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NEWS

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Issue: 11.3 (May/June 2013)
Article Description: No description available.
Article Length (in bytes): 27,695
Starting Page Number: 8
Article Number: 11301
Related Web Link(s):

http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/realbasic/plugins.shtml
http://delaneyrm.com/fpPlugin.html
http://www.studiostable.com/database
http://delaneyrm.com/PolyRootsRB.html
http://vecite.com/files
http://www.pidog.com/Modules.shtml
http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/realbasic/WebStarterKit/
http://www.studiostable.com/graphics
http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/realbasic/Bugreporter/
http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/realbasic/UpdaterKit/
http://erockus.home.mchsi.com//Mac/katt.zip
http://code.google.com/p/zd-gravatarurl/
http://delaneyrm.com/SolveDiffEq.html
http://www.ohanaware.com/appwrapper/
http://www.studiostable.com/webessentials/demonstration
http://www.studiostable.com/webessentials
http://www.tempel.org/Arbed/
http://delaneyrm.com/MatrixPlugin.html
http://delaneyrm.com/MPCalcPlugin.html

Full text of article...

Monkeybread Plugins Reach 13.1

The MBS plug-in comprises a collection of several plug-in parts which extend the Real Studio development environment with 1,700 classes featuring over 46,000 documented functions. Our plugins support all three platforms Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux with all project types (desktop, web, and console). Highlights of the 13.1 update:

The plugins are working fine with the upcoming Xojo 2013r1 version. If you plan to try the new release, be aware that older plugin versions will not work correctly with Xojo. You can use the normal Real Studio plugins from us with Xojo, but you may prefer to download our new Xojo plugins. They are optimized for the new version and you benefit from smaller file sizes and faster loading times.

The new NikonCamera plugin allows you to connect to Nikon cameras with the Nikon SDK. You can query features and download image files. With sending commands to the devices you can have it delete files or shoot a new image. Than you can download image files and also show live video preview.

For Core Image: added ten new filter classes. You can automatically enhance your pictures by using the auto adjust filter functions. In Cocoa applications you can directly render to a picture with a context. The new MT functions on CIImageMBS allow you to load images better in background thread.

For Cocoa applications there are new classes for Drag and Drop handling. We also improved our custom cocoa control classes to have drag and drop events. Our NSMenu handling has been improved with better validation code. For Core Animation we now have classes for layers and transitions to do some effects.

In your Mac application you can use the new keychain classes which use the latest APIs and provide much more functionality. The MacAliasMBS class has been improved to use newer APIs and offer more functionality. Several CoreGraphics functions have been updated and we got new function to create graphics contexts. This way you can draw directly to picture objects in Cocoa.

For Windows there's now a class to learn about disk changes. The WMI classes can now read string arrays. DNS functions like DNSNameToAddressMBS now use newer APIs on Windows 7 and still carry fallback code for Windows XP. So you get better result with DNS queries. And MBS now supports IPv6 for all platforms.

To improve security HMAC hash functions for MD5, SHA1 and SHA256 have been added.

The SQL Plugin has been improved with new informix class and improved record insertion code. The Twain scanning classes got new options for orientation and resolution and handle better when scanning without user interface. For the Java database classes there's improved blob support for drivers using streams.

Product: MBS Real Studio plugins 13.1

Platforms: All

Price: $29-$299

Website: http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/realbasic/plugins.shtml

fp Plugin 6.2 Released

This release adds the BigFraction type which represents num/den where num and den are BigIntegers.

Using a custom fp multi-precision engine, fp Plugin for Real Studio adds four new data types, BigInteger, BigFloat, BigComplex, and BigFraction. Except for available memory, there is no limitation on the size of a BigInteger. BigFloat is a multi—precision floating point number. You can set both the internal precision and the decimal output precision for BigFloat, with no limitation except for available memory. BigComplex is composed of two BigFloats. BigFraction represents num/den where num and den are BigIntegers.

fp Plugin itself allows you to construct programs which can handle the four new data types much like doubles and integers are handled. To a large extent the new data types can be freely used with the +, -, *, and / operators, and can be used in comparisons. And most of REALbasic's functions have been overloaded to take the new data types, where it makes sense to do so. The added 5th data type is ComplexVector, which holds an array of complex numbers. Additional functions use the Laguerre method to find for a polynomial all its roots (complex or real) to any chosen precision.

Product: fp Plugin 6.2

Platforms: All

Price: Free

Website: http://delaneyrm.com/fpPlugin.html

Studio Stable Database 2.5

This release fixes an issue with negative double values in SSRecordSet and SSDatabaseRecord. It also adds a new class to the client library, SSDataSet, that enables use with Real Studio's reporting system.

