DARTCOM iDAP/MACROPRO RELEASE NOTES (January 5th, 2023) This file documents new features, changes and bug fixes up to the current release of the Dartcom iDAP and MacroPro software. The history is listed in reverse chronological order, with the most recent version at the top. If you discover any further bugs or have suggestions for changes or new features, please report them to the following address: bugs@dartcom.co.uk VERSION 11.2h The Visual C++ runtime has been updated to the latest version (14.38.33130). Very occasionally the reprojection and RGB product creation facilities would use the wrong tile from the source image. This has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 11.2g Support has been added for SQLite lightning database files produced from GOES GLM or MTG LI data by the Dartcom Geostationary Ingester software. Lightning flashes covering a specific time window (up to 60 minutes) relative to the image acquisition time can be automatically displayed on images and included in animations, exported images and prints. The database file can be specified in the Paths tab within the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...) and the time window, symbol and colours (used to graduate oldest to newest flashes) can be specified in the Appearance tab. Lightning flashes can be shown or hidden on images using View > Lightning. A read-out of the number of lightning flashes at the cursor position has been added to the read-outs panel. It can be configured to either show flashes for the cursor position only, or the total within a square of image pixels centred on it. This can be done in the Appearance tab of the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...) and also affects the figures returned by the ltngflashes function (see below). Two new functions (ltngflashes and ltngwindow) have been added to the formula language used by the RGB chef and formula palette functions. The ltngflashes function returns the number of lightning flashes at the current point, or a square centred on it, depending on the setting in the Appearance tab of the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). The ltngwindow function returns the time window covered, in minutes. Again this can be configured in the Appearance tab of the Configuration window. A Lightning Density product preset is now available when creating formula palettes. The results depend on the setting for the lightning flashes read-out which can be configured in the Appearance tab of the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). An option has been added to the Blue Marble masking function (Navigation > Blue Marble mask... and the Blue Marble mask operation) to specify an alternate data set to use for nighttime areas, together with a new Night Lights data set (available on the Downloads page of our website). This blends daytime and nighttime data sets with a smooth transition between the two. A Blended visible and infra-red RGB recipe is now available for each type of satellite data. This blends visible data for daytime areas and infra-red data for nighttime areas with a smooth transition between the two. Combined with the new Blue Marble masking nighttime option mentioned above, this allows creation of a visually appealing combined visible and infra-red image that can be used 24 hours a day. It is particularly effective when animated. A True Colour (hybrid green) RGB recipe is now available for MTG, Himawari and GK-2A data. This solves the problem of the green channel on those satellites not being centred on chlorophyll green, causing land on true colour images to appear brown. It overcomes this by blending NDVI with the green channel to produce a hybrid green, and performing piecewise linear scaling to improve the final appearance. To enable the above recipes to be implemented, several new functions have been added to the formula language used by the RGB chef and formula palette functions. The ucalib function returns uncorrected calibrated values (i.e. before any solar correction has been applied). The blend and sblend functions perform linear and S-curve (sigmoid) blending respectively. The plenhance1..5 functions extend the existing enhance function by performing piecewise linear scaling with between 1 and 5 intermediate points in the input and output profiles. A partial daytime and nighttime applicability option has been added to RGB recipes allowing RGB products to only be produced if the coverage area is entirely daytime or nighttime. Daytime, nighttime and partial daytime and nighttime options have been added to the Reproject operation in MacroPro macros, allowing control over when the reprojected image is produced. A Centre image button has been added to the Features Manager window (Navigation > Features...). This centres the active image on the selected point, allowing its position to be checked visually. The drawing speeds of features and range rings have been improved to provide smoother scrolling. Various other minor changes, performance improvements and bug fixes. VERSION 11.1h Various minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 11.1g Support has been added for Meteosat Third Generation (MTG) Flexible Combined Imager (FCI) level 1c (L1c) images output by Geostationary Ingester (formerly known as XRIT Ingester). Support has been added for JPSS-2 GeoTIFF files produced by IPOPP. The majority of windows can now be resized in the normal way rather than being a fixed size. The included ZLib compression library has been updated to version 1.2.3. The included LibBZip2 compression library has been updated to version 1.0.8. The included LZ4 compression library has been updated to version 1.9.4. The included LibPNG library has been updated to version 1.6.40. The included LibTIFF library has been updated to version 4.5.0. The included LibGeoTIFF library has been updated to version 1.3.0. The included GIFLib library has been updated to version 5.2.1. The previous JPEG library has been replaced with LibJPEG-Turbo version 3.0.0 with added support for 10-bit lossless JPEG files. The range rings editors in the Features Manager and Configuration windows now add new range rings below the selected ring instead of above. If no range ring is selected, the new ring is added at the top of the list. This makes it easier to set up a sequence of range rings. Documents left open in MacroPro were being marked as modified by the Navigate automatic processing macro operation. Due to MacroPro intentionally not providing a Save function, this was incorrect behaviour and has been fixed. After using File > Save a copy... on an image or animation it would stop updating automatically. This has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 11.0j The maximum length of an animation can now be specified as a timespan in hours or minutes, or a number of frames as in previous versions. The Del key can now be used as a shortcut to delete items from list and tree boxes throughout the software. The Ctrl+X, Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V keyboard shortcuts can be used to cut, copy and paste items respectively in windows containing list and tree boxes that include clipboard functionality. The GeoTIFF import parameters have been moved from the HKEY_CURRENT_USER Registry key to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE to ensure it is available to all users. The migration is done by the iDAP/MacroPro update installer. The satellites database has also been moved from the HKEY_CURRENT_USER Registry key to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE to ensure it is available to all users. The migration is only done once by iDAP using the database belonging to the current user at the time. The base Registry key for iDAP settings has been renamed from SiamivState to iDAP, and MacroState to MacroPro. Migration of both keys is done automatically by iDAP or MacroPro, whichever runs first. In the Automatic processing settings window (Utilities > Automatic process settings...) a crash occurred if an item was cut and pasted under certain circumstances. This has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 11.0h An issue with map overlay creation on systems with a high-DPI primary display has been fixed. VERSION 11.0g To fix user interface layout issues, high-DPI display modes in Windows are now ignored. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 11.0f The Visual C++ runtime has been updated to the latest version (14.36.32532). Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 11.0e The graduated colour options for land and sea in the DEM masking window (Navigation > DEM mask...) were behaving the same as the solid colour options. This has been fixed. VERSION 11.0d The Setup assistant window (Utilities > Setup assistant...) was not able to install defaults if the iDAP folder did not already exist in the user's application data folder. This has been fixed. Various other minor bug fixes. VERSION 11.0c The iDAP file format has changed (version 30). Please install the latest XRIT Ingester and Polar Orbiter Ingester updates to avoid compatibility problems. A new RGB chef window (File > Create RGB product...) has been added to iDAP. This creates multi-plane RGB (red, green, blue) products covering a chosen area by combining data from up to three different iDAP images (single plane or multi-plane) according to a pre-defined recipe. They help highlight features such as airmass, ash, cloud phase, convection, dust, fires, fog, microphysics, snow, sulphur dioxide and water vapour. Recipes are provided for MSG, GOES, Himawari, GK-2A and NOAA/Metop data, and more will be added in future. To create RGB products automatically, you can add them to macro sets in MacroPro. RGB product creation uses multiple worker threads for higher performance. To complement the new RGB chef facility, the RGB recipe manager (File > RGB recipes...) allows RGB recipes to be added, edited and deleted if required. Each recipe comprises a formula for each plane (red, green, blue) that produces its data from the source image assigned to the plane. A built-in reference for the formula language is included, and function templates can be inserted into the formula. The built-in formula language used for creating products has been extended. Wavelengths (such as 0.47 or 10.8) can now be used to specify the source data for the pixel, raw, calib and radiance functions. Additional functions are available for obtaining the image date, time and earth-sun distance, returning the satellite zenith and azimuth angles, returning the minimum or maximum of two values, performing additional trigonometric calculations, and producing enhanced image data for RGB products. The UNIX-style comment symbol # can also now be used. The Automatic processing settings window in MacroPro (Utilities > Automatic processing settings...) has been extensively redesigned and improved. As well as standard macros, you can now create RGB products (an automated version of File > RGB chef... in iDAP). Macro set items can be organised into groups, and cut, copied and pasted within or between macro sets. You can right-click items to display a context-sensitive menu of tasks. If the Automatic box is ticked for the macro name, a summary of the enabled operations is shown after the document name. A Filter operation has been added allowing sharpening, softening, edge extraction and blurring (equivalent to the filtering facilities within the