PixInsight 1.8.0 RC3 'Ripley' Released

[Juan Conejero]

Hi everybody,

PixInsight version 1.8.0.963 RC3 Ripley is now available on the Software Distribution site. It fixes a few minor bugs and comes with interesting new features for developers. I'll describe everything new on the release information and development forums.

We believe RC3 is a production/stable PixInsight version, just a step before the final 1.8.0 release. I encourage you to update all your PixInsight installations to RC3 as soon as possible.

As always, your comments (even positive!) and bug reports are absolutely welcome. Enjoy!

[DanH]

Thank you Juan !

I didn't install RC1 or RC2, but a you labeled this RC3 as "production/stable", I didn't resist any longer

I'll test it ASAP.

Best regards,

Dan

[georg.viehoever]

...and comes with interesting new features for developers. I'll describe everything new on the release information and development forums.....

Yes, please!  8)

[luigis]

Hi,

Sorry to be so stupid.

Can you please describe what is new for end-users, what has been added, changed, things to try,etc?

I've read the threads about 1.8 and got lost in the messages about when to release, bugs, fixes, etc.

I'm not a power user, I use some basic functionality but I would like to know what is new.

Thanks a lot, really appreciated!

[Peter]

Thank you so much for releasing such a wonderful package that PixInsight is. I am a beginner at the base of the learning curve but I am truly open jawed at the power of PixInsight. I have been singing its praises on various astronomy webcasts shouting out about there being other programs than photoshop and maxim dl. Hope to get some feedback from these guys but again thank you for PI it really is a marvel.

[vicent_peris]

Hi,

I have been working with RC3 the whole day and, amazingly, the same instance didn't crash not even one time. I would say that RC3 is very stable. Juan is just writing now a message about the new features.


Best regards,
Vicent.

[Juan Conejero]

Thank you all for your nice words!

Right now I'm writing several documents describing the new features, including some key development topics (the new threading model, the new real-time generation model, etc...). I'll post them on the forum as soon as I have something finished.

I ask for a bit of patience while I manage to write something coherent

[DaveS]

I downloaded and installed RC3 this evening, and from the limited amount of function testing that I have carried out, it seems fine to me 

My thanks to Juan, and the 'team' for all the hard work that has gone into this upgrade, it seems that you now have it 'cracked'  8)

Dave

[luigis]

Thank you all for your nice words!

Right now I'm writing several documents describing the new features, including some key development topics (the new threading model, the new real-time generation model, etc...). I'll post them on the forum as soon as I have something finished.

I ask for a bit of patience while I manage to write something coherent

Thank you, if you can write a short bullet list of new things for the basic user I would appreciate it, I'm not a developer 

[Geoff]

To install RC3 I have to remove my v1.7. What will be the procedure for installing the final version of 1.8? Will I have to remove RC3 or can I do it through the update system.
Geoff

[astrodoc71]

I have already RC1 installed and have received a couple of updates to that. Can you update RC1 to RC3 through the system or do I have to uninstall RC1 and start over?
Thanks
Dave

[Juan Conejero]

Hi Geoff and Dave,

The release candidate versions cannot be downloaded through the automatic updates system. You have to download them from our Software Distribution site, uninstall your current version (either 1.7.x, RC1 or RC2) and install the new one. The same will happen with the final 1.8.0 release.

[Juan Conejero]

if you can write a short bullet list of new things for the basic user I would appreciate it, I'm not a developer 

This is a quick list with the most important new features in PixInsight version 1.8.0. Features in bold face are intended for the general audience, not only for developers:

* New File Explorer window.

* New Object Explorer window (a developers resource).

* Redesigned/reimplemented Script Editor (mainly a developers resource)

* A new cache system in the ATrousWaveletTransform and MultiscaleMedianTransform tools. Thanks to this cache, these tools are now fast and accurate when used with partial previews and with the real-time preview window.

* Redesigned/reimplemented real-time preview functionality in all standard PixInsight tools. The real-time preview is now much faster and does not block the graphical interface, as happened with versions 1.7 and older.

* A new multithreading system, rewritten from scratch. Everything is faster, more reliable and much more stable in version 1.8.0 on all supported platforms.

* PCL 2.0 (for developers). The new version is an open-source library released under PCL license. It is much more complete, powerful and comes with lots of new classes and improvements (instantiable processes, external processes, image iterators, redesigned ImageVariant class, new multithreading classes, network classes, etc.)

* Lots of improvements and new objects in the JavaScript runtime (PJSR).

* Thousands (literally) of bug fixes and improvements everywhere, including the core application and all standard and contributed tools.

Note that the improvements and new features for developers are also important (perhaps more important, actually) for all PixInsight users, since they will make possible the development of more and much better new tools.

For the final 1.8.0 release, we plan on including the new Layers tool, the FlexibleCurves tool (a reimplementation of Carlos' InterchannelCurves), and maybe a few goodies that I still am not going to reveal

[luigis]

Thank you Juan!

Looking forward for the final 1.8 release and the goodies!  8)

[p3x249]

Hello,  I installed the 1.8.0 RC3  32 bit version,  it gave me the memory warning which I was expecting but when I went to do Image intergration for my ha subs  the I got the memory warning but it locked the program had to do task manager to kill the program

program locked onlywhen I used process explorer,  when I used the drop down memu from the top of the screen it works fine.

this could all be my 32bit vista operating system  I can try on my big desktop computer.
Clear skies
Sonya