The Studio Stable Database (SSD) does several things. First, SSD has a Client Library, with full REALbasic source included, that wraps REALSQLDatabase and makes the SQL commands it issues more transparent. The API is very similar to REALbasic'a Database API, and makes it possible to view and debug INSERT and UPDATE statements generated by the API. The Client Library is available for free.

Second, SSD has GUI and command-line servers, accessed by the same Client Library, which run on Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux. The GUI servers are very simple to set up and maintain. My Mom can do it, and yours probably can too! These servers are perfectly capable of powering well-designed small to medium sized multi-user database application deployments. We have applications with about 20 users running with our database servers. The binaries of the database servers are also available for free, with very liberal free deployment terms.

Third, the full source (except recommended plugins) are available for the servers. You can customize them, or incorporate the servers into your own applications. Hutchings Software charges a one-time fee of $49.95 for this source code, with free updates for as long as they support the product.

Product: Studio Stable Database 2.5

Platforms: All

Price: Free ($49.95 for source code)

Website: http://www.studiostable.com/database

Download PolyRootsRB 1.2 for free

PolyRootsRB finds the roots of a polynomial to any chosen accuracy using Laguerre's Method. The coefficients of the polynomial can be real or complex. PolyRootsRB uses the fp Plugin. PolyRootsRB is released as freeware, with no restrictive licenses.

Product: PolyRootsRB 1.2

Platforms: All

Price: Free

Website: http://delaneyrm.com/PolyRootsRB.html

Vecite Files Beta Available

Vecite Files ("Veh-sih-tee Files") is a secure offline file sharing system, built with Real Studio Web Edition. If you have sensitive data, like financial statements, personnel files, and legal documents, Vecite Files is a safer way to share that information with others than email, Evernote, or Dropbox. You can learn about it in our introductory video (https://vecite.com/files).

Vecite now has a RESTful session-based API that will allow your application to upload and download files, and query for files available to a user. There's a set of Real Studio classes that make the API easy to integrate into your applications. You can read about the API online (https://www.vecite.com/files/developer/).

If your application needs secure cloud backing store with secure file sharing features available out of the box, you might want to look at Vecite Files. The company is offering a new Developer package that includes the API for $99.95 per year. This is great for getting your application running. The Professional package is $649.95 per year.

Product: Vecite Files

Platforms: All

Price: $29.95-$69.95/year (personal), $99.95-$649.95/year (team)

Website: http://vecite.com/files

piDog Bundle for Real Studio adds AppPrep

The piDog Bundle for Real Studio includes TheBigUndo, ActivityViewer, piDog CalendarControl, and now AppPrep.

AppPrep allows RealStudio Developers to quickly prepare their apps for the Mac App Store, or for delivery outside the store. Many new features have been added, including:

* Sandboxing/Entitlements capable

* Icon cut/paste editing with support for 1024x1024 icons

* File Types and File Type Icons up to 1024x1024

This is an extensive rewrite so please take a look at the demo.

TheBigUndo 1.0.2.4:

* Minor internal efficiency improvements

* If UndosAreManual is set for a control, the control is now checked before the Undo Menu is enabled

* Added UndoSetsContentsChangedFlag extension to Window Class

* Added a Cocoa workaround for sliders to handle setting a value of 0 in an undo/redo

CalendarControl 1.0.5:

* Removed AllowsMultiple, added Mode property. 0=single date 1=single date with range 2=multiple single dates

* Added InitialDisplayMonth and InitialDisplayYear for when the InitialDate and displayed date need to be different

* Allows setting of DisplayMonth and DisplayYear

* Added InitialDate property. Can be "Today" "Tomorrow" "Yesterday" "None" or a date parseable by ParseDate

* Now allows SelectedDate to be nil when InitialDate is "" or "none".

Product: piDog Bundle for Real Studio

Platforms: All

Price: $60 (entire piDog Bundle)

Website: http://www.pidog.com/Modules.shtml

Introducing the MBS Real Studio Web Starter Kit

The MBS Real Studio Web Starter Kit is a starting point for building your Web Applications with Real Studio. Version 1.0 is the first public version with these features:

* Database Support including REALSQLDatabase, MySQLCommunityServer, CubeSQLServer and SQLDatabaseMBS. Other databases can be added easily.

* Simple User Management for Admins and normal users.

* Login Panel.

* Auto login, so people don‘t need to login each time.

* Collects Exceptions and JavaScript Errors in database and displays them to Admin.

* Allows logging to text file and database and displaying them.

* SQL Console with download of database and query result as CSV file.