Processing menu in iDAP). When configuring the Reproject and Create product operations in MacroPro, you can now quickly create a macro to further process the resulting image (archive, export or animate it, for example) using the new buttons. This removes the need to click the Test macro button, then manually add a macro and browse for the resulting image. The Automatic import settings window in MacroPro (Utilities > Automatic import settings...) has been improved. You can right-click items to display a context-sensitive menu of tasks. Outputs now have an option to archive files, removing the need to create automatic processing macros to perform archiving. The borders of document windows now have a more modern appearance, overriding the Windows 7 style provided to multiple-document applications by the Windows Theme Manager. The Enhance window in iDAP (Processing > Enhance...) now has a gamma slider, allowing gamma correction to be performed. The Formula palette window is now titled Product creation, the corresponding menu item Processing > Formula palette.... is now titled Processing > Create product..., and the correspdonding Create palette operation in MacroPro is now titled Create product. The Product creation window now shows the data requirements for the selected formula. It also includes a built-in reference for the formula language, and allows function templates to be inserted into the formula. The Projection transform window is now titled Reprojection, and the Navigation > Projection transform... menu item is now titled Navigation > Reproject... to match the Reproject operation in MacroPro. The Reprojection window now uses multiple worker threads to reduce processing times, and is up to 3 times faster depending on settings and PC specifications. In the Overlay settings window (Navigation > Overlay settings...) you can now right-click overlays in the list to display a context-sensitive menu of tasks. In the Series manager (Navigation > Series...) you can now right-click features in the lists to display a context-sensitive menu of tasks. In the Features manager (Navigation > Features...) you can now right-click points and range rings to display a context-sensitive menu of tasks. In the Appearance tab of the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...) you can now right-click station range rings to display a context-sensitive menu of tasks. The Setup assistant window in iDAP (Utilities > Setup assistant...) has been redesigned, and options have been added for installing the default RGB recipes. New icons in the Read-outs panel in iDAP (View > Read-outs panel) allow the formulae used to generate an RGB product or apply a palette to be viewed, and the interpretation guide for an RGB product to be viewed. The File details area in the file browsing window (e.g. File > Open...) now shows the data bands present on each plane of an image or animation. Two additional symbols for feature points and the station position marker have been added - a star and a ship. The Save icons in windows such as the Map options manager are now highlighted when there are unsaved changes to indicate they need saving. The automatic importer in MacroPro now monitors the available storage in each source path and generates an alarm if it falls below the threshold configured in the Diagnostics settings window (Utilities > Diagnostics settings...). The Visual C++ runtime has been updated to the latest version (14.34.31938). Some very long, straight lines (such as the USA/Canada border) may not have been shown correctly on map overlays, or may have been missing altogether if they were not entirely visible. This has been fixed for new images. To fix it on an existing image, go to Navigation > Overlay settings... and click OK. This causes the image's overlays to be recreated. To fix it for a map option in the Map options manager, click the Overlay settings... button, click OK, then click Apply. Some segments of the borders around Pacific Ocean islands in the GSHHG borders, L3 marine overlay were missing. These have now been added. Please download and install the latest Map overlays update (April 2023) to install the corrected version. The Reprojection window (Navigation > Reproject...) erroneously prevented a single-plane image from being assigned as the base image for a multi-plane image, and vice versa. Both these scenarios are now allowed as intended. In the Reprojection window (Navigation > Reproject...) if a single-plane image was reprojected using a multi-plane base image with the Recalculate enhancement option switched off, any enhancement previously applied to the image was lost. This has been fixed. Accented characters are now handled correctly when sorting points in the Features manager (Navigation > Features...). Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.13e In the Automatic import settings window in MacroPro (Utilities > Automatic import settings...) if an output was moved downwards the displayed output settings no longer corresponded to the selected output. This has been fixed. VERSION 10.13d The Utilities > Security... feature has been split into Utilities > Lock... and Utilities > Unlock..., although the functionality is the same. The settings in the Distance, bearing and profile window (Navigation > Distance, bearing and profile mode) are now "sticky". The Enhance window (Processing > Enhance...) now has buttons that reset each slider to 0. It also has a new tick box (Selected plane sliders control all planes) that causes the brightness, contrast and offset sliders for the current plane to affect all other planes simultaneously. This makes it quicker and easier to adjust the overall brightness and contrast of an image without having to adjust each plane individually. The plane button icons indicate which plane's sliders are being adjusted. The software is now built with Microsoft Visual C++ 2022 and the Visual C++ runtime has been updated to the latest version (14.34.31931). The software is now built with Windows SDK version 10.0.22621 which supports Windows 11 22H2 and all prior versions of Windows 10 and 11. The automatic importer in MacroPro was still occasionally not importing some GeoTIFF images if they were produced in quick succession by the source software. This has been fixed. Using File > Save a copy... caused the image or animation to stop updating with new data if Utilities > Automatic update was switched on. This has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.12b A new setting has been added in the Display formats area of the Station tab in the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...) that allows the time zone of dates and times inserted in file names to be specified. This applies to functions that offer automatic file naming, such as image export (File > Export > Image...), and to the Archive operation in automatic processing macros. It offers the same options as the existing time display setting and defaults to "Local time when ingested". Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.12a A "delete frame and save" icon has been added to the animation tools panel. This allows frame deletion to be made permanent more easily. Windows 11 is now fully supported. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.11m Resizing image windows in iDAP and MacroPro is now smoother and faster in most cases. The MacroPro system tray icon now changes to show two small white circular arrows during automatic processing. The current MacroPro automatic processing status can now be seen by hovering the mouse over its system tray icon. If the MacroPro system tray icon is clicked during automatic processing, the window for the current macro operation now appears along with the main MacroPro window. Please note that this behaviour doesn't apply to any MacroPro icon in the taskbar, only to the system tray icon. We therefore recommend using the system tray icon to activate MacroPro once running. During automatic processing in MacroPro, the Cancel button is now available in progress windows. When clicked, this cancels the current macro and the remainder of the current automatic processing run. This means you no longer have to wait until automatic processing has finished before changing settings. The automatic importer in MacroPro was occasionally not importing some GeoTIFF images if they were produced in quick succession by the source software. This has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.11h The AHRPT EPS level 0 exporter was not working. This has been fixed. VERSION 10.11g A random crash problem that affected some systems since version 10.11e has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.11e The Blue Marble masking, DEM masking and formula palette operations now use multiple worker threads to reduce processing times. They are now up to 3 times, 6 times and 7 times faster respectively, depending on settings and PC specifications. You may notice the PC's cooling fan speed increasing during processing due to higher CPU usage. By default the number of worker threads will be half the number of CPU cores in the PC, up to a maximum of 8. However this can be overridden in the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). We don't recommended setting the number of worker threads higher than half the number of CPU cores (or 8, whichever is less) as this may actually increase processing times due to additional overheads, memory and storage bandwidth limitations and increased shared resource contention. It may also adversely affect other software running on the PC. In any image viewing mode (pan and scroll, magnification, etc) you can now press and hold down the scroll wheel, middle mouse button or Ctrl key while moving the scroll wheel to magnify or reduce the image centred on the pixel under the mouse pointer. A sound can now be played each time documents are automatically updated, alerting users of new data. This can be set up in the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). The default file name for the position source has changed from GPS.txt to GNSS.txt in line with recent changes to the Dartcom Polar Orbiter Ingester software. This change will not affect existing settings which will continue to use the previous file name. