to use. Instead of setting the paper size when printing or creating a PDF, you now set the paper size when creating a new event, or when using the File/Set Print Area command. You can set different paper sizes for different courses.
The print area can now be viewed all the time using the View/Show Print Area command. When changing the print area, you can now have the print area fixed to be the same as the page size, which greatly simplifies setting the print area. Also, there is an automatic setting which automatically choses the print area based on the map and the course.
When loading files created in a previous version of Purple Pen, you should check the paper size and make sure it is set correctly.
A new option is present on the Event/Customize Appearance dialog: Use overprint effect for colors marked overprint. On an OCAD map, this causes Purple Pen to use the overprinting effect when printing (or creating a PDF) for colors in the color table that request it. This is off by default. If you don't know what this means, you probably want to leave it off.
When adding textual lines in the middle of a description using "Item/Add Text Line", you can now have multiple lines of text.
On the "Event/Customize Description Text" dialog, there is now an option for "Make this the default language for new events." This does just what it sounds like; change the language that is used for textual control descriptions on new events.
Textual control descriptions for Chinese (Traditional) are included. Thanks to Raphael Mak.
The setting of View/All Controls" is now saved between runs of the program.
If the "White outline around numbers" options was used, and a PDF was created, the number "11" in had the white outline on the second "1" offset. This was due to different kerning rules being used for the control number and the outline. This is now fixed.
OCAD 11 changed the way that dashed lines were drawn, then in OCAD 11.5.4 added the View/Line Objects Appearance as in OCAD 10. Purple Pen now respects both options when drawing dashed lines. (Thanks to Mark Roberts for noticing this.)
In rare cases Purple Pen would draw fences and similar features with corner points different than OCAD. (Thanks for Mark Roberts for noticing this.)
A text symbol with an attached point symbol did not display correctly in some cases.
When loading bitmaps used as background maps, Purple Pen would lock the files so that OCAD could not load them. Purple Pen no longer locks bitmap files.
When using PDF files that used to produce the error "Cannot handle iref streams", Purple Pen now detects the problem and works around it (at the cost of bigger file size and slightly reduced resolution.)
Added the "Course/Duplicate Course..." command to duplicate a course. (Requested by several people.)
Added the ability to override the automatic computation of course length and specify a course length in the course properties. (Thanks to David Rosen for this request.)
When a control that is shared between multiple courses is moved, a dialog now comes up asking if you want to move that control is all courses, or create a new control (thereby not changing the other courses.) This does not occur if you move a control on the All Controls display, or move a control less than 50 meters. This helps a common confusion, especially among beginners.
After deleting a control, the control that preceded it is selected. This makes it easier to add a new control. (Thanks to Mark Roberts for this suggestion.)
On commands that have a list of courses to select from (Print, Create OCAD files, etc.), the set of courses selected is preserved between invocations of the command. (Thanks to Mark Roberts for this suggestion.)
Printing courses has an option to pause printing after each course or course part is printed. This allows easily changing paper or flipping paper over to print the back side. (Thanks to Mike Gammon for this suggestion.)
Textual control descriptions can be done in Japanese. (Thanks to Tojo Masaya for this translation.)
The default number of copies of a course to print is always 1. (Thanks to Mark Roberts for this suggestion.)
Remove the "Exit" button from the initial screen, since there is already an "X" button in the top corner. (Thanks to Mark Roberts for this suggestion.)
Fix problem where Purple Pen would not draw some text objects in the OCAD 11 layout layer. (Thanks to )
Add the ability to blend the purple color of courses with the underlying map, so that dark and black objects show through the purple color. (This is sometime called overprinting.) This is turned on by default when creating a new Purple Pen file. You can turn this on and off by choosing Event/Customize Course Appearance, and checking the "blend purple with underlying map colors".
Purple blending works in the on screen display, printing, and PDF file creation. When exporting to OCAD, the purple color has the "overprinting" option turned on.
Creating the ability to export a GPX file with control locations to copy to a mobile GPS unit. If you use an OCAD map that is properly georeferenced, you can create a GPX file with the control locations that you can download to your GPS device (or smartphone). When setting courses this can help double check that the control location is correct.
