Download Data Crow 3.4 Beta

Data Crow is written in Java and allows you to maintain a database containing information about CDs, DVDs, software, books, and music files. In this way it is possible to maintain a database in which your own collections can be found. Data Crow automatically retrieves additional data from the Internet, such as track listings, descriptions, and the names of the artists and authors. In addition, it is possible to adjust the appearance of the program and to print your collection. The developers have released the first beta of Data Crow 3.4 with the following list of changes:

Data Crow 3.4 beta has been released

The new version does contain less new functionality then originally planned. There were a couple of performance issues which needed to be addressed. With this release the startup time, online search and saving of items has been increased dramatically for large databases. The performance for filling the card and table view has also also increased. The upgrade process has been changed. It will now check for the version of Data Crow on startup. The same functionality is used for the backup and restore tool. The location field has been replaced by a container field. These containers are managed from within the container module. This module will be expanded for the next version. Furthermore has new tree become available which shows the file structure of the items. And last but not least a lot of bugs have been fixed. The change log will tell you what exactly has been fixed and implemented. Please help with the testing of this version!

Changelog:

This version comes with new functionality, fixes and an improved upgrade process. The improvements of the upgrade process are mainly due to the new version management. When upgrading a warning will appear stating that the version of your database or backup could not be determined. As long as you follow the upgrade paths it is safe to ignore the message. After the first startup this message will no longer appear.

[New]

• Online services are now plugin based. Additional plugins can be delivered as jar libraries which can be put in the services directory. The online services are no longer bound to software version deliveries and can be released separately. Data Crow will come however with a default online services pack. Plans have been made to allow automatic updates.
• Clickable links in the quick view and the item form for faster navigation to sub items (such as actors for movies)
• container module. The location field has been replaced with a container field. A container can be anything such as a CD, a CD box, a closet.. anything. On startup you will be prompted to convert the locations to container items. This module will be expanded in the near future.
• File structure tree.

[Changed]

• Code review: filter operators rewrite, music album importer code reuse issue.
• Removed the following message box: “save succeeded”.
• Removed the following message box: “no items have been found for xx” when searching for an item.
• The online search form will no longer close after adding a new item or updating an existing one. It will now add the item(s) and clear the form. This allows users to do multiple searches without having to re-open the form every time.
• Replaced Entagged with JAudioTagger for parsing information from music files. JAudioTagger has continued on the work of Entagged
• Version numbering is no longer dependent on the settings file. The version is now kept (in a structured way) in the database.
• New backups now contain a version number. This will be used to check if a backup can be restored in the current version.
• Restoring an backup of an older version will now cause Data Crow to restart. A restore of a backup of the current version will not cause a restart. This has been changed to make sure older databases are correctly upgraded on startup.
• Table view: removed line numbering. Removed horizontal grid lines.
• Settings views: removed line numbering.
• Quick view settings: added an option to set the background color. Removed the dependency of the background color towards the even/odd color of the view.
• View Setting: There were all kinds of dependencies towards the general field settings. Most of the option were not really clear. To overcome this each view has gained its very own settings dialog. Everything for that view can be changed from there. Removed the visible option from the field settings. Card view item description can now be set via the View Settings.
• Web Field Settings: Removed the dependency for the quick search fields towards the general field settings. The web field settings now contains the option to use a field as a quick search field.
• Removed the question mark images for missing covers.
• caching of items to improve startup times. Instead of creating all the data sets on each startup the data sets are now written out to disk on shutdown and reloaded on startup. When upgrading or restoring a backup the cache will be ignored and the data sets will be recreated from the database (which is still the leading data store). Additionally, if needed for any reason), Data Crow can be started without using the cache by adding the parameter -nocache. Startup times are improved by 20% due to this change. The first startup however will still load the items from the database.

[Fixed]

• Sometimes items are not added to the view after a different node in the grouping pane has been selected.
• Database collation was incorrect by default causing Chinese characters (and others) to be stored incorrectly. This is only fixed for new installations.
• Faster image loading for the card view. It now uses less memory and has a better performance.
• [2039920] “Update all” empties fields
• [2039948] Save from “online search” issue
• [2032102] Threading issue with saving IMDB movie actors
• [2027395] Incorrect label for “manage states” (music album/track)
• [2030645] Front picture not shown in card view (sometimes)
• [2029825] Updating old record empty fields doesn’t work
• [2029628] Online update on actor inside the movie module fails
• [2029637] Can’t cancel changes
• [2034988] Can’t re-attach Quick filter widget
• [2039939] “update all” not fully applied (view changes)
• [2005182] Initial Start Up
• [1995128] Upgrade error
• [2055353] Uncaught NPEs
• [2063861] Very Slow, uses 100% of CPU. The startup time for databases containing a high number of items (20,000+) has been increased dramatically (from minutes to seconds). Additionally a caching mechanism has been introduced which further improves the starting time by about 20% on a seconds run.
• Screen lock ups. Threads were running with a maximum priority causing them to get a higher priority then other Windows threads. This caused Data Crow to become inresponsive.
• Message box is sometimes shown on the wrong form causing the current window to loose its focus.
• Pressing escape in the mainframe bypasses the check for changes.
• Incorrect message when exiting Data Crow. Changed the message to “There are unsaved changes. Are you sure you want to exit?” when exiting Data Crow.
• Fixed several possible startup issues for Linux platforms. (preventing message boxes to block the screen while the splash screen is being shown).
• Fixed non fatal null pointer errors on startup.
• Version number was not written to the settings file making it unusable for future reference (upgrading).
• Messages for upgrades were not in the center of the screen.
• Improved error handling for the upgrade processes. Better information and warnings when the database is of an older version.
• After removing the properties/settings file the system asks to perform unwanted upgrades.
• Continuous scrolling in the card view, online search and manage item x forms.
• When hiding the grouping pane all views are re-filled. This makes Data Crow very slow and does not abide to the standard behavior. Only the views of the current module should be refilled.
• Incorrect display of the module permissions (user form).
• Deleted child items still shown in the view.
• Null pointer after closing the image editor.
• Navigation buttons for the field settings, quick view settings and the web field settings were incorrectly aligned.
• Tabs are hard to distinguish.
• Discogs: images not retrieved.
• Discogs: for some albums empty tracks are added.
• Performance bug when filling a view with items with children.
• Button alignment for the question message box (yes/no).
• ISBN 10 calculation was incorrect.
• Starting a file import multiple times results in the previous items to be added to the new tab again.
• Barnes & Nobles online search did no longer recover the title.

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Data Crow screenshot, click on the image for a larger version.