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.10f Since version 10.10d, the Formula palette window (Processing > Formula palette...) produced an error when saving a new formula palette. This has been fixed. Since version 10.10d, reprojected formula palettes lost their colours if the Recalculate enhancement tick box had previously been ticked in iDAP, or if it was ticked in the Reproject operation in MacroPro. This has been fixed. Since version 10.10d, ticking the Override tick box in the Create palette operation in MacroPro caused the palette creation to fail. This has been fixed. Since version 10.8b, solar zenith angle read-outs have been incorrect, also having a knock-on effect on Albedo calibrated read-outs. This has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.10d The read-outs panel (iDAP) and import status panel (MacroPro) have been redesigned with a cleaner look. The profiling facility in iDAP (Navigation > Distance, bearing and profile) has been redesigned with a cleaner look, larger graph and more space for product values. The settings panel for the Assign series operation in MacroPro now includes an Edit... button to allow management of the series and features. The image export facility in iDAP (File > Export > Image...) has been redesigned. The widely-used GeoTIFF format is now supported, plus an option to build the file name automatically based on the satellite, data type, image bands and date/time. It also allows multiple exports to be performed without the window closing each time. Position read-outs are now provided for the image preview. The Export image operation in MacroPro includes the same functionality changes as the image export facility in iDAP. Additionally the folder in which to save an automatically named file can be specified. The data export facility (File > Export > Data...) has been redesigned. An image preview is now provided to make area selection quicker and easier. The widely-used GeoTIFF format is now supported and obsolete formats have been removed. There is an option to build the file name automatically based on the satellite, data type, image band, value type and date/time. Position read-outs are now provided for the image preview. The Export data operation in MacroPro includes the same functionality changes as the data export facility in iDAP. Additionally the folder in which to save an automatically named file can be specified. The printing facility in iDAP (File > Print...) has been redesigned. Position read-outs are now provided for the image preview. The CSV import facility in the features manager (Navigation > Features...) now recognises the UTF-8 BOM (Byte Order Marker) and correctly interprets accented characters. The CSV import facility in the formula palettes manager (Processing > Formula palette...) now recognises the UTF-8 BOM (Byte Order Marker) and correctly interprets accented characters. The last entry in a classification palette (Processing > Formula palette...) will now be applied to values equal to or greater than the specified value, and the larger values option is no longer available. This is to correct an issue where the last classification entry was not shown in read-outs unless the value was exactly equal. The formula palette key now appears and disappears automatically as images and animations with and without formula palettes are activated if View > Palette key is switched on. The value and classification label are now shown for classification palette read-outs - previously only the label was shown. The default overlay settings can now be edited using Navigation > Default overlay settings... which removes the need to first close all document windows and use Navigation > Overlay settings. The Overlay settings window has gained a Reset to factory defaults... button and the Grid lines section has been slighty redesigned to remove extraneous space. The persistent window positions can now be reset using the Reset button in the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration... > Session tab). When starting the software, you can now reset the persistent window sizes and positions, tool bar, panels and status bar, and prevent open document windows being restored, by holding down the Shift key until the main window appears. This is useful in a multiple display setup where displays have been rearranged and some windows end up positioned completely outside them. When Window > Snap to edges is enabled, document windows now snap to each other as well as the document area and screen edges when moving or resizing them. This makes it quicker and easier to arrange several document windows without them overlapping slightly or having small gaps between them. Two new default features (Level 1 places and Level 2 places) are now available in the series manager (Navigation > Series...). They are designed to replace the original Default feature which contained a number of inaccurate positions and names. The new features contain up-to-date points of interest split into two levels. Level 1 includes national capitals, other large cities and small islands. Level 2 includes smaller cities and other points of interest. This means that if too many points of interest are visible causing images to be excessively cluttered, the level 2 points can be switched off in one go rather than switching off individual points. The document updating interval in the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration... > Station tab) now also affects the automatic importer in MacroPro. The ability to import and export a number of legacy raw data types (CHRPT, SeaWiFS, GVAR and MTSAT LRIT/HRIT) has been removed. However existing iDAP image and animation documents of those types can still be opened and processed as normal. An issue with points of interest on the opposite side of the globe appearing occasionally on images in certain circumstances has been fixed. The Microsoft Visual C++ 2019 runtime has been updated to the latest version (14.29.30139.0). Numerous other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.9m An issue with images created using the AHRPT sub-sampler not being calibrated if the channel 3A/3B switchover occurred during the pass has been fixed. An issue with imported GeoTIFF images having incorrect overlays and read-outs with the stereographic projection centred on a point in the southern hemisphere has been fixed. To correct the problem on existing images, go to Navigation > Overlay settings... and click OK. VERSION 10.9k If a new series was added in the series manager, then the features manager was accessed from within the series manager, the list of available features did not refresh. This has been fixed. The HRPT raw importers now have an improved algorithm for detecting missing data. The HRPT and AHRPT sub-samplers now recalculate the navigation data when a sub-sample is created. This ensures that any changes to the navigation algorithm are applied. The navigation accuracy of AHRPT images has been significantly improved. The selected files in the HRPT raw importers did not necessarily correspond to the files indicated. This has been fixed. The HRPT raw importers were not setting the plane types and calibrations for imported images. This has been fixed. The scroll bars on the sub-sampled image in the HRPT and AHRPT sub-samplers did not appear initially. This has been fixed. The Microsoft Visual C++ 2019 runtime has been updated to the latest version (14.29.30135.0). Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.9d The path selection window now includes a new network enumerator that uses the Windows Shell API instead of the Windows Networking API which relied on SMB v1 being enabled. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.9c The grid line latitude/longitude labels are now shown at the edges of the window rather than the edges of the overall image. The name of the map option that was used to create a reprojected image is now shown in the text area of image windows. An issue with the direction (E/W) of the grid line longitude labels being reversed has been fixed. Due to the use of new Windows APIs present only in Windows 8 onwards, Windows 7 is no longer supported. The Microsoft Visual C++ 2019 runtime has been updated to the latest version (14.28.29914.0). Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.8h An issue with the Blue Marble and DEM masks being reversed in the longitude direction has been fixed. Various other minor bug fixes. VERSION 10.8g During automatic import in MacroPro, if a source path is inaccessible for any reason (such as a network issue or deleted folder) this is now logged and an alarm generated. The station and cursor read-outs in iDAP were showing the wrong direction for longitudes, i.e. degrees East instead of West. This has been fixed. Other read-outs elsewhere in iDAP were not affected. Under certain conditions, parts of the Configuration and About windows would not always redraw properly. This has been fixed. The Visual Studio 2019 runtime has been updated to the latest version (14.28.29334.0). Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.8d Antarctica was missing from the new default overlays and has been added. After updating, go to Navigation > Overlay settings... with no images open and reset your default overlay settings to defaults to include the Antarctica overlay. The GSHHG Antarctica overlays had spurious lines where they spanned the 0 degree and 180 degree longitude lines. These have been fixed in the associated Map Overlays Update (December 2020). Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.8b The separate map overlays update must also be installed when upgrading from version 10.7h or older. This provides new, up-to-date, high-resolution overlays created from the GSHHG data set and broken down into coastlines, lakes and lake islands. To change the default overlay settings to use the new overlays, ensure all images are closed, then select Navigation > Overlay settings... To replace the existing overlays with the new standard set (green coastlines and lake islands, blue lakes, red political boundaries) click Reset to defaults. Alternatively, select appropriate GSHHG overlays to replace your existing World overlays. To make existing images use the new GSHHG overlays, open each image and repeat this process as required. Map options will also need updating in the same way. Map overlays created by this version will have smoother lines with fewer points, improving their appearance and drawing speed. The Overlays Utility can now import overlays from ESRI Shapefiles. The features manager (Navigation > Features manager...) can now import points from ESRI Shapefiles. Automatic import outputs in MacroPro now have an option to use the default map overlays (configured using Navigation > Overlay settings...) or custom overlays specific to each output. To ensure continuity, existing outputs will have the Custom overlays option selected after installing this version. It is therefore necessary to edit each output and select the Default overlays option where required. The Navigate operation in MacroPro now has an option to create default or custom map overlays for the image. This can be used to ensure consistent overlays for images from different sources, or create custom overlays for a specific purpose such as animation or formula palette creation, temporarily if required. Formula palette presets can now be edited within MacroPro using the Edit... button in the Create palette operation settings. The position display format and temperature units can now be set in MacroPro independently of iDAP using the Station tab within the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). Times can now be shown in UTC (the default), or local time when the data was ingested (assuming the PC was set to the local time zone), or current local time. This can be adjusted in the Station tab within the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). The time interval between automatic document updates in iDAP, and automatic processing runs in MacroPro, can now be adjusted in the Station tab within the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). This allows reduction of the latency before new data is displayed and increases the automatic processing throughput in MacroPro. The display position of the frame time overlay on animations can now be configured in the Appearance tab within the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). The new File > Save a copy... facility allows a copy of the active document to be saved with a different name, or in a different folder, without affecting the name or location of the active document. Recompiled using Microsoft Visual Studio 2019 with the latest Windows 10 SDK. The overlay selection drop-lists in the Overlay settings window (Navigation > Overlay settings...) did not have vertical scroll bars, and deleting an overlay did not always work correctly. These issues have been fixed, and the drop-lists are also now wider to accommodate longer overlay names. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.7h Support has been added for GK-2A UHRIT images. Messages boxes normally shown when a document cannot be opened have now been suppressed in MacroPro to prevent processing being stopped until they are dismissed. The Navigation > Projection transform... facility was not preserving the colours of single plane images. This has been fixed. The currently selected automatic import settings in MacroPro were always reverting to Default. This has been fixed. Deleting automatic import settings did not actually delete the settings, and instead deleted an automatic processing macro set with the same name. This has been fixed. Custom file names specified for automatic import outputs in MacroPro were not being saved. This has been fixed. If the "Image type" file name option was selected for an IPOPP VIIRS ENCC Day/Night automatic import output, files were not output due to the name containing an illegal forwardslash character. This has been fixed. In certain situations, the type of image produced by an automatic import output was incorrect. This has been fixed. Temperature read-outs on IPOPP MODIS LST products were not showing for the full range of possible values. This has been fixed with a change to the formula palette preset "IPOPP MODIS LST". Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.6h Various minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.6g Various minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.6c Various minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.6b Various minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.5e Support has been added for the improved accuracy navigation parameters due to be added to GOES HRIT products in March 2020. A formula palette and associated formula have been added for the GOES HRIT ACHA (cloud height) product available since late January 2020. Support has been added for importing Feng Yun 3 GeoTIFF products created by Dartcom extensions to the CMA processing software. The enhancement window (Processing > Enhance...) has been redesigned and options added to clip unwanted pixel values from the low and high ends of the enhancement profile. It also now shows the progress of apply an enhancement in the case of large images where this takes a significant amount of time. Distance unit conversion functions (mtoft, fttom, kmtomi, mitokm) have been added to the formula language for cloud height products. The letters R, G and B have been added to the plane icons across both applications to make it clearer what they correspond to. Changes made to certain automatic processing settings in MacroPro would not be saved automatically when OK was clicked in the automatic processing settings window (Utilities > Automatic processing settings...). This has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.4s The Automatic import settings window did not work as expected when duplicating sources or outputs, and did not always display the correct source settings. These issues have been fixed. If an animation document was updated while it was not playing, the displayed frame was not updated accordingly. This has been fixed. The station position in MacroPro was not updating automatically. This has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.4q An automatic import facility has been added to MacroPro. It runs in the background in a separate thread so as not to disrupt the normal operation of MacroPro and triggers alarms if any problems occur. Automatic importing can be configured using Utilities > Automatic import settings... and switched on/off using Utilities > Automatic import. A dockable panel showing the current automatic import status can be shown using View > Automatic import status panel. Support has been added for GK-2A LRIT/HRIT data which has replaced COMS-1 LRIT/HRIT. Support has been added for GOES HRIT level 2+ products. Due to them being single-plane greyscale images, they do not have associated colour palettes. However, Dartcom has created a range of formula palettes (having names starting with "GOES HRIT") that can be applied using Processing > Formula Palette... or the Create Palette operation in MacroPro to restore the missing colours. The data export window (File > Export > Data...) has been redesigned to be more similar to the automatic data export settings panel in the Automatic processing settings window (Utilities > Automatic processing settings...). Both windows benefit from improved functionality, including the ability to specify the temperature units (°C, °F or K) when exporting calibrated values. A Set file names button has been added to the Automatic processing settings window (Utilities > Automatic processing settings...). This resets the macro's output file names to match its associated document, which is useful if the document is changed. The layout of the Station tab in the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...) has been revised. It now also allows the temperature units (°C, °F or K) used throughout iDAP/MacroPro to be set. The lower half of the read-outs panel (View > Read-outs panel) has been redesigned to allow more information to be displayed, including the wavelength of the data if available. AVHRR channel 3 is also now indicated as being 3A or 3B. Animations now show various details in the read-outs panel. They refer to the frame most recently added to the animation. Existing animations will not show the full range of details until another frame is added. The Distance, bearing and profile window (Navigation > Distance, bearing and profile mode) has been redesigned to remove the temperature units selection (now done globally using Utilities > Configuration... > Station) and make the read-outs more closely mirror the appearance of the read-outs panel. If View > Automatically centre on station is switched on for a document, the station position now stays centred when the window is resized. The amount of storage used by a document is now shown in the File details area in file windows (e.g. File > Open... and File > Delete...). The temporary storage path is now monitored by MacroPro, triggering an alarm if the free space falls below the threshold set in the Diagnostics settings window (Utilities > Diagnostics settings...). The path selection window now shows the names of storage volumes, and the hosts and share names for mapped drives. The formula language has gained temperature conversion functions for Kelvin (ctok, ktoc, ftok, ktof). The majority of the tool bar icons have been redesigned or refreshed. The delete icon used in various windows has been changed from a cross to a dustbin. The PCI Geomatica, ERDAS IMAGINE, ENVI/IDL and GeoTIFF exporters had not worked correctly since version 10.0 - all the raw and calibrated planes contained the same data. This issue has now been fixed. The ERDAS IMAGINE exporters did not work if additional data was selected without also selecting calibrated data. This problem has now fixed. Image document windows no longer redraw every time they are deactivated when not in Distance, bearing and profile mode. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.3d A new option has been added to map options that causes the projection to be automatically centred on the current station position. This is intended for moving vessels, so map options "follow" the vessel. It can be switched on or off using the Automatically centre on station tick box in the Map options manager window (Navigation > Map options...). It can only be switched on in Easy mapping mode and cannot be used with the Hammer, Miller Cylindrical, Mollweide, Robinson, Sinusoidal or Wagner projections. Colour selectors now have a new look that fully utilises Windows themes. Document windows are now redrawn to show the latest station position if it has changed by more than 1 kilometre, instead of 0.1 degrees of latitude or longitude as previously. This ensures that the frequency of station position updates is consistent from the equator right to the poles. The magnification and pan/scroll position of new projected images are now reset to defaults instead of inheriting those from the unprojected image. This ensures a consistent initial appearance when they are opened. If no default series was selected, all open document windows would redraw every minute for no reason. This has been fixed. If no map option was selected for the Reproject operation in a MacroPro macro, the first available map option was used. This now triggers an alarm instead. If no formula palette was selected for the Create palette operation in a MacroPro macro, the first available palette was used. This now triggers an alarm instead. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.3b Full diagnostics facilities have been added to MacroPro - namely logging, alarms and available storage monitoring. This will alert you to any issues that occur during automatic processing, allowing you to pinpoint and fix the causes easily. To configure the diagnostics facilities, go to Utilities > Diagnostics settings... Alarms in MacroPro are displayed in a dockable panel, similar to the read-outs panel in iDAP. This can be shown or hidden using View > Alarms panel, or the associated tool bar icon (sixth from right). MacroPro now has a system tray icon which is used to display alarm alert balloons if MacroPro is minimised, and can also be clicked to show the MacroPro main window. The Automatic processing settings window in MacroPro (Utilities > Automatic processing settings...) is now wider and has received several enhancements. When you click Add macro... the new macro is now added below the one selected in the Macros list, or at the end of the list if no macro is selected. The Duplicate macro button adds a copy of the selected macro. You can now edit each macro's name by switching off the new Same as document tick box and editing the name in the box next to it. The Test macro button now has detailed error reporting to allow any issues with the macro to be pinpointed and fixed easily. A new menu item in MacroPro (Window > Minimise on startup) allows you to choose whether or not the main window is minimised automatically when you start it. Previously it was always minimised automatically. A new tool bar icon has been added corresponding to Utilities > Automatic update in iDAP (sixth from right) or Utilities > Automatic processing in MacroPro (seventh from right). A new tool bar icon (eighth from right) has been added for Utilities > Automatic processing settings... in MacroPro. The performance of the Navigation > Projection transform... facility in iDAP and the Reproject operation in MacroPro have been improved for larger images. The Navigation > Blue Marble masking... facility in iDAP and the Blue Marble operation in MacroPro are now around 3 times faster than before, and as much as 8 times faster on larger images. The Navigation > DEM masking... facility in iDAP and the DEM operation in MacroPro are now around twice as fast as before, and as much as 4 times faster on larger images. MacroPro now includes the