Make the donation link on the initial screen more prominent.
Change the default color of purple to add some cyan.
The "Rasterize Before Printing" option in File/Print Courses is now on by default.
Fix typo in German control description text (thanks to Andrea Schneider).
Add the ability to change the size of the gap (or disable the gaps) placed when two legs cross each other. This is changed in Event/Customize Course Appearance.
Change the default gap size placed when two legs cross each other from 5.0mm to 3.5mm.
Don't create a gap when a leg bend is inserted right at the end of a leg (for instance to slightly displace a leg.)
Remove ArgumentNullException when loading non-OCAD map.
Prevent problem in rare case when an old symbols.xml file is in the Windows VirtualStore directory. (Thanks to Roy McGregor for reporting this.)
Add the "Add Special Item/Image" command. This allows adding a bitmap image (in either BMP, JPEG, PNG, GIF, or TIFF format to a map. This is useful for adding sponsor logos and other bitmaps to a map. NOTE: If you add an image object, your Purple Pen file cannot be loaded by earlier versions of Purple Pen.
Add the "Add Special Item/Line" and "Add Special Item/Rectangle" commands. These allow adding a series or line segments or a rectangle to the map. The color and width of the line can be set, and lines can be single, double, or dashed. NOTE: If you add a line or rectangle object, your Purple Pen file cannot be loaded by earlier versions of Purple Pen.
Add the "Add Special Item/Text" command can now customize the color and font of the text.
In "Event/Customize Course Appearance", you can now choose whether the descriptions on the map are shown in black or purple. (Thanks to Noel Schoknecht for this suggestion.)
Legs of a course automatically have gaps added where they cross other legs (or controls).
The setup program is now signed with a digital signature. This should make people feel more safe downloading it, and also will make the Windows SmartScreen filter accept the file without a nasty warning message (eventually).
Japanese translation. (Thanks to Tojo Masaya.)
Textual control descriptions are now available in Catalan. (Thanks to Salvador Pratt Oller for the translation.)
When determining the bounds of a map (for printing), hidden symbols are now ignored. (Thanks to Bob Forgrave for reporting this.)
Added the "white outline around numbers" options in Event/Customize Course Appearance.
Fixed occasional "Generic GDI+ Error" when exporting to OCAD and the map is a bitmap file.
Better handling of large bitmap and PDF maps. This should significant reduce out of memory errors.
Improve PDF output for better compatibility with Adobe Illustrator. (Thanks to "highervan" for this report).
First control number property now works correctly for score courses. (Thanks to "m.seddon33"" for this report).
Self-recursive background maps no longer crash the program.
Add notification message for rare case of incorrect .NET framework installation.
Improve program running in "high-DPI" systems. Maps should display sharper, and redrawing bugs fixed.
Fix problem where bitmap background maps in OCAD 8 were incorrectly displayed. (Thanks to Mike Godfree for finding this.)
Fix problem where OCAD background maps with real world coordinates didn't align properly. (Thanks to Phill Batts for finding this.)
Fix problem where OCAD 8 export of bitmap or PDF maps was incorrect.
When an OCAD files has visible background maps (also known as templates), those are now displayed as part of the map file. Some people used background maps as part of the actual map they wanted to view or print, so this is now enabled.
Fewer out of memory errors when using large bitmap maps.
Better handling of the case where the map file cannot be found.
Allow using a PDF file as the map file, instead of an OCAD file or bitmap. Purple Pen automatically downloads and uses GPL Ghostscript to read PDF files.
Create vector PDF files directly from the program, without having to use a PDF print driver or OCAD. Uses the CMYK color space for the PDF files, if desired. If the map file was a PDF also, incorporates the PDF map file into the final PDF at original quality.
When exporting OCAD maps, if the map file was a PDF file, or a bitmap file of a format that isn't supported by the OCAD version targeted, Purple Pen will automatically create a bitmap file of a supported format to use as the background map in OCAD.
Add Course Part Options to allow adding the finish to parts of a course with a map exchange.
