New versions of the PixInsight Core application and PCL packages are now available for download. As I write this announcement, the website is not updated yet, so I'll write direct links to the installation archives:
For Linux x86:
http://pleiades-astrophoto.com/export/PI32-linux-01.00.42.325rc7-20070914.tar.gzhttp://pleiades-astrophoto.com/export/PCL-linux32-01.00.21.136-20070914.tar.gzFor MS Windows 32-bit:
http://pleiades-astrophoto.com/export/PI32-win-01.00.42.325rc7-sfx-20070914.exehttp://pleiades-astrophoto.com/export/PCL-win32-01.00.21.136-sfx-20070914.exeBugs permitting, this version is almost identical to the final release version 1.0.Besides documentation for the core application, this version only lacks a few icons in some menu items, a few modifications to the Deconvolution process (which will be followed by a tutorial), a simple process to build luminance masks, and some minor additions to the JavaScript runtime.
This version includes the following main new features:
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New View > Global Security Options menu command. This command opens a dialog box where you can set a number of important security settings. Read the tool tips for the different check boxes for more information.
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New Module Authentication functionality. This option can be selected with Edit > Global Security Options. Basically, it performs an authentication procedure for all installed modules upon startup. For each module, a cryptographic hashing value is compared against a remote authentication database that is downloaded upon startup. By default, module authentication is disabled. It requires an active Internet connection and up-to-date module versions.
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New command-line functionality. For information, run the PixInsight application from a console with the --help argument. Unfortunately, this only works on Linux (for now). In an incoming document we'll explain the full set of command-line options.
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New FITSHeader process (Image category). It can be used to inspect, edit and store FITS header keywords.
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Finished the Preferences process (Global category). Now we have the final version of this tool.
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Added a global preferences option to select the maximum thread priority for processing modules. This can be set via the Preferences interface and also with the
parallel command.
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Full support for dropped URLs. Now you can drag and drop a set of file or URL links, for example from a desktop file browser like Konqueror or Windows Explorer, or from a web browser like Firefox, or even from other applications, to PixInsight's workspace. PixInsight will open the dropped files sequentially. Supported dropped files include all installed image formats, PSM files, and script files.
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New drag&drop mask activation functionality. Now you can drag a main view selector to the view selector tray of another image window, and if the dragged image is compatible with the target image, it is activated as a mask for it. If this is done with Ctrl pressed, the mask is activated with inversion.
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Lots of bugs fixed in Preferences. In particular, now all fonts are correctly selected and the AutoHide selectors also update correctly.
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Lots of bugs fixed in the JavaScript runtime. This includes all bugs recently found in the TreeBox and TreeBoxNode objects (see the Bug Reports section).
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New Settings JavaScript Runtime object. This objects allows scripts to store their own settings and preferences, which are remembered across sessions.
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New Math.mtf static method (JavaScript Runtime). This method implements a Midtones Transfer Function.
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An important bug fixed in the CurvesTransform interface. This bug was causing incorrect real-time previews under certain circumstances.
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An important bug fixed in the ImageIdentifier process. A parameter of this process was not communicating well with the core application, which could be the cause of some rare unstable behaviors.
This version expires on September 29. Have fun!
