ecFlow's documentation is now on readthedocs!

We re-install ecFlow with ecFlowUI from time to time at ECMWF on the workstations and on ecgate (see Getting Started with ecFlowUI). On this page we will document the main features and improvements with each installation. Note that this page was only started in December 2016 and so does not contain updates from the previous months. The release notes for the 'core' of ecFlow are here.

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Updates for version 5.9.0

Area

Description

Notes

Remote access via teleportImprovement: remote access to ecFlow servers at ECMWF was improved as described here: Using ecFlowUI via the ECMWF Teleport gateway
Log server

New feature: added new request type to the log server to transfer only the portion of the log file from a given byte offset. With this ecFlowUI can highly optimise file transfer from log servers supporting this option (see below).


Log serverImprovement: previously the log server applied a text filter on the file contents it transmitted. This filter is now removed and the log server sends the full file contents leaving the optional filtering to the client applications.

Log output

Improvement: the log file access has been refactored internally to optimise loading updates for the currently viewed log file. When pressing the (blue) reload button in the Output panel:

  • for files served by a logserver an incremental file transfer is initiated whenever the logserver is supporting this request type
  • for local files only the increment is added to the text viewer
  • when there is no increment (the file did not change) the text viewer is not updated at all (previously it always reloaded the whole file)

A full reload can still be initiated by using the Load whole file button under the More actions submenu. In the same submenu the Load current jobout file button was added to load the current jobout file.

Log outputImprovement: rearranged buttons in the Output panel. Some buttons were moved into a menu accessible from the More actions button to the right.

Log outputImprovement: the progress bar for remote file transfers now only appears after a delay so it is not visible for short enough transfers. Previously it appeared immediately the file update was requested.
Log outputImprovement: added options to show/hide the directory listing panel at the bottom. This can be done using the toggle button at the top of the Output panel. On top of that a close button was added to the directory panel. When the directory panel is hidden it is also disabled and ecFlowUI does not try to update it automatically.

Log outputNew feature:  added button to the directory listing panel in the Output panel  to show detailed information about how the directory information was updated.

Log outputImprovement: In the various views and info labels the file size label for files larger than 1 GB is now displayed with 1 decimal place precision, e.g. 1.3 GB (previously it was displayed as an int).
Node search
New feature: added new Status change option called "older than" to the filter.  It is used to filter nodes with status changes older than the specified period.

System server listNew feature: the system server list access has been redesigned. Previously a centrally installed file defined this list for each ecflow installation at ECMWF. From this version on multiple system server files can be defined independently from the actual installation using either the ECFLOW_SYSTEM_SERVERS_LIST environment variable or specific settings in the ecFlowUI configuration dialogue. See the full description here: System server list files in ecFlowUI
Timeline and server load
Improvement: added button (see the << or >> icon) to show compacted file information in the Timeline and Server load panels. In compact mode only the file name is visible in the file information label, but the full information is still displayed as a tooltip.

Manage serversImprovement:  when changing a host or port or renaming a server all the user interface components (views and panels) are automatically adjusted to the changes. Note: when the host or port altered the original server will be removed from the tree view and a newly created one will be added to the end of the tree.
Manage servers

Improvement:  reports error for newly created servers when host or port contain whitespace characters. When a server added/modified in the ui the following rules are applied:

  • name: cannot contain whitespace characters except space. Cannot start or end with space.
  • host: cannot contain whitespace characters
  • port: can only contain digits
  • user: cannot contain whitespace characters

Preferences dialogImprovement:  when opening the Preferences dialog it will show the last used tab in the current configuration category.
Command line help

Improvement:  when ecflow_ui is started with the -h option (help) the version info is also displayed


Context menu Fix: fixed an issue when shortcuts were not visible in the the node context menus.
Context menu
Fix: fixed an issue when setting variable value for multiple nodes was only applied to the first selected node.
Info panelFix: fixed an issue when Info panel tabs were not notified about selection change when they became unselected
Output panelFix: fixed issue when a stray coloured rectangle appeared in the Output panel message label when it was selected

Updates for version 5.8.1

AreaDescriptionNotes
Log output

Fix: fixed an issue when fetching remote log output via the log server did not work in the Output panel


Updates for version 5.8.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Log server

New feature: The server settings tab now contains two parameters in the "Fetching files" section to define custom log server host/port for the given server (by default these are specified by the ECF_LOGHOST and ECF_LOGPORT variables).