* Session management for admin to see what users do.

* Chat Window.

* Creates Backup of database.

* Object browser and memory statistics.

* Messages for Admins to/from users.

* File Browser.

* Shows how to cache images/files to save memory.

* and much more....

The Kit may be used as a foundation of your new web application or you can simply copy the parts you need to your own web application. This Kit is the result of putting together all the goodies MBS developed in the last two years for various web applications. The Web Starter Kit requires Real Studio 2012 or newer and a license of the MBS Real Studio Plugins. The Util Plugin part is required and the MacOSX part is useful.

Product: MBS Real Studio Web Starter Kit

Platforms: All

Price: $149

Website: http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/realbasic/WebStarterKit/

Studio Stable Graphics 2013.1

Studio Stable Graphics 2013.1 (SSG) is now available for Real Studio. SSG is a plugin for Real Studio containing several high quality, high performance graphics operations that will make your application better.

This version supports desktop and console (including Web Edition) apps on Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux. It costs $49.95 for a one year subscription. A free trial that works in the IDE but not for built applications is available from the Studio Stable website. Studio Stable Graphics works exclusively on modern pictures with alpha channel. It accounts for the alpha channel and for premultiplied pixels as needed.

List of methods in the SSG module:

* SSG_AdjustHSV – Adjusts hue, saturation, brightness of a picture or rectangular portion thereof, returns new result. Can also make a photographic negative of the picture.

* SSG_AdjustHSV_InPlace – Adjusts hue, saturation, brightness of a picture or rectangular portion thereof, in place. Can also make a photographic negative of the picture.

* SSG_GetAverageHSV – Gets average hue, saturation, and brightness of a picture or rectangular portion thereof.

* SSG_AdjustRGB – Adjusts red, green, and blue of a picture or rectangular portion thereof, returns new result.

* SSG_AdjustRGB_InPlace – Adjusts red, green, and blue of a picture or rectangular portion thereof, in place.

* SSG_GetAverageRGB – Gets average red, green, and blue of a picture or rectangular portion thereof.

* SSG_FlipRotate – Flips a picture horizontally and/or vertically, and/or rotates the picture at 90° intervals.

* SSG_FreeRotateByShear – Free rotates and image, places a frame color (which may be transparent) on unused pixels in result.

* SSG_MakeGradient – Creates vertical two color gradient of requested size.

* SSG_MakeDoubleGradient – Creates vertical three color gradient of requested size.

* SSG_ShearHorizontal – Shears an image horizontally, places a frame color (which may be transparent) on unused pixels in result.

* SSG_ShearVertical – Shears an image horizontally, places a frame color (which may be transparent) on unused pixels in result.

* SSG_Stretch – Resizes a picture using a high quality bilinear image resizing algorithm.

* SSG_Trim – Trims (crops) and image. Can also frame an image. Frame color (which may be transparent) placed on unused pixels in result.

Product: Studio Stable Graphics 2013.1

Platforms: All

Price: $49.95

Website: http://www.studiostable.com/graphics

New MBS Real Studio Bug Reporter Kit

The MBS Real Studio Bug Reporter Kit helps you reporting bugs in your applications back to you, the developer. The new version improves the Kit by using newer plugin features and by updating for Real Studio 2012.

* Crossplatform Bug Reporter engine for Mac OS X, Linux and Windows.

* Full Source code access.

* Collect bug reporter data and send to server for delivery as email (or insert to database)

* Handle unhandled exceptions. The plugin reports the exception class name and message.

* Find Mac OS X crash reports and report them.

* Run bug reporter for feature request.

* Catch Windows System Exceptions.

* Catch Signals on Mac OS X and Linux.

* Catch unhandled C++ exceptions.

* Catch Cocoa Exceptions

* Localized for English and German.

New in Version 1.1:

* Signals on Mac&Linux now show stack trace.

* Reason is now part of the report. Else you may miss it.

* Moved project to Real Studio 2012.

* Removed reference to GetObjectClassNameMBS

* Now uses BackTraceMBS function on Mac to query stack backtrace.

* Added LinuxSysInfoMBS for more details on Linux.

* Fixed some minor bugs.

* Added Italian translation and improved German&English

The Bug Reporter Kit requires Real Studio 2011 or newer and licenses of the MBS Real Studio Complete License or the plugin parts Util, Cocoa, Win, and MacOSX.

Product: MBS Bug Reporter Kit

Platforms: All

Price: $69

Website: http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/realbasic/Bugreporter/

MBS Real Studio Updater Kit 1.5 Released

The MBS Real Studio Updater Kit helps you in adding an automatic update feature to your application. Version 1.5 improves the Kit for use with Real Studio 2012r2.