Add $(CoursePart) to the special text options for Text special items.
Fixed OCAD export of courses with map exchange to export parts separately. (Thanks to Oliver O'Brien for the report on this.)
Fixed display of description line height in tool tip. (Thanks to Mike Godfree for the report on this.)
You can now delete a map exchange at a control point by selecting it in the description sheet and pressing Delete.
Flagged lags after mandatory crossing points now display in the description sheet.
Fixed exception with certain OCAD line symbols. (Thanks to Steve Watkins for the report on this.)
When exporting to OCAD, copy the real world coordinates of this underlying OCAD map. This fixes a problem in OCAD 11 where the underlying map is not displayed.
Added Australian English as a new language for control descriptions. This is the same as the normal English descriptions, except that "reentrant" becomes "gully" and "stream" becomes "watercourse". I'm happy to take further changes from any Australians who wish to make them.
Added documentation to the help file for all new features.
Fixed problem with XML and RouteGadget export when the classes are multiple lines. (Thanks to Paul Frost for finding this issue.)
When using map exchange with marked route, the map exchange point is not shown on the previous part, but the marked route is (if long enough to extend beyond the last control circle).
Fixed problem with setup program not associated .ppen files correctly.
Printing of descriptions on All Controls now works.
A few crashing bugs fixed.
When the program crashes or encounters an unhandled exception, an option is provided to send a detailed crash report to the developer to use to help find and fix the problem.
Added links to a new part of the Purple Pen web site that accepts donations.
Based on feedback, no longer warn for control codes that are numbers less than 31.
Files saved with 2.0 can now be loaded into 1.x version of Purple Pen without error.
Trying to add descriptions to "All Parts" of a course with a map exchange now gives a message explaining what to do, rather than just disabling the command. (Thanks to Bruce Marshall for feedback on this.)
If the Arial Narrow Regular font was missing, but Arial Narrow Bold was not, the program would crash. (Thanks to Lukas Janusauskas for reporting this.)
Arrow keys now work correctly for moving around the map.
The text on the all controls description that indicated the number of controls always appeared in English, instead of using the language of the description. (Thanks to Christopher Schive for bringing this to my attention.)
Small or zero-sized rectangle symbols with rounded corners did not display correctly. (Thanks to Brian Ward for reporting this and helping me to track it down.)
Printing with JPG, GIF, PNG, BMP, or TIFF maps failed with "method not implemented" error. (Thanks to several people for reporting this.)
A few fonts were printing slightly vertically displaced.
Can now click on the background to de-selected whatever was selected. Also, dragging the map with the left mouse button works even when placing controls. (Thanks to Steve Edgar for feedback on this.)
Install program now removes previous versions from the Add/Remove programs list.
Full support for map exchanges. You can add a map exchange either at a control, or with a flagged route to a map exchange point. Purple Pen allows you to view either parts of the course, or the entire course, and creates partial or full control descriptions, as appropriate. You can set a different print area for each part of a course with a map exchange, although all parts must be on the same map file.
Multi-column descriptions on the map. If the control description won’t fit well in a single column on the map, you can change the shape of the description to appear in multiple columns.
The "all controls" map can have a description sheet placed on it with descriptions for all the controls.
When you hover over a control or leg on the map, a small popup appears with information about the control or leg. This can be turned on or off with the "View/Show Popup Information" menu item.
On Windows Vista and later, printing has been completely revamped to use a vector-based printing model. This should result in smaller spool files, faster printing, and better PDF creation when used with a PDF print driver. You can switch back to the old method (in case of problems) by checking the "Rasterize Before Printing" check box in the Print Courses dialog. (On Windows XP, the Rasterize Before Printing option is always on and cannot be disabled).
The program now uses the "CMYK" (cyan-magenta-yellow-black) color model by default when printing or displaying on the screen. This should mean that maps print with colors much closer to what the map creator intended, and similar to how OCAD prints them on a PostScript printer. When printing, you now have the option of using the "CMYK" color model (the new default), the “RGB” printing model (how Purple Pen 1.x did it), or "OCAD Compatible". The "OCAD Compatible" model should produce the same output as OCAD does on the same printer.