When both the server and port are non-empty their values are used to connect to the log server instead of using the  ECF_LOGHOST and ECF_LOGPORT ecflow variables.

When a custom logserver host/port is defined for a given server it is displayed in the tooltip in the tree view.

Log outputImprovement: when refreshing the output of a running task in the Output panel, the text view occasionally scrolled to the beginning of the file. This was improved and now the text view always scrolls to the end of the file in these situations.

Log outputImprovement: the text view in the  Output panel  now only switches into large file view mode when the file size is >= 40MB (the previous limit was 1MB).

Log output

New feature: added button to the Output panel to control text wrapping in the log output panel. Please note it does not work in large file view mode (for file size >= 40 MB).

Log output

New feature: improved text navigation actions in the text view in the Output panel. There are 4 new buttons available to go to the start/end of the document or start/end of the current line. On top of that the text navigation shortcuts were improved and harmonised between the standard and large file view modes. The current list of navigation shortcuts are as follows:

ActionLinux (Leap42)MacOS
start of documentCtrl+HomeCmd+Up
end of documentCtrl+EndCmd+Down
start of lineHomeCmd+Left
end of lineEndCmd+Right
scroll up by one rowUpUp
scroll up by one rowDownDown
scroll up by viewportPage UpFn+Up
scroll up by viewportPage DownFn+Down

Log output

New feature: added button (see the << or >> icon) to show compacted file information in the Output panel. In compact mode only the file name is visible in the file information label, but the full information is still displayed as a tooltip.

InstallationImprovement: ecFlowUI can now be built with both Qt6 and and Qt5. If both versions are available the build process automatically selects Qt6.

Exit
Fix: fixed an issue when ecFlowUI crashed on exit when multiple windows were open

Exit Fix: fixed an issue when an empty window appeared on the screen on exit
Tree view
Fix: fixed an issue when the node status was not updated automatically in the tree view
Tree viewFix: fixed an issue when ecFlowUI crashed if the z key was pressed in the tree view with no nodes selected
Timeline
Fix: fixed an issue when could not cancel log file transfer in the Timeline panel

Updates for version 5.7.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Startup

New feature: the ecflow_ui command now allows to use the -cmd option to specify a command that the executable (ecflow_ui.x) should be started through. E.g.

ecflow_ui -cmd proxychains4

will invoke the executable as

proxychains4 ecflow_ui.x

Search dialog

New feature: The internal widget type of the Search dialog was changed (technically it was converted from a QDialog to a QMainWindow) so that users can minimise/maximise it. This conversion causes a change in behaviour:

  • when the parent ecFlowUI window is minimised/maximized the Search dialog does not follow it (since it is no longer a QDialog)
  • pressing enter still invokes the search but the search button is not highlighted any longer (this is only available in a QDialog)

Trigger graph

New feature: double-click on a node in the trigger graph looks up the node in the tree view


Node Context Menu

New feature:  the Clear threshold flag action was added to the node context menu. Can be accessed on tasks as:

Special -> Clear threshold flag


Node Context Menu

New feature:   the Clear restored flag action was added to the node context menu. Can be accessed on restored nodes as:

Special -> Clear restored flag


Search dialogNew feature: the archived, restoredno_script and threshold (=slow job creation) flags were added to the flags option the Search dialog.

Session manager
New feature: the list shown in the session manager is now sortable

Shell command historyFix: fixed an issue when the shell command history popped up even when it was disabled in the Preferences

Updates for version 5.6.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Server Load

New feature: the Server load tab has been redesigned and the log file fetching mechanism works in the same way as in the Timeline tab (documentation is available here).