name of the current macro in the status bar messages displayed during automatic processing. The Enhance, Export image and Archive operations in MacroPro now have progress bars. If you click Cancel while testing a macro, the entire macro is now stopped rather than just the current operation. The Enhance operation in MacroPro has not worked since version 10.0 - this is now fixed. The Processing > Enhance... facility in iDAP was unaffected. The Autosat, GRIB, Cinesat and SATAID data exporters have also not worked since version 10.0 and are now fixed. The Blending setting for the Blue Marble and DEM operations in MacroPro defaulted to Screen instead of Normal when macro sets were imported into versions 10.0 through 10.2. This will have caused unexpected results such as strange colours or a "washed out" appearance. The only solution is to go through each macro and set Blending to Normal where required. Animations smaller than the document area were not opening at their original size - this has been fixed. Various other minor changes, enhancements and bug fixes. VERSION 10.2e A GeoTIFF import facility (File > Import > GeoTIFF...) has been added. It also has an associated tool bar icon (second from left). It currently supports GeoTIFF files produced by the NASA IPOPP (International Polar Orbiter Processing Package) software. Support for other types of GeoTIFF file may be added in future according to demand. A GeoTIFF archive path has been added in the Paths tab of the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). A new tool for centring the view of the active image on the current station position (View > Centre on station) has been added. It also has an associated tool bar icon (eighth from left) and is only available for navigated images. Note that if the station position is towards the edge of an image it may not end up in the centre of the view. A new setting for automatically centring the view of the active image on the current station position (View > Automatically centre on station) has been added. It also has an associated tool bar icon (ninth from left) and is only available for navigated images. When switched on, the image will automatically be centred on the current station position whenever it is opened or updated, or if the station position changes. This setting is per image rather than global, and is saved with the image. As well as floating windows, all first-level windows (i.e. those accessed directly from menu items or tool bar icons) now remember where they were positioned if Window positions is ticked in the Session tab of the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...). A new tool for snapping window edges to the boundaries of the displays and document area (Window > Snap to edges) has been added. This works with the application window as well as document windows. It is designed to make it easier to move and resize windows on multiple displays without exceeding the bounds of each display. A new tool for automatically sizing the application window to fill the displays it currently intersects (Window > Fill intersecting displays with application) has been added. So you can roughly position and size the application window so it appears on all the displays you want to use, then use this tool to make it completely fill those displays. A new tool for automatically sizing the active document to fill the displays it currently intersects (Window > Fill intersecting displays with document) has been added. So you can roughly position and size the document window so it appears on all the displays you want to use, then use this tool to make it completely fill those displays. The Edit > Cut and Edit > Paste menu items and associated tool bar icons have been removed as they were never available. The Polar navigate tool bar icon has been removed as it was only available for images produced by the legacy APT/WEFAX Grabber and HRPT/CHRPT Grabber software. The Open last saved document when window is closed tick-boxes (in the Formula palette and Projection transform windows, for example) have been renamed Open after save. Their states are now remembered and they cause each image to be opened immediately after it has been saved, rather than only the last saved image being opened when the window is closed. Images that are already open will be updated. When using multiple displays, windows will no longer be split across displays, instead opening in the centre of the display on which the top left corner of the window is situated. Animations will now retain their correct aspect ratio when maximised. When opening a document, its window will now initially fill the display intersecting the top left corner of the document area only rather than the entire document area. The cross (X) and plus (+) marker symbols are now drawn thicker on printed output to make them more visible. The figures produced by the range calculation function in the formula palette facility now have the same number of decimal places as the palette, and infinity is recognised and displayed accordingly. An issue with classification formula palettes not being applied correctly if the values had been edited has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 10.1p The formula palette facility (Processing > Formula palette...) has been redesigned. The scale can now have up to 256 colours (40 previously) and is defined by minimum and maximum values rather than minimum and step. Logarithmic scales (base 10 or base e) have also been added with limits defined by minimum and maximum powers. Hovering over the scale shows the colour and corresponding value under the mouse next to the currently selected colour (to the right of the colour grid). The colour grid now contains a wider selection of colours arranged in a more logical way. Specific colours can also be defined using the Red, Green and Blue boxes. The Auto graduate fill mode now shows the range of colours that will be filled when you hover over the scale. Lastly the colours, values and labels in the scale can be imported and exported in CSV format (values and labels are only imported for classifications). An issue with the range calculation function in the formula palette facility producing incorrect results has been fixed. An issue with formula palette creation stopping part way through giving an error related to calibrated data has been fixed. The formula palette key (View > Key...) now has a larger box for the formula name and a much smaller button (labelled f=) for showing the formula. The Product box in the readouts panel is now taller to allow for longer formula names and units. The Profiler window (Navigation > Distance, bearing and profile...) is now larger and the read-outs have been re-arranged to allow for a larger Product box. Also the axis scales now intelligently adjust the frequency of labels to match the range of the graphs. The icons in path selection windows now match those in the Windows version on which the software is running. The Dundee standard raw importer now supports Metop files. Special satellites named Dundee Metop-A, etc, have been added to the satellites database in File > Import > Satellites... to allow the imported Metop files to be sub-sampled as calibrated HRPT images using File > Create from raw > HRPT. Metop-C has been added to the satellites database in File > Import > Satellites..., with pre-launch calibration coefficients until the satellite is declared operational and the final coefficients published. Various other minor changes. VERSION 10.0g There is now no limit on the size of images that iDAP and MacroPro can handle. A new, purpose-designed file format has been developed by Dartcom to allow this. Existing images will be imported automatically, and old format files will be deleted automatically when images are saved in the new format. Multi-plane image files will use about 33% more storage than the old file format. The new file format allows images to be opened and saved significantly faster, and has enabled several operations to be streamlined, e.g. masking, image exporting, animation and formula palette creation. The new file format also reduces the amount of memory used by iDAP and MacroPro, at the expense of increased use of temporary storage. However, it is still important to have plenty of memory in the PC, as this will take advantage of disk caching to maximise performance. We recommend a minimum of 8GB. Using a Solid State Drive (SSD) for temporary storage will also increase performance significantly. The width and height of animations are limited to 6,000 pixels. Animation frames larger than that will automatically be scaled to fit within the limits. The map overlays, station position marker, features, range rings and lat/lon legends are drawn on the animation frame after it has been scaled so they remain legible. The width and height of exported images (File > Export > Image...) are limited to 12,000 pixels. Lower limits can also be specified using new settings. Images will automatically be scaled to fit within the limits. The map overlays, station position marker, features, range rings and lat/lon legends are drawn on the exported image after it has been scaled so they remain legible. The Blue Marble and DEM masking facilities (Navigation > Blue Marble masking... and Navigation > DEM masking...) have gained a Blending setting. Normal blending produces the same results as in previous versions. Screen blending causes the transparency of the mask to increase with the brightness of the underlying image. So darker areas such as land and sea are coloured by the Blue Marble mask, and lighter areas such as clouds are barely coloured at all. In Screen blending mode we recommend setting Slice and Opacity to 100% for best results. The ability to export a matrix containing DEM values has been removed from the DEM masking facility (Navigation > DEM masking...). The image processing operations in the Processing menu (Sharpen, Software, Extract edges, Blur, Rotate and Flip) can now be cancelled while in progress. The file browser window (e.g. File > Open...) now shows the size of charts and animations if Preview is switched on. Paths in the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...) can now be reset to defaults using the Reset buttons. The "splash" box has been redesigned and now stays visible long enough to read the information it contains. An issue with the area of an image covered by a scroll bar not always being redrawn when a scroll bar was hidden during resizing has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 9.4h A crash problem when reading zero length GIF files has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 9.4g Various minor changes, bug fixes and enhancements. VERSION 9.3d Support has been added for GOES-16 ABI data which is now available on EUMETCast. iDAP and MacroPro can now use up to 3GB of RAM each on 32-bit Windows, and up to 4GB each on 64-bit Windows. This should allow simultaneous display and processing of more images and animations without memory limits being reached. MSG-4 (METEOSAT 11) images and EMWIN chart products are now identified correctly. