New animations, display system, printing, and image exports in NovaMind 5 for Mac; Beta testers wanted

NovaMind 5.3 for Mac

We’re very excited to announce that we have just entered public beta testing of the next significant update of NovaMind 5 for Mac.

What’s New?

• A complete rewrite of the entire drawing system for NovaMind.
• Crisper looking topics and text in most circumstances.
• New animation system, which allows animated panning, zooming, collapsing and expanding topics, grouping, ungrouping, expanding, collapsing, focussing on a topic, addition and deletion of topics, moving topics, grafting, layout angle changes etc. All of these actions and many more are now smoothly animated, with some of the animations being simple fade in and out, some being the movement of topics, and some being collapsing into a parent topic or expanding from a parent topic.
• More efficient drawing to improve performance of the program.
• Better handling of topic resizing, text editing of topics on the left side of the Mind Map, and related issues.
• Better handling of keeping topics scrolled to be visible when they should be.
• Full support of gradients, shadows, and reflections for printing and export.
• Full translucency support for printing and export, including gradients with translucent colors, and the glassy overlays.
• Inline hyperlinks on topic text are now preserved live (clickable) in PDF exports.
• Completely reworked glassy overlay drawing so it looks good no matter how much you zoom in.
• Completely reworked image export system to give better results and crisper images.
• Completely reworked printing system to work in with the new display system.
• Improved loading of documents, with animation of topics from the Mind Map title.
• Improved handling of addition and removal of Mind Maps in a document.
• Improved handling of movement of link lines when their parent topics are moved.
• Fixed a problem where sometimes if you had an inline image in text it would draw upside down.
• Made performance improvements to text editing.
• Fixed a major performance issue which could happen when pasting or grafting a topic which had already been pasted or grafted.
• Improved the creation of theme preview images.
• Improved handling of image and adornment drag and drop.
• Better handling of pinch zoom operations, and animated zooming using the zoom menu and hotkeys.
• Improved handling of color updates and automatic coloring.
• Improved the topic resizing when adding or removing elements like task information and checkboxes.
• Improved the drawing of background texture images.
• Numerous other small enhancements throughout the program.

This is a huge update that we have been working towards for a very long time – we spent at least 6 months trying to work through an animation issue with Apple. In the end we had to create our own animation system, but now we have that in place, we can easily utilize it for whatever purposes we need within the application.

How do I get it?

You can download it from here: http://downloads.novamind.com/novamind5/mac/NovaMind530b6.dmg

You must be running MacOS X 10.6 or later to use the new version.

FAQ

Q: I’m scared of beta releases – will I get automatically notified when this is released?
A: Yes, it will be released through the normal update channels. You will not be bothered with notifications about updated beta releases.

Q: Why are you doing this beta thing instead of just releasing the software already?
A: This is a completely new display system using different technologies than what we have used before, as well as a completely new animation system, image export system, and printing system. While we have done our best to test these new features internally, the nature of the changes mean that we need to make sure it runs properly on all hardware variations, and that we haven’t missed any significant bugs before doing a full release. This way, people can decide whether they are interested in working with the beta, or just want to wait for the final release.

Q: When will v5.3.0 final release be ready?
A: When it’s ready We can not predict how long the beta program will take, but we are keen to get it completed ASAP so we can move on to the next set of enhancements.

Q: I purchased NovaMind through the Mac App Store – can I be part of the beta program?
A: When you purchase through the Mac App Store, you do not receive a license key, so if you download NovaMind, it will run in 30 day trial mode, and then as a viewer only.

Q: Will this replace my copy of NovaMind that I already have installed?
A: Yes, if you purchased directly from us (as opposed to from the Mac App Store), and drag it to your applications folder. If you do not want to replace your current copy of NovaMind, you can put it in a different folder. If you purchased from the Mac App Store, the application name is different in your Applications folder, so installing this beta would not replace it.

Q: If I replace my copy of NovaMind, but then find an issue that means that I need to go back to the released version, how do I do that?
A: You would just download the latest release from the NovaMind web site and replace the beta with the one you download.

Q: Can I run both the older released version of NovaMind and the beta version at the same time?
A: No. You can have them both installed at the same time, but if you want to switch between one and the other, please quit one before starting the other. If you don’t do this, NovaMind could get confused about autosave and which documents are open.

Q: What do I do if I find a problem in the beta?
A: Use the normal options – either using the Send Feedback, Report a Defect menu items, or the crash reporter. Please ensure that your email address is correct in the error reporter so we can contact you if we need further information.

Q: How will I know if there is an updated beta available?
A: The normal update checking will show you updates to the beta release when you are running a beta release.

Q: If I am running the beta release, how will I know when the final release of v5.3.0 is available?
A: You will be notified through the normal update mechanism.

Q: I like the cool animations – can I slow them down so I can see them better?
A: Yes, but you will need to use the Terminal application to do so – here are the instructions:

1. Open /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app
2. Paste in the following command:
   defaults write com.novamind.novamind5 AnimationDuration 3.0
3. Press Return (this will change the animation from the default 0.25s to 3.0s – use a different number if you want…).
4. Quit and restart NovaMind 5.3.

To return NovaMind to the default animation timing:

1. Open /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app
2. Paste in the following command:
   defaults remove com.novamind.novamind5 AnimationDuration
3. Press Return.
4. Quit and restart NovaMind 5.3.

Q: I’m waiting for feature “X” to be implemented, when will it be available?
A: We do not comment about unreleased features and when they may be available. We are working very hard to improve NovaMind as quickly as possible, and the latest enhancements are a huge step towards our upcoming enhancements that we are working on. They give us a much better framework to work on both now and in the future.

Q: What if I have other questions about the beta?
A: Please send your queries to support@novamind.com

We hope you enjoy the updates we have included in this release of NovaMind.