* Crossplatform update engine for Mac OS X and Windows.

* Full Source code access.

* Using Sparkle on Mac OS X for updating and our own code for Windows.

* Includes all code and help to setup Sparkle for Windows.

* Includes script file for Inno Setup engine. (you can use others if you like)

* Using digital signatures on Mac and MD5 Checksum on Windows to ensure download integrity.

* Includes generator for XML file for your server and code to parse this file and find newer versions.

New in Version 1.5:

* We now detect older version and tell user that he has the current version. This avoids showing an error for users who have a newer version (e.g. a beta version).

* Updated to Real Studio 2012

* Fixed kYouhavethecurrentversion to show name of app.

The Updater Kit requires Real Studio 2011 or newer and a license of the MBS Real Studio Complete License.

The Updater Kit is available for $99 USD or 79 Euro (+VAT if needed).

Product: MBS Real Studio Updater Kit 1.5

Platforms: All

Price: $99

Website: http://www.monkeybreadsoftware.de/realbasic/UpdaterKit/

K.A.T.T 1.8

KATT, the Knight Advanced Technical Technician, is a multimedia novelty app. It is a simple, yet fun program based off the TV show Knight Rider. KATT will play some formats including mp3, mp4, mov, wav, avi, flv and more.

KATT v1.8 fixed an issue with the&not getting parsed correctly when scanning iTunes and added 5 new visualizers for a total of 30.

Product: K.A.T.T 1.8

Platforms: OSX

Price: Free

Website: http://erockus.home.mchsi.com//Mac/katt.zip

zdGravatar URL—A Gravatar for Real Studio

zdGravatarURL is a class written in REALbasic. It allows you to use the Gravatar.com API by generating the URL needed to retrieve a Gravatar member's avatar given his/her email address and a few other options. zdGravatarURL can handle all functionalities provided by the Gravatar API for avatar:

- No email address embedded in the generated URL, only a MD5 hash

- The avatar's size can be customized from 1 pixel up to 2048 pixels

- Use predefined default avatars or your own custom picture if the address email is unknown to Gravatar's server

- The display of the default avatar can be forced for testing purpose

- 4 rating levels available for returned avatar: G, PG, R, X

- A secure URL (https) can be generated if needed

- Optional file-type extension .jpg for compatibility purpose

- No API key, no subscription needed

- Works with any type of project with Real Studio 2009r4 and later

- The pdf documentation is available in English and in French.

zdGravatarURL is open source code released under the X11 license. It allows you to use zdGravatar without the constraint of opensourcing your entire codebase.

Product: zdGravatar URL

Platforms: All

Price: Free

Website: http://code.google.com/p/zd-gravatarurl/

SolveDiffEq 3.5

SolveDiffEq is made with Real Studio and shows how RBScript allows the creation of a very versatile mathematical application. The Help menu provides a tutorial on its use.

SolveDiffEq is an application which can solve a set of coupled first-order differential equations. Thus it is also capable of solving many types of ordinary and non-linear differential equations and of evaluating definite integrals. Your equation input is translated into machine language for a rapid solution. Also, courtesy of RBScript, you can program the output to be of any format desired.

Version 3.5, with the new functions dtChange and Compare, allows the Format script to change the dt value while the calculation is in progress. So values around a chosen t value can be investigated more closely. Or one can approach a singularity as closely as desired.

Product: SolveDiffEq 3.5

Platforms: All

Price: Free

Website: http://delaneyrm.com/SolveDiffEq.html

Ohanaware updates App Wrapper to 2.1

App Wrapper is the tool that Ohanaware use to package their applications for the Mac App Store and their web site. App Wrapper is a simplified approach to performing meanial tasks that are required in order to distribute applications for Apple's Mac App Store and OS X Mountain Lion.

App Wrapper simplifies the process of Code Signing, Sandboxing, Compressing applications (via OS X Installer or Zip file), generating Retina Compatible High Resolution icons, and Help Documentation preparation. Reducing the time required to prepare applications for distribution via the Mac App Store or OS X Mountain Lion.

Code signing is required for both the Mac App Store&OS X Mountain Lion. App Wrapper's Code signing engine is capable of code signing helper apps, frameworks, plugins&AppleScripts. Sandboxing is required for the Mac App Store. App Wrapper 2.0 features a new GUI interface to simplify the specification of Entitlement keys and their values. It includes tools to help validate a Sandboxed application and to track down Sandbox violations.