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 9.2p Various minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 9.2k The Features Manager window (Navigation > Features...) now includes the option to show a set of range rings around each point, with the radius, colour, line style and width of each ring configurable. The Configuration window now includes the option to show a set of range rings around the station point, with the same settings as the Features Manager. Range rings can be shown or hidden using View > Range rings, or the associated tool bar icon, plus a new option in the print and image export windows and automatic processing settings tabs. The Features Manager window now allows points to be imported from a Google Earth Keyhole Markup Language (KML) file with extension .kml or .kmz. The Overlays Utility (Navigation > Overlays Utility...) now includes the ability to import line points from a Google Earth Keyhole Markup Language (KML) file with extension .kml or .kmz. Existing overlays can also now be deleted if required. Animations can now be synchronised using View > Synchronise animations, or the associated tool bar icon. When synchronisation is switched on, if you start playing an animation, the others will also play using the same speed and looping settings. Dragging an animation's position slider or clicking its previous and next frame icons will also update the other animations to match. The way animations are synchronised can be controlled using View > Synchronise frame times, or the associated tool bar icon. When frame time synchronisation is switched on, the acquisition time recorded with each frame is used to synchronise the animations. When switched off, the frame's numerical position in the playing order is used. The palette key (View > Palette key) was not always available for animations with formula palettes. This has been fixed, but animations will need to be recreated or have a new frame added to restore the palette key availability. When starting iDAP, the visible area of images restored from the previous session was not always restored correctly. This has been fixed. When in cursor mode, moving the mouse between images with no cursor set would leave a cursor on those images. This has been fixed. Various other minor changes, bug fixes, enhancements and performance improvements. VERSION 9.1r The format of iDAP/MacroPro files (.did/.dmd) has changed slightly and the version number has therefore been increased to 24. Please ensure all other Dartcom software is updated to use the same file format version. The supported version is shown in the About window (Help > About). A new Cursor mode has been added (View > Cursor mode) which allows a cursor to be placed on an image to make obtaining read-outs for specific points easier. Left click to place the cursor, left drag to move it, right click to clear it. The cursor position is saved with the document. The Reference Points window (Navigation > Reference points...) has been replaced with a new Series Manager (Navigation > Series...) and Feature Manager (Navigation > Features...). These allow control over appearance and allow points to be joined up with lines. Please see Help > Help topics... or the iDAP/MacroPro Software User Guide for more information. The tool bar icons have been re-arranged in a more logical order to match the menus. New icons have been added for controlling and editing Series and Features, and some icons have been redrawn. A new Assign Series operation has been added to MacroPro (Utilities > Automatic processing settings...) to allow a specific series to be assigned to an image automatically. A new Appearance tab has been added in the Configuration window (Utilities > Configuration...) providing control over the appearance of the station position marker, lat/lon legends and animation details. Issues with previews not being displayed in the HimawariCast LRIT/HRIT projected exporter windows (File > Export > HimawariCast LRIT/HRIT) have been fixed. Support has been added for data from the forthcoming GOES-16 (GOES-R) satellite, including colour charts. However at the time of writing the satellite is only transmitting test data, so further updates may be needed once live data transmissions have started. Various other minor changes, bug fixes and enhancements. VERSION 9.0u The format of iDAP/MacroPro files (.did/.dmd/.dfd) has changed slightly and the version number has therefore been increased to 23. Please ensure all other Dartcom software is updated to use the same file format version. The supported version is shown in the About window (Help > About...). The Windows SDK has been updated to version 8.1 which supports Windows 7, 8 and 10. Earlier Windows versions (including XP and Vista) are no longer supported. Apple QuickTime has been replaced with a proprietary animation system and associated file format developed specially by Dartcom. Existing QuickTime animations will be imported automatically when opened in iDAP, or when new frames are added by MacroPro. The obsolete QuickTime movie files will be deleted automatically when imported animations are saved. To improve responsiveness, animations no longer play when previewed in File > Open, instead showing only the first frame. The frame date and time is now overlayed on animations and stays a fixed size so it is readable if the animation window is resized. Keyboard shortcuts have been added for animations, so the arrows and Home/End keys can be used to set the current frame, space bar (or Pause or Clear) to play/pause, and Delete (or backspace) removes the current frame. Third-party libraries have been updated to their latest available versions. Longer file names are no longer arbitrarily truncated by File > Save As, and the initial folder in the Save As window now always matches the location of the document. Issues with exported GeoTIFF files not being recognised by some third-party software packages have hopefully been resolved. The Navigation > DEM Masking facility now works with the ETOPO1 (1 minute of arc) DEM data set which is available from Dartcom in a separate DEM Data update. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. For best performance we recommend running 64-bit Windows with at least 8GB of RAM, preferably 16GB if you intend to have many animations playing at once. VERSION 8.9g Problems with overlay misalignment on very large images have been fixed. To correct the overlays on existing images, go to Navigation > Overlay Settings... and click OK. This causes the overlays to be redrawn with correct alignment. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.9f The GVAR calibration system has been redesigned, however extensive testing has shown negligible differences in read-outs between the old and new systems. Calibrated read-outs on reprojected GVAR images will now be correct. The online help is now consistent with changes made to the menu structure in version 8.9b. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.9b Support for HimawariCast LRIT and HRIT data has been added. Various other changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.8k An issue with the Data export window (File > Export > Data...) not working correctly with GVAR images and legacy HRPT, APT, PDUS and WEFAX images has been fixed. VERSION 8.8i The Data export window (File > Export > Data...) now works correctly with images containing space data - previously it prevented export of calibrated values. It also now exports the value -999999 for pixels that do not have a valid value (e.g. space data). The Enhance window (Processing > Enhance...) now gives correct read-outs from the graph rather than just the text "D'Oh!". The Distance, bearing and profile window (Navigation > Distance, bearing and profile mode) did not always display graphs for calibrated data when it should, e.g. if the profile started in space data - this has been fixed. Temperature read-outs from infra-red and water vapour images are now shown as "(n/a)" for pixels where the calculated radiance is 0 or negative. VERSION 8.8g Various minor changes and bug fixes. The .exe files are now digitally signed with Dartcom's code signing certificate. VERSION 8.8f At zoom levels greater than 1:1, map overlays now align correctly with the reference points. For this correction to be applied, go to Navigation > Overlay settings... and click OK to redraw the overlays. As a side-effect, overlays will now be slightly higher resolution and require slightly more disk space as a result. Using the radio buttons in the DEM masking window (Navigation > DEM masking...) for controlling the highest and deepest colours had no effect. This has been fixed. Applying a formula palette (Processing > Formula palette...) to a night-time multi-plane image with a visible channel on one of the planes would result in pixels with a zero value in the visible channel not being coloured, even if the same pixel in the infra-red channels had non-zero values. This has been fixed, and any non-navigable pixels (e.g. space data) in a navigated image will now no longer be coloured. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.8c The format of iDAP/MacroPro files (.did/.dmd/.dfd) has changed slightly and the version number has therefore been increased to 22. Please ensure all other Dartcom software is updated to use the same file format version. The supported version is shown in the About window (Help > About...). A spurious error message in all the raw importers when no files existed in the selected path has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.7d Various minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.6z A problem with the polar-orbiter satellites database used by the importers under File > Import being lost has been fixed. A Quorum Standard Raw importer has been added to the File > Import sub-menu. A problem with the Calibration Editor window following import and export has been fixed so it now correctly reports the planes imported or exported. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.6t The EPS level 0 exporter has been revised to output a single file for each product type, as required by the AAPP processing package. Support has also been added for the Multi-Mission Admin Message and various issues have been fixed. A database of polar-orbiter satellites has been added under File > Import > Satellites for use with the Dundee Standard Raw importer and other future importers. The lists of images in the HRPT/CHRPT Grabber Raw Importer and Dundee Standard Raw Importer windows are now sorted in ascending order of date to make finding and selecting the required images easier. Images imported by the Dundee Standard Raw importer are now calibrated, and support for the Dundee 1996 Header format has been added. A problem with single plane AHRPT images created using File > Create from Raw which caused incorrect grey values has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.6f Raw AHRPT (Metop) data can now be exported to EPS Level 0 format (File > Export > AHRPT > EPS level 0) for use with the AAPP processing package and other third-party software. A licence key is required - please contact Dartcom for more details. A small error in the headers produced by the ERDAS exporter has been fixed - the pixel resolution was in kilometres instead of metres. Processing facilities in the Navigation menu were erroneously available for GOES LRIT NWS products (fax charts) and will now be disabled. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.4f A problem with poor performance when exporting an image in JPEG format (File > Export > Image) has been fixed. Images with formula palettes created since version 8.4b should now open and save slightly quicker. Support has been added for MTSAT images transmitted on the GOES LRIT service. A problem with the other raw format exporters (File > Export > HRPT/CHRPT/SeaWiFS > Other raw format) where the resulting files were sometimes missing data from the end of the pass has been fixed. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.4b Applying Navigation > Projection transform to a single plane image with a formula palette caused iDAP or MacroPro to crash. This has been fixed. Applying Navigation > Projection transform to a formula palette image which uses the nadir() function would cause the product value read-outs to be missing from the reprojected image. This has been fixed for formula palettes created with v8.4b onwards. The product values are now saved in a matrix which is stored with the image (.frm file). This has increased the processing time and memory usage for the Processing > Formula palette and Navigation > Projection transform functions. The data files for single plane images with a DEM or Blue Marble mask applied using v8.4b onwards will now be smaller and therefore use less memory. Single plane images created from raw data using the File > Create from raw menu now have the full 256 greyscales. Previously single plane images were quantized to 128 greyscales because the other 128 colours in the palette were reserved for the Processing > Formula palette function. However this has been rewritten to remove that requirement. Invalid channel wavelengths were displayed in the information panel for images created from raw data using the File > Create from raw menu. This has been fixed. Using Navigation > Distance, bearing and profile mode with a reprojected formula palette image may not have shown the product value profile. Additionally the profiles may not have matched up with the line drawn on the image. Both these problems have been fixed. The popup window displayed when the Formula... button is clicked in the Key window (View > Palette key) was always displayed on the primary monitor in a multi-monitor setup regardless of which monitor iDAP was running on. This has been fixed. The format of iDAP/MacroPro files (.did/.dmd/.dfd) has changed slightly and the version number has therefore been increased to 21. Please ensure all other Dartcom software is updated to use the same file format version. The supported version is shown in the About window (Help > About...). Various other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.3e Support has been added for GOES-15 LRIT and GVAR images, and COMS-1 LRIT and HRIT images. The "handle" at the top of the read-outs panel has been removed due to visual inconsistencies with the toolbar. However it can still be moved and docked/undocked as before by dragging an empty area of the panel. The font used for the date and time on animations produced by MacroPro has been changed to match the rest of the software and made slightly bigger. Various other minor changes and bug fixes. Recompiled using Microsoft Visual Studio 2010. VERSION 8.2i A graduated fill mode has been added to the iDAP Formula palette window to allow graduated colour palettes to be created much more quickly and with smoother graduations. The Map options manager window (Navigation > Map options) has been completely redesigned but its functionality has not changed significantly. The Projection transform window (Navigation > Projection transform) has been completely redesigned. The mapping parameters are now adjusted using the Map options manager window but the remaining functionality has not changed significantly. The required size for the base image is now shown to assist in choosing a suitable image. Raw LRIT and HRIT data can now be exported to PCI Geomatica, ERDAS IMAGINE, ENVI/IDL and GeoTIFF formats using the File > Export sub-menus. The data must already be decrypted and decompressed. Raw HRPT, CHRPT, SeaWiFS, AHRPT and DMSP data can now be exported to GeoTIFF format using the File > Export sub-menus. The path to archived LRIT/HRIT data has been added to the Paths tab in the Configuration window (Utilites > Configuration). The layout of the Reproject settings in the MacroPro Automatic processing window (Utilities > Automatic processing settings) has been changed to match the new iDAP Projection transform window. A Legacy mode tick-box has been added to all the archiving settings in the MacroPro Automatic processing window to provide compatibility with the archiving system used in versions prior to 8.0 (Weekly/Monthly/Yearly). Displaying the Key window (View > Palette key) for an animation document with a formula palette no longer causes iDAP to crash. Numerous other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.1d The mouse scroll wheel can now be used to scroll image previews in various windows and works more reliably in image windows. The "Calculate range" button in the iDAP Formula palette window now shows the correct progress instead of always showing 100%. An issue where the name of the last plane in an exported ENVI/IDL image was blank when opened in ENVI has been fixed. The Key window now sizes itself correctly so the "Formula" button is never partially obscured. Layout issues with formula palette keys on printed and export images have been fixed. An issue where the Nadir and Phase angle (BRDF) options were erroneously unavailable in the Data export window has been fixed. Older format HRPT, CHRPT and APT images can now utilise the recent improvements to the Overlay settings window (line styles and thicknesses). Please note such images will be re-navigated if their overlay settings are changed. Map overlays with dotted or dashed lines are now drawn correctly. An issue where the overlays on images where a nudge had been applied would move if the overlay settings were changed has been fixed. Windows XP users should check they have installed Service Pack 3 (SP3) as resource leaks in SP2 can cause problems when running software for long periods of time. Fixed a problem which could result in the software crashing if all resources had been used. Other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.0w The Overlays Utility now correctly imports overlays from text files. Other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.0u Legacy NOAA HRPT images could not be exported to NOAA level 1B format. This has been fixed, however previously imported images will need to be re-imported before they can be exported to NOAA level 1B format. True single plane GVAR images can now be created allowing very large areas to be specified. Previously if a single plane was specified a multi-plane image would still be produced. GVAR images without a visible channel would not navigate correctly - this has been fixed. Other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.0r A "legacy mode" option has been added to the MacroPro archiving system to provide folder naming compatibility with older software versions which used the Weekly/Monthly/Yearly archiving system. VERSION 8.0p Single channel GVAR images are now created as single plane bitmaps allowing very large images to be sub-sampled. Fixed a resource leak which could result in the software crashing after an extended period of continuous running. Reprojecting an HRPT or CHRPT image may have caused the software to crash - this has been fixed. VERSION 8.0m Minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.0i Minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 8.0d The software has been significantly rewritten to interface with the Dartcom Polar Orbiter ingester software and provide full compatibility with Windows Vista. The user interface now includes full support for Windows Themes. A setup assistant has been added to import settings from previous software versions. iDAP images are now created from HRPT, CHRPT, SeaWiFS, AHRPT and DMSP raw data using the File > Create from raw sub-menu. Legacy and third-party HRPT, CHRPT and SeaWiFS raw data can now be imported into iDAP using the File > Import sub-menu. The File > Export sub-menu now contains all export functions, including those for HRPT, CHRPT, SeaWiFS, AHRPT and DMSP data. Major and minor grid lines are now supported in the Overlay settings window, plus different line styles and widths. An unlimited number of reference points can now be set up and organised into separate databases using Navigation > Reference points. The station point title is now configured in the Configuration window. The swathe angle for polar orbiter images can now be adjusted dynamically without the need to renavigate. Map overlay files can now be imported and exported using the Dartcom Overlays Utility, accessible via Navigation > Overlays utility. Archiving in MacroPro can now be configured for a specific number of days instead of just Weekly/Monthly/Yearly. VERSION 7.1y Microsoft Visual C++ libraries updated to latest versions. Further problems with MacroPro crashing after several days have been traced and fixed. VERSION 7.1t Blue Marble masking has been added to the Navigation menu in iDAP and the automatic processing settings in MacroPro. This uses NASA Blue Marble imagery to apply a "realistic" land and sea mask to an image, slicing out cloud if required. A graduated atlas colours option has been added to the DEM masking facility. DEM files are now stored in a sub-folder named "DEM" within the map overlays folder. Any existing files are moved to the new location automatically when Navigation > DEM masking is used. Problems with rogue reference points appearing on HRPT and CHRPT images have been fixed. Corrupted files are now detected and handled more robustly. If multiple macros were set up on the same file they may not have all executed under certain conditions. This has been fixed. MacroPro can now be started automatically at the same time as iDAP using a new option in the Utilities menu. Numerous other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 7.1f Problems with the graduated colour blending option for formula palettes with certain types of image have been fixed. Problems with incorrect results from the projection transformation function with certain types of image have been fixed. Problems with certain projection types in the ENVI HRPT/CHRPT exporter have been fixed. Problems with MacroPro crashing after several days when updating an animation have been fixed. VERSION 7.0s Problems with crashing when opening corrupt image files or under full disk conditions have been fixed. Since version 7.0q the file types list in the MacroPro Open window contained a message about QuickTime instead. This has been fixed. VERSION 7.0q Problems with exported PNG and TIFF images having an alpha (transparency) channel have been fixed. Images exported from MacroPro were 1 pixel smaller than they should have been. This has been fixed. Problems with the Dundee HRPT importer have been fixed. VERSION 7.0n The graphics library has been replaced to improve general performance, reliability and stability. All processing functions should now be around 25% faster than in previous versions. The scrolling speed has been improved greatly and the size of scroll bar "thumbs" is now proportional to the area of the image in view. Latitude/longitude labels (legends) can now be displayed at the edges of navigated images (View > Lat/lon legends). The print engine has been completely rewritten to improve quality, legibility and performance. The animation creation engine has been updated to improve performance. The Sharpen, Soften and Extract