Score courses can have the controls labeled with the number of points for the control (along with the control number or code).
Gaps in control circles are now much better and more like gaps in a leg. You can drag a gap of any size and adjust the size of a gap after it is created. You can now add a small (2mm) gap in a leg by just clicking after selecting the add gap command.
Provide the option of a center dot for controls in Event/Customize Course Appearance.
Add $(PrintScale) to the special text options for Text special items.
You can drag the map around with the left mouse button as well as the right mouse button.
For clarity, the "Create EPunch Interface File" menu item has been renamed to "Create Data Interchange File (IOF XML)".
When a new version is available for download, provides the option to automatically download and install the new version.
The setup program is redone. This shouldn't make a large difference, but hopefully will be more reliable.
Class names (from the secondary title/class name for a course) are now exported to the IOF XML. This should improve compatibility with some other software.
The program now uses the .NET Framework 4.0 instead of the .NET Framework 2.0. The setup program will automatically download and install the new version if necessary.
German translation, thanks to Andrea Schultze.
Estonian translation, thanks to Tarmo Klaar.
Estonian translation, thanks to Tarmo Klaar.
Support for reading and writing OCAD 11 format files.
Eliminate exceptions with certain video cards when dragging controls.
Improve memory usage in some scenarios.
Orienteering Interchange XML files are written without a byte order mark.
Bulgarian translation, thanks to Galena Tomova.
Romanian translation, thanks to Virtual Orienteering (vorienteering.com).
In certain rare cases where a line object ended with a corner point, fence symbols (and similar) had an extra tick mark and the very end of of the line. (Thanks to Mike Godfree for the report.)
In rare cases an empty text object would cause the map not to display. (Thanks to Mike Godfree for the report.)
Nynorsk translation, thTTTTanks to Michael Willig.
Spanish translation, thanks to Antonio Salguero.
Finnish translation, thanks to Mikko Tani.
In certain rare cases, line features with pointy ends (such as "Erosion Gully") were not drawn correctly. This is now fixed. Thanks to Andrew Evans for reporting this issue and providing a map that showed the problem.
Treatment of symbols with colors that are not present the OCAD color table updated (now ignores color, rather than picking another color).
Display of lines with decreasing symbols was improved, and a crashing bug fixed if the final size was zero. These symbols are rarely used in orienteering maps.
The Course Appearance dialog now allows setting control numbers to be bold on the map.
Text lines in the control descriptions will wrap to multiple lines if necessary.
When the Norwegian translation is enabled, a menu item appears which brings up a web site with Norwegian documentation for Purple Pen. This can be enabled for other languages also, should anyone wish to create such web sites.
IOF XML files now number course ids starting at zero for better compatibility with other software.
Fix problem loading certain malformed OCAD files, to avoid error message "Points array must have at least two elements".
Now supports Norwegian in program user interface and control descriptions.
Translations for some of the new features (RouteGadget file creation) are now available in French.
In some cases, clicking in column A on the All Controls description would cause an exception.
Some structured area symbols where the structured symbol was far from the origin did not display correctly. Now fixed.
IOF XML files now include the date and time they were created in the XML.
Fully supports reading and creating OCAD 10 files, including all new symbol and object features.
The new "Create RouteGadget Files..." command on the File menu automatically creates both a .GIF format image of the map (appropriately cropped with the correct resolution) along with an .XML file, for use in RouteGadget.
You can specify the number of the first control in a course in the Course/New or Course/Properties command. The number is typically 1, but you can set it to another value as a way to handle multi-part courses and other special situations.
You can specify the style to print the labels on control circles -- the usual sequence number, the control code, or both (e.g., "4-234"). Thanks to Andy Simpson for contributing code for this feature.
For score courses, you can specify which column the points for each control is displayed in: column, A, B, H, or not displayed at all.
When a font cannot be found, and bold and/or italic was specified, uses the bold and/or italic version of Arial (matching OCAD's behavior), instead of the non-bold, non-italic Arial.