Please note that at the same time the standalone Server load viewer was removed from ecFlowUI.


Timeline

New feature: added combo box to the duration view mode in the Timeline panel to control what duration is actually shown. There are these two options now:

  • First duration in period (valid for the first submitted and active duration pair in the currently selected period) 
  • Mean duration (valid for the whole log period)

Please note that Mean duration is a newly added option.

TimelineNew feature: the dialog showing the task details now opens up in non-blocking mode
Node Context MenuNew feature: the Set complete and Set aborted actions are now available on suspended nodes
Search

Fix: fixed an issue when selecting an item in the search result view caused a crash


Output logFix: fixed an issue when the text view in the output tab did not scroll automatically to relevant keywords (e.g. aborted)

Updates for version 5.5.2

AreaDescriptionNotes
Server Load

Fix: fixed an issue when clicking the show_full_period button in the server load tab caused a crash


Suite Filter
Fix: fixed an issue when disabling a suite filter did not delete the client handle on the server
Suite FilterFix: fixed an issue when client handles built up on the server
Startup Fix: fixed an issue when deleting lock files on startup did not work
Logout
Fix: fixed an issue when an uncaught exception caused a crash during logout

Updates for version 5.5.1

AreaDescriptionNotes
Tree View

Fix: fixed an issue when removing a server from the tree view caused a crash


Updates for version 5.5.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Date and time attributes

Improvement: there are more details displayed about date and time attributes in the Tree view and Info panel.





Log output
Improvement: when the text filter is used in the Log output panel the number of matching lines are displayed next to the filter expression widget. By default this feature is disabled,  it can be enabled in Tools  →  Preferences →  Appearance →  Other.

Info panel

Improvement: it is now possible to hide the text labels on the main Info panel tabs and show only the icon decorations. This option is disabled by default, it can be enabled via Tools  →  Preferences →  Appearance →  Other.


Info panelImprovement: context menu for multiple selection now works both in the Node log and Server log info panel tabs.
Context menu

Improvement: when a shell command is run from the context menu and either stdout or stderr is generated a popup window appears showing the shell output and the shell command history. This windows can now be prevented from popping up by using the options added to Tools  →  Preferences →  Menus→  Shell commands. By default the window appears for both stdout and stderr output.

Tree view
Fix: fixed an issue when the 'clock' icon on a node incorrectly showed whether the node has any holding time dependencies
Info panelFix: fixed an issue when the icon pixmap on the close button of the Info panel was not visible.
Manage servers dialogFix: fixed an issue when ticking the Use ssh option on the edit server dialog caused a crash
Context menu
Fix: fixed an issue when the Shell command history dialog always appeared after running a shell command form the node context menu (it should have only appeared when stdout or stderr were generated).

Updates for version 5.4.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Triggers

New feature: the Triggers tab in the info panel now contains a new view showing the dependencies between nodes in a graph layout. The algorithm to generate the graph is the same that was used in ecflowview. The type of the connections between the nodes/attributes are indicated by the line colours. The possible connector types are as follows:

  • direct trigger (black)
  • trigger via dependency (blue)
  • parent child relationship (red)

The line colours and some other properties can be changed from Tools → Preferences → Appearance → Triggers:





ecflowui-trigger-graph-preview.png

Tree view Improvement: allows moving suites within the same server using the plug command in the context menu (implemented via Special → Mark for move and Special→ Move marked node here ). The moved suite is inserted before the target one.
Startup

ecFlowUI 5 uses a different config directory to ecFlowUI 4. If this directory does not exist it is automatically created using the contents of an existing ecflowUI 4 configuration.

From this version on the session description is not copied over from version 4. As a result ecflowUI will start afresh showing an empty tree on first start up.


Output logFix: fixed an issue when the env variable HTTP_PROXY was mistakenly used in getting the output log from a log server
Triggers
Fix: fixed an issue when the trigger view did not show some limits with relative paths

Updates for version 5.3.1

AreaDescription
Servers

Fix: fixed an issue when loading an unavailable server caused a crash

Manage servers dialog
Fix: fixed an issue when after changing a server host or port the server became unavailable on next load (the port number was incorrectly set as the remote user id and this blocked the communication).