App Wrapper can add High Resolution ICNS files to the application bundle, or it can generate High Resolution ICNS files from almost any transparent image. App Wrapper also features a 'Document Icon Maker' that can generate (AHIG conforming) High Resolution ICNS files using the Application icon and a simple identifier. App Wrapper uses High Quality scaling to retain as much detail when generating icons at smaller sizes. When creating Retina compatible applications, App Wrapper can generate HiDPI ICNS files (dependant on the specified Minimum OS).

App Wrapper can add a Help folder or Help file into the application bundle, and add the correct keys to the plist. Also featured is a Help Validator which will check the help documents for simple XHTML errors, broken links, missing images and other common errors.

App Wrapper features functionality to add importable and exportable UTIs to an application, it includes a function that can generate a matching UTI from a document type. This enables developers to easily add support for "Document Packages".

Many required plist keys can be specified using the App Wrapper interface. For more advanced plist editing, App Wrapper includes a simple plist editor.

App Wrapper features GUI options for configuring the Apple About Box. Included in the App Wrapper help is code for Real Studio developers to use, that will display a genuine Apple About Box.

App Wrapper automatically saves the settings, restoring them when the application is re-opened in App Wrapper.

App Wrapper was made with Real Software's Real Studio and App Wrapper was used on App Wrapper, to generate the icons, validate and include the help, configure the about box, codesign the bundle and then to create the Zip compressed file.

Version 2.1 of App Wrapper, features over 20 changes, that cover new features, enhancements and fixes. New features include such as "Debug Build Options", which enable App Wrapper to wrap the application when using the "Run" command from Real Studio. More options have been added to the Code signing and Sandboxing engine. While fixes have been carried out throughout, including an issue with some generated icons on 10.8.

Product: App Wrapper 2.0.1

Platforms: OSX

Price: $49.99

Website: http://www.ohanaware.com/appwrapper/

Studio Stable Web Essentials 2013.1

Hutchings Software has added more useful stuff to Web Essentials to kick off 2013:

* Set alignment of heading cells in WebListBox—left, center, right.

* Respond to heading cell clicks in WebListBox.

* Keep track of and visually indicate a selected column in WebListBox.

* Change the heading height in WebListBox—great for touchable apps.

* Adjust heights of WebLabel to match the text within. Great for dynamic layouts.

* Progress bar and thermometer (vertical progress bar) classes that can match your UI and fill from either direction or center.

* Ubiquitous "PrepareToShow" event that lets you do one-time initialization before pages or controls are shown for the first time.

Try a demo (http://www.studiostable.com/webessentials/demonstration) if you'd like!

Product: Studio Stable Web Essentials 2013.1

Platforms: All

Price: $29.95

Website: http://www.studiostable.com/webessentials

Arbed 1.6 is Out!

Arbed is a tool to perform advanced editing operations with Real Studio projects, such as:

* Comparing two projects, seeing and merging them in a structured manner much better than what an be achieved using plain text files (such as XML and RBVCP).

* Greatly assist in preparing an existing app for localization by turning strings in your code into dynamic ones, all in one go.

* Advanced search&replace functions, even scriptable.

Version 1.6 adds the following features:

* Reads and writes VCP (.rbvcp) projects now, too!

* String Obfuscation lets you conveniently hide your texts (e.g. SQL statements) from hackers.

Product: Arbed 1.6

Platforms: All

Price: Free/$59/$195 (free, basic, and complete licenses)

Website: http://www.tempel.org/Arbed/

Matrix Plugin 3.4 Available

Matrix Plugin for Real Studio allows you to construct programs which, because of operator and function overloading, can handle real matrices much like doubles and integers are handled. Matrix elements are doubles. A matrix can be entered in standard form in a TextArea and read in by a single instruction.

Matrix Plugin 3.4 adds the functions "NumRows(M As Matrix) As Integer" and "NumColumns(M As Matrix) As Integer".

Product: Matrix Plugin 3.4

Platforms: All

Price: Free

Website: http://delaneyrm.com/MatrixPlugin.html

MPCalc Plugin

MPCalc Plugin allows a Real Studio developer to design a multi-precision RPN calculator. It could handle numbers with up to 30,000 decimal digits. It could also handle numbers whose absolute values lie between 1e-65000000 and 1e+65000000. It is a Universal plugin for Mac OS X. Over forty scientific functions are now available. functions such as Bessel Functions, Fresnel Integrals, etc.

MPCalc Plugin now uses its own multi-precision engine fp. When the plugin used NTL, it had to have the GNU General Public License. Now it has a much more relaxed license.

Product: MPCalc Plugin

Platforms: All

Price: Free

Website: http://delaneyrm.com/MPCalcPlugin.html

End of article.