Edges functions in the Processing menu now allow adjustment of the severity using a slider and can be undone. Latitude/longitude read-outs are now available in the GVAR sub-sampler window. When drawing a profile line, a line is drawn from the start point to the current mouse position to assist in positioning the end point, and the image auto-scrolls to allow the end point to be outside the area of view. More informative mouse cursors are now displayed to better show the current image mode. The File > Delete function now works with large numbers of files. Numerous other minor changes and bug fixes. VERSION 6.5k: The grid lines overlay was always produced for sub-sampled GVAR images even if it was switched off. This has been fixed. The reference points were not being synchronised when the Synchronise with iDAP button was clicked in the MacroPro Configuration window. This has been fixed. VERSION 6.5i: The export data operation in MacroPro did not produce the correct file name as specified for the macro settings. This has been fixed. VERSION 6.5h: Support added for MTSAT LRIT and HRIT images. Problems with image times being incorrect if opened in a different time zone to that in which they were created have been fixed. However, you must open any existing images in the time zone in which they were created and resave them. VERSION 6.4a: Rebuilt with revised compiler optimization settings to resolve problems with document windows not being restored when iDAP or MacroPro is started and other potential problems. VERSION 6.3z: Latitude/longitude read-outs are now available in the GVAR sub-sampler window. GOES satellites are now correctly identified in GVAR image documents. The CineSat data exporter now outputs the image data in big-endian format. On first use the temporary path was being set to a non-existent folder which would prevent a number of processing functions from working, including image export, reprojection and formula palette creation. Fixed. The GVAR sub-sampler window caused a stack overflow when displayed. Fixed. VERSION 6.3y: Support added for EUMETCast MTSAT images (they would open previously, but would be of unknown type and from an unknown satellite). VERSION 6.3x: In the "Data export" window you can now change the output path by clicking "Choose..." if "Build automatically" is selected. PNG image export now works correctly - previously, the files it produced were unreadable. The palette key on exported images now sizes automatically to fit the width of the formula title and is drawn more tidily. Various small bugs have been fixed and other minor changes and improvements made. VERSION 6.3u: Raw value read-outs were being displayed as "(n/a)" for pixels with a raw value of 0. Fixed. VERSION 6.3t: The projection transformation system has been replaced with the GCTP Library, a cartographic system which provides many more projections and parameters than before. Any number of map options can now be saved. Names are now used instead of numbers. Previous map options are imported into the new system automatically. A map options manager has been added to iDAP and MacroPro. It allows map options to be added, edited and deleted. The map overlay settings window has been replaced with a new one which allows any number of overlays and a greater range of colours to be selected. Classification products with text labels can now be generated using the formula palette function. Additional options have been added to the formula palette function to allow the number of decimal places to be specified and graduated colour blending used. The PCI, ERDAS and ENVI export windows have been completely revamped. All three exporters now use the new cartographic projection system, though not all projections are supported by all packages. The output path and file name can also now be specified. Up to 500 reference points can now be defined. An exported data path has been added. It is "sticky" when using the image or data export functions, and can also be changed using Utilities > Configuration. Custom overlays can now be specified in the GVAR sub-sampler window. The "rubber band" selection boxes have been improved to make them more visible on certain images. Various other bugs have been fixed and minor changes and improvements made. VERSION 6.2b: The labels for reference points, the station position and lat/lon labels are now smaller and have a transparent background with a black outline around the text. The points themselves are also smaller and the colours have been changed so they show up better. The distance, bearing and profile line now has a black outline so it is more visible on cloud. The enhancement algorithm has been improved to show more cloud detail. Use View > Restore from original data to use the improved algorithm with existing images. Two new enhancement profiles have also been added - Sine (usually gives better results than Min-max) and Cosine (shows maximum cloud detail at the expense of land). If you change the overlay settings, you are now asked if you want to apply them to the active image (polar-orbiter images only). The settings in the image export and print windows are now "sticky". The recent files list was not being saved when the software was closed. This has been fixed. The formula palette key could be displayed for all animations. It is now only displayed for animations created from formula palette products. The formula pop-up in the palette key could not be scrolled. This has been fixed now. Redraw problems when cancelling a DEM masking or formula palette creation in progress have been fixed. Enhancing a greyscale image which previously had a DEM mask would result in an image apparently of Mars (red). This has been fixed. The active image was not being redrawn after an export operation. It is now. Greyscale images did not have their correct palette in the image export and print windows. They do now. Occasionally the software was reporting that it could not communicate with the security device when starting up. This has hopefully been fixed now. Exported and printed images did not have the correct overlay nudge applied. This has been fixed. The station settings were not being synchronised when Synchronise with iDAP was clicked in the MacroPro configuration window. They are now. VERSION 6.1d: The compression codec used for animations has been changed to improve image quality, the trade-off being larger animation files. This will only affect new animations, or new frames added to existing animations. VERSION 6.1b: In Navigation > DEM masking, if only land or only sea masking was switched on, the rest of the image would be covered with a stripy pattern. This has been fixed. Major improvements have been made to the HRPT/CHRPT and APT navigation modules to fix problems with images covering the North and South poles. Please contact us if you require further technical details on this. VERSION 6.0w: The software would let you apply a DEM mask to an image which already had one. You can no longer do this. Further image redrawing problems related to cancelling image processing operations in progress have been resolved. A DEM masking tool bar button has been added for quick access to the DEM masking function. VERSION 6.0u: The Navigation > DEM masking function now allows a slice point to be set, in a similar way to Navigation > Projection transform. Any pixels whose values are above this will not be masked. This allows cloud to be excluded from the mask, leaving a cloud overlay on green land and blue sea, for example. Some experimentation may be required to determine the correct slice value for different applications and types of imagery. This function has also been added to the automatic DEM masking operation in MacroPro. The DEM masking function now also allows the opacity (transparency) of the mask to be set. This can be used to tint land green and sea blue whilst still retaining the land detail in the imagery. The lower the opacity, the more land detail will show through the mask, but the less tinted the land and sea will be. Some experimentation may be required to determine the correct opacity value for different applications and types of imagery. This function has also been added to the automatic DEM masking operation in MacroPro. The default document and import paths have been changed to "C:\Dartcom\Images". This only applies the first time you run iDAP or MacroPro after installing it - existing users will not be affected. The default GPS source path has been changed to "C:\Dartcom". Again, this only applies the first time you run iDAP or MacroPro after installing it - existing users will not be affected. On starting iDAP or MacroPro, the station position was unavailable if Fixed was selected in the Utilities > Configuration window and Update automatically was switched off. This has been fixed now. 6. Applying a DEM mask to a single-plane image would result in strange readouts and displays, with the image apparently appearing as multi-plane. This has been fixed. 7. Images were not being refreshed properly in the event of some image processing functions being cancelled. This has been fixed. 8. In Navigation > Distance, bearing and profile mode, clicking a point off the edge of an image would result in a strange error message. This has been fixed. 9. If the mouse was moved off the pop-up animation tools window on to an image, the tools window's controls would no longer be clickable. This has been fixed. VERSION 6.0r: Problems with navigation of APT and HRPT/CHRPT images have been fixed, with the exception of those which cover the poles which will only have partial overlays for the time being. Adjustments to the prediction model to fix this fully are planned for the near future. Large images (such as HRIT HRV) were not fully visible in the File > Print window in iDAP. This has been fixed. Attempting to print an entire HRV image would result in iDAP or MacroPro entering a "dead end" state. This has been fixed, but due to problems with a third-party library, prints of such large images may not have overlays and may take a considerable amount of time to print. These issues will be addressed in a future major software release. VERSION 6.0p: By popular request, pan/scroll and zoom functions have been added to MacroPro. Again by request, station and reference points can now be displayed on images in MacroPro. If you change the reference points using iDAP, select Utilities > Configuration in MacroPro and click Synchronise with iDAP to update them in MacroPro. Small improvements have been made to the speed of opening and redrawing images. The File > Export > Data function in iDAP now allows latitudes and longitudes to be exported from LRIT/HRIT images. If the latitude or longitude is unavailable for a particular pixel, its value is set to -999 in the output file. This also applies to the automatic data export operation in MacroPro. If MacroPro is minimised, the processing windows will no longer appear on your desktop during automatic processing. A number of customers have reported problems with iDAP and MacroPro crashing randomly, which we have traced to the QuickTime text media handler. As a temporary workaround whilst we find a more permanent solution, the time is now "burnt in" on animation frames rather than being resizable text. This should fix the crashing problems, but will have a detrimental effect on the readability of the frame time. --- NO HISTORY AVAILABLE FOR VERSIONS BEFORE 6.0p ---