Updates for version 5.3.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Attributes

New feature: autorestore, autoarchive, autocancel and queue attributes can now be:

  • visible in the tree view
  • listed in the Info tab in the info panel


Statusbar clock

Fix: fixed an issue when the clock in the statusbar could not be hidden


Updates for version 5.2.3

AreaDescription
Startup

From this version ecFlowUI will use a different config directory to enable the clear separation of ecFlow4 and ecflow5 related settings!

In the pre-5.2.3 versions the config settings were stored by default in

${HOME}/.ecflow_ui

From this version on the setting will be stored in

${HOME}/.ecflow_ui_v5

If this directory does not exist yet and we start ecFlowUI without the -confd option a new config directory will be created by copying the contents of the old config directory.


Updates for version 5.2.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Job status panelNew feature: a new tab called Job status was added to the Info panel to run and display the output of the --status command on a given node.

ShortcutsNew feature: A number of tree navigation and node context menu shortcuts were added to ecFlowUI. To get a full overview of the available shortcuts use: Help → Keyboard shortcuts ...

Popup dialogs

New feature: The list of visible context menu actions to open a given tab of the info panel in a popup dialog is now customisable from:

Tools → Preferences → Menus → Info panel

Label styling

New feature: styling is available to labels using four predefined categories: Default, Error, Warning and Info. Each non-Default category is identified by regexp pattern matching on the full contents of the label (name + text). The label style can be fully customised via:

Tools → Preferences → Appearance → Node Labels.

By default the Default style is used (the other ones are disabled).

Icons/flags

New feature: new icons representing server log and checkpoint file error flags were added to the tree/table views. At the same time the meaning of the 'slow disk write' icon changed. The table below gives details about all these icons (available on servers only) :

IconDescriptionAssociated flagHow to clear flag from context menu?
Error in opening/writing to logLOG_ERRORSpecial → Clear log error flag
Error in opening/writing to checkpoint fileCHECKPT_ERRORSpecial → Clear checkpoint error flag
Slow checkpoint file writingLATESpecial → Clear late (=slow) checkpoint flag

Output panelNew feature: added button to show/hide the line numbers in the Output info panel.

Context menu

Improvement: renamed the Sort submenu in the node context menu as Sort peers to indicate that the sorting takes place on the level of the node (and not within its children).

Node searchNew feature:  added KILLCMD_FAILED and STATUSCMD_FAILED flags to search options


Node searchFix: fixed issue when server variables did not appear the in the node search results.


Updates for version 4.17.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Date/Time attributesNew feature: date and time attributes which are holding the given node are decorated with an icon and rendered with dark red colour. This colour can be changed via: Tools → Preferences → Appearance → Attributes → Times and Dates.

Limits

New feature: added button to kill tasks consuming a given limit from the edit limit dialog.

Table viewNew feature: added toggle button to table view to control if the view should automatically scroll to the current selection when it is resorted after a server refresh. The default option is to automatically scroll to the selection.

Table viewNew feature: the sort order and the sort column in the table view is now saved on exit and restored on startup.

Timeline viewNew feature: the timeline view can now read compressed (.gz, .Z) server logs in archive mode .

RepeatsFix: fixed issue when repeat date with only one date  started with ... in the tree view.
Table viewFix: fixed issue when sorting was not correctly performed in the table view after server refresh.


Updates for version 4.16.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Context menu

New feature: added option to rerun all the aborted children of the selected suite or family.



Context menuFix: fixed issue when command Execute aborted was recursively run for all the nodes in the given tree branch
Commands

Fix: fixed issue when user defined commands were only executed for the first node in multiple selection


RepeatsFix: fixed issue when repeat string is wrongly interpreted as repeat date.
TriggersFix: fixed issue when deleting a trigger caused a crash.


Updates for version 4.15.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Timeline view

New feature: Added option to sort the nodes according to the order they appear in the tree view. This new sorting option is called "Sort by tree".


