Ganymede dev4a released

[Jonathan Abbey <jonabbey@arlut.utexas.edu>]

Ganymede developer pre-release 4a, dev4a.tar.gz, is now available from

 ftp://ftp.arlut.utexas.edu/pub/ganymede/

 or

 ftp://129.116.212.1/pub/ganymede/

if your client has trouble resolving a proper address for
ftp.arlut.utexas.edu.

There was a critical bug in dev4 that could prevent the client from
working (a ClassNotFoundException was thrown) when the client was run
exclusively from the client jar file.  This release has been tested
under JDK 1.2 beta 4 on both the server and the client, using the
Java 1.1beta plug-in on Win32 for the client.

Otherwise, most of the changes in this release are minor.

-------------------- Changes from dev4 to dev4a -------------------

Ganymede Developer Release 4a
August 11, 1998
CHANGES

RELEASE DATE: August 11, 1998

1. [SERVER] Deleting admin personae now works properly

Before, deleting an admin persona object would cause a null pointer
exception to be thrown, as the code that checked to verify the new
name wasn't expecting a null name.

2. [SERVER] Added more rescan info for client.

In many cases, the server would not properly notify the client of
fields that Wizard code had changed on behalf of the client.  Now,
anytime anyone calls setValue(), setElemet(), addElement(), or
deleteElement() on a field, the ReturnVal returned will include an
instruction to the client to rescan that field.  This is primarily
useful for Wizard code that changes fields on the client's behalf.

3. [SERVER] User names forced to lowercase on login

Previously, it was possible to log in with mixed case or all-uppercase
and have Ganymede not recognize that the user was the same as another
login by the same user for the purpose of tracking the client's name.
Now, whenever a user logs in, Ganymede will track that user by an
all-lowercase version of their name.

4. [SERVER/CLIENT] Server tells Client its assigned id

If a user logs into the server more than once concurrently, the server
assigns each instance a unique name.  The client now asks the server
what that name is, so that you can see which instantiation of the
client matches which entry in the admin console's active user list.

5. [SERVER/CLIENT] String Fields can optionally be multi-line

The schema editor and the client now support multiline string fields,
for cases where an object needs more than a simple TextField can
reasonably provide.

6. [SERVER/CLIENT] CategoryTransport, BaseListTransport fixed

CategoryTransport and BaseListTransport are serializable classes that
transport data from the server to the client.  Both of these classes
included transient (non-transported) references to the GanymedeSession
class for use on the server.  Because we are not using the
RMISecurityManager any longer, the JVM is not able to download the
GanymedeSession class definition when the object is deserialized.  To
get around this, these classes now simply hold a generic transient
Object reference, and do a cast whenever the methods intended to be
run on the server are run.  This allows us to defer the class-loading
on the client until a server-side only method is called on these
objects, which should never happen anyway.

7. [CLIENT] Viewing The Ownership Panel Fixed

In dev4, clicking on the 'ownership' tab on a viewed (not edited)
object would throw a null pointer exception.

8. [SERVER/CLIENT] ReturnVal Rescan Information Reworked

In dev4 and before, the ReturnVal object returned by the server to the
client in response to most operations included information on what
fields and objects should be rescanned.  The design was ad hoc and
unwieldy, and has been changed.  This change simplifies code on the
server and particularly will help simplify wizard construction.

9. [CLIENT] String, Number Data Fields Limit Entry Properly

For awhile now, the GUI fields that allow String and Number entry
in the client weren't properly restricting keystrokes to enforce
string length and acceptable character restrictions.

In addition, String fields in the GUI will now size themselves to
reflect the size limit for size-limited fields.  Fields with large
sizes will be limited to 40 characters wide.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jonathan Abbey				              jonabbey@arlut.utexas.edu
Applied Research Laboratories                 The University of Texas at Austin
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Download ganymede from ftp.arlut.utexas.edu/pub/ganymede/.

To see the latest design specs for Ganymede, visit the Ganymede web page
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