Fixed a bug that would result in OutOfMemoryException when drawing certain OCAD maps.
A new special item has been added: white out area, which can be added like other special items (such on out of bounds area). The white out area blanks out the underlying map.
Made more resilient in opening OCAD files with malformed or unexpected data.
Fixed a problem that prevented loading certain OCAD files with mismatched objects/symbols.
Text special items that were empty caused an exception.
In certain cases, trying to place a text object that was empty would cause an exception. This is fixed.
OCAD text objects which had a newline at the very beginning drew one line too low compared to OCAD (for no apparent reason, OCAD ignores an initial newline in a text object.) Purple Pen now matches OCAD's behavior.
Fixed the appearance of some dialog windows when running with "Large Fonts".
Some arrow characters didn't appear in a vanilla XP installation.
Swedish and French translations updated.
The user interface of the program can be displayed in multiple languages. Use the File/Program Language command to change the language of the user interface. English, French, and Swedish languages are provided.
Automatically generated textual control descriptions can be displayed or printed in different languages. To change the language for an event, use the Event/Customize Description Text command. English, French, Swedish, and UK English are provided.
By default, when printing the map is cropped to fit on a single page. In most cases, this means you don't have to set the print area manually, since Purple Pen intelligently crops to fit the course best on the page. If you want you can still print a map across multiple pages.
Arbitrary text can be added to the map using Item/Add Special Item/Text. This text can have special text in it that changes depending on the course (e.g., $(CourseName) becomes the name of the course).
The new Event / Customize Course Appearance command can be used to adjust the sizes of controls circles, lines, and control numbers. It can also be used to change the shade of purple used for the course.
The event title, and the class list/secondary title, can have multiple lines in them. This is especially useful for courses with many classes in them. When editing directly in the description pane, use vertical bar (|) to separate the lines.
Overlapping control circles are automatically cut to avoid the overlap (except on the All Controls display).
In the initial start up window, you are now given a choice (the default choice, in fact), to load the last file you were working on.
Dialog windows now use a nicer looking and slightly bigger font.
Problems loading or drawing certain OCAD files have been fixed.
Exported IOF XML (Create E-Punch Interface File) no longer contains the DOCTYPE declaration referencing the IOFdata.dtd file, since it caused problems with some programs.
Printing should be faster, especially in cases with large patterned area (e.g., open land with scattered trees), or printing multiple copies of the same map.
If the background map is changed while it is open (for example, the map is edited and saved in OCAD), Purple Pen will automatically reload the changed map file.
The AltGr key on some keyboards now works correctly when directly editing the title of an event or the dimensions in column F. Also, if you enter text here and then click outside the popup without pressing Enter, the entered text is used instead of discarded.
If the textual description for a control is too long to fit into two lines using the default font size, the font size is automatically shrunk so the description will fit.
Display of the margins and page size now is in mm when in a metric locale, instead of inches.
OCAD compatibility has been completed (to my knowledge). All OCAD symbols and options should print and display correctly.
New command "Delete Unused Controls" on the Event menu allows easily deleting all controls in the All Controls collection that are not being used by any course.
New Event Audit report checks and reports on many possible problems, including unused controls, missing descriptions, controls less than 100m apart, missing punch patterns, and more.
It is now possible to move control codes on the All Controls display. To prevent errors, they must still be directly adjacent to the associated circle.
English description text is phrased better. Instead of "knoll, rocky, E side", you get "E side of rocky knoll".
Control gaps are now maintained separately for each print scale. So if one course is at 1:15,000 and another is at 1:10,000, then different gaps can be placed in the same control circle.
Create OCAD Files now allows placing a prefix before the course name for each file generated. Also, if files will be replaced, you are warned about them.
When creating a new event, you are now prompted for the default printing scale. This becomes the printing scale for All Controls as well as the default scale for new courses.
You can change the print scale for All Controls by choosing Course/Properties when the All Controls map is displayed. This affects the size of circles on the All Controls map, as well as the scale when printing the All Controls map.