Timeline view

New feature: Added option to load archived log files. The timeline view has now two basic modes:

  • Current log: the contents of the current log file is loaded (this is the default mode)
  • Archived log: a selected set of archived log files can be loaded using the Open files button:

Timeline view

New feature: Added option to only show the currently selected node and its children:

Timeline viewNew feature: Added option to control the maximum size of data loaded from the log file in Current log mode. It can be configured per server via Tools → Preferences → Server setting → Timeline. The default value is 100 MB.

Timeline view

New feature: Added option to the node path filter to specify the string match mode. The available modes are as follows:

  • contains
  • matches (wildcards can be used)
  • regexp

Timeline view

New feature: Implemented zoom and interval control in the Daily cycle view of individual nodes.

Timeline viewNew feature: Added option to specify remote user id for transferring log files from remote machines via scp/ssh. It can be configured per server via Tools → Preferences → Server setting → Timeline. The default value is the current username.

Timeline viewImprovement: Some options are now represented as icons in the user interface.

Context menu

New feature: Added option to execute all the aborted children of the selected suite or family.



LabelsFix: Fixed issue when deleting a label caused a crash.
Timeline viewFix: Fixed issue when the start year of the current timeline period was always displayed as 2018.


Timeline viewFix: Fixed issue when dates were displayed in local time instead of UTC.


VariablesFix: Fixed issue when deleting a modified generated server variable caused a crash.

Trigger viewFix: Fixed issue when extra forward slash appeared in event names in the Trigger view


Updates for version 4.12.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Timeline view

New experimental feature: A new tab called "Timeline" was added to the info panel. It extracts information from the server log file to show/analyse the state changes of nodes in the selected time period.

EventsNew feature: Events now come with an editor that can be loaded from the context menu in the various views. The editor contains the list of all the nodes depending on the event (i.e. the event appears in there trigger expression).

Tree view

New feature: when the ecfcmd_failed flag is set on a node the text "submission failed" appears next to the node in the tree view in the colour assigned to the "aborted" status.

Context menu

New experimental feature: A new action "Create JIRA SD ticket" is available in the "Special" submenu. This action automatically creates a JIRA Service Desk issue for the node by compiling excerpts from the  node job output and the server log into a report. Please note thathis is an experimental feature and only available for a selected group of users at ECMWF for testing.


Script panel

Fix: Fixed issue when the script file location (in the Script info panel tab) reported to the user was wrong.


Context menu

Fix: Fixed issue when variables were not correctly substituted when a command definition was expanded.


Timeline view

Fix: Several improvements


VariablesFix: Fixed issue when variable values could not be set to a string starting with  '--'.
LogsFix: Fixed issue when node log dates were displayed in local time instead of UTC.


Updates for version 4.11.1

AreaDescriptionNotes
Node views

Fix: fixed issue when the last viewed node on exit was not selected automatically on startup and hyperlinks did not work in the Why and Triggers output panels.


Updates for version 4.11.0

AreaDescriptionNotes
Table view

New feature: It is now possible to add/remove columns showing the actual value of a given ecflow variable to the table view. To add a variable column  use the "V+" icon in the table view control panel. Alternatively variables can be added to the table from the Variables panel's context menu:

image-2018-10-03-12-45-16-359.png

Tree view

New feature: Leaf nodes can be automatically expanded when clicking on the parent node. This feature can be turned on/off in Tools → Preferences → Appearance → Tree view using option: Automatically expand leaf nodes. By default this option is off.