On some printers, dashed lines (such as paths) would print without the dashes. On some printers, patterned areas like indistinct marshes might print partially in the wrong color. These are fixed.
If a leg had bends or gaps in it, and one of the controls on the end was deleted, an internal error could occur due to inconsistent data. This is fixed.
Control codes that are a single letter or digit are now allowed.
When creating OCAD files, characters in the course name that are not allowed in file names are now correctly handled.
Very occasionally on a few maps with short dry ditch symbols, an OutOfMemoryException would occur at certain zoom levels. This should be fixed now.
OCAD compatibility has been vastly enhanced. Almost all OCAD symbols and options print and display correctly. The warning message that used to display before printing courses has been removed, because printing courses directly from Purple Pen now works correctly in virtually all cases. In the cases where the OCAD map contains a symbol that will not print correctly, Purple Pen detects in and displays a message before printing indicating which symbol is affected.
The menus have been somewhat rearranged to make the layout more logical and make commands easier to find. In particular, there are two new menus. The Event menu contains commands that affect the entire event. The Item menu contains commands that affect the currently selected item (control, start, finish, leg, special item). Other small changes have occurred also.
The new Item/Add Text Line command can be used to add an arbitrary text line anywhere in the description sheet.
The Create XML Interface File command has been renamed Create E-Punch Interface File to reflect its primary usage.
The Add Gap and Add Bend commands have toolbar buttons and keyboard shortcuts for them.
New command: Event/Map File, which allows changing the associated map file after the event is created.
If the map file cannot be found when the Purple Pen file is opened, a useful error message is shown and the user is prompted to find the map file.
Map files can now be bitmap files as well as OCAD files. The supported bitmap file formats are TIFF, JPEG, BMP, GIF, and PNG. When you export courses to OCAD, the bitmap becomes a template (background map) for the OCAD course.
If an OCAD map file contains a font that is not installed on the current computer, the user is warned about this when the event is loaded. If desired, the warning can then be turned off for the event.
Based on feedback, the control descriptions on the map now appear in black (previously they appeared in purple).
Added "Leg Lengths" report to the Reports menu. This shows the lengths of each leg on each course, as well as the average leg length for each course.
Added "Customize Descriptions" to the Controls menu. This dialog allows you to change the English text associated with any of the symbols. This is especially useful for the special item symbols. You can also add a key at the bottom of description to show what the special item symbols denote.
The order of courses can be specified by using the Course/Course Order command. By default, courses are displayed in the order in which you added them (instead of alphabetically as before).
When adding a new control, if no control or leg is selected, the control is inserted in the nearest leg (instead of at the end of the course). When adding a new control, or moving a control, the connecting leg lines are shown to provide better feedback as to what will happen.
When adding a new control to a course, a control already in the existing course can be chosen, so that butterfly-style courses can be easily created.
The "abbreviate in text" option for printing control descriptions has been removed, as it added complexity with minimal benefit.
A new "Clear Selection" command (keyboard shortcut: Esc) clears the selection on the current course. Clicking on nothing accomplishes the same thing.
When starting Purple Pen, a new option allows loading the sample event, so people using the program for the first time can get a sense of how it works. This file also is placed in a different location on install.
32x32 icon was empty. Now the correct Purple Pen icon is there -- used for desktop shortcuts, for example. You may need to rebuild your Windows icon cache for this to show up if you installed an older version of Purple Pen.
When textual (or text & symbols) descriptions are placed on the map, one line descriptions are now correctly centered vertically in the box.
The map intensity reverted to full after printing. It doesn't do that any more.
Mandatory crossing points are now shown in the all controls map.
In score courses, the finish could not be selected or moved. This is fixed.
OCAD files that had a template (background map) with non-ASCII characters (accented letters) would not load.
Files from OCAD 5 and earlier are now detected and give a useful error message (but they still won't load).
Many cases of symbols not displaying like they do in OCAD (some major, some minor) are fixed.
Symbol "fragments" created when doing a "To Graphics" in OCAD 9 now display.
Creating OCAD files in OCAD 7 format did not write the template information correctly; now fixed.
Initial release.