Node icons

Improvement: The clock icon can now distinguish two kinds of time dependencies: holding and non-holding ones. In holding mode, when there is an active cron, time or today attribute set on the node the clock icon appears with a white face. In non-holding mode, when the time attributes are defined but not active the face of the clock in the icon is yellow. 

image-2018-10-08-09-36-15-363.png

Context menu

New feature: A new action called URL command was added to the Special submenu. This action executes the command (via the shell) defined by the ECF_URL_COMMAND ecflow variable of the given node.

image-2018-10-04-11-34-42-469.png

Context menu

New feature: The visibility of the Defstatus node context menu in the various menu modes (User, Operator or Administrator) can now be controlled via Tools → Preferences → Menus using option: Node context menu control. By default the Defstatus menu appears in all menu nodes. 

image-2018-10-08-12-55-17-606.png

About dialogNew feature: the paths to the  ecFlowUI log files are now displayed in the About dialog
Output log
Improvement: the output file list in the Output info panel  is sorted by time in descending order when it first appear
Table view
Improvement:  the meter column is now sorted by the meter value (previously it was sorted by the meter name)
Table view
Improvement:  the text of table headings in the table view are now left-aligned (previously they were centre-aligned)
Suite filterFix: fixed issue when suite filters set for various aliases of the same server became identical
Output log

Fix: fixed issue when running the text filter with no output file selected caused a crash


Zombies

Fix: fixed issue when the "Duration" column in the Zombies view was incorrectly sorted


Node log

Fix: fixed issue when wrong dates were shown for log entries


Node log
Fix: fixed issue when width of the log entry column was not automatically adjusted to contents
Server load
Fix: fixed issue when having no server log files available caused a crash

Updates for version 4.10.0

Installation date 2018-07-10

AreaDescriptionNotes
Server loadExperimental feature: a new info panel tab called Server Load was added to display various diagnostics about the given server. Note that this module will only be built if the installed version of Qt has the QtCharts component.
Table view

New feature: When a new table view is added the Table Filter dialog automatically appears so that the table filter could be defined before the actual table data is loaded. This can result in much faster initial loading of the table view. 

This feature can be turned on/off in Tools → Preferences → Appearance → Table view using option: Popup filter dialog when new table view is added. By default this option is on.


Table viewImprovement: The first column in the table view (node path) is sorted by the node index in the given tree instead of the path string itself. This significantly speeds up the table view.
PanelsImprovement: The Suites, Zombies, Server Settings and Server Load info panels, which belong to a given server, are now always visible whichever child node of the given server is selected. Previously these tabs were only visible when a sever node was selected.
Commands
Improvement: when a command sent to a given server fails, the server state is automatically refreshed
Node log
Improvement: added horizontal scroll bar to node log panel
Suite filterFix: fixed issue when suites not filtered by the suite filter appeared in the tree view
Tree viewFix: fixed issue when nodes were not always selected in the standard tree view with left click

Updates for version 4.9.0

Installation date 2018-04-05  (version 4.9.0)


DescriptionNotes
Output logNew feature: if an output file has the extension ".html" it will be rendered as HTML. Note that only static HTML is supported, not JavaScript.

Example output with an HTML table

Server syncImprovement: to further reduce polling commands sent to busy servers, the default behaviour of ecFlowUI is now to increase the sync drift interval at 1.4 times its previous value after each sync. This behaviour is configurable, both globally and per-server from the Server Settings dialog.
Server syncImprovement: ecFlowUI now drops all its handles with a server when it resets its communication with that server, thus avoiding the accumulation of client handles on the server
Suite filterImprovement: ecFlowUI now saves its suite filter settings as soon as they are changed (previously they were only saved on closedown)
Tree viewImprovement: when an alias is removed, the selection no longer jumps to the top node
Tree viewFix: fixed issue where a time icon could be shown on nodes that did not have time attributes
Main UIFix: fixed issue where the user interface could hang when trying to write its settings to an erroneously locked settings file

See also below for more improvements in version 4.9.0


Installation date 2018-02-16  (version 4.9.0)


DescriptionNotes
Log output

New feature: a text filter interface was added to the Output panel. It can be controlled via these buttons:

The first button makes the text filter bar visible, while the second one shows the context menu of the text filter. The text filter is defined by a regular expression and runs the UNIX grep command to perform the actual filtering of the output file. It can be used in two modes:

  • match: in this mode only the lines matching the regular expression are shown
  • no match: in this mode only the lines not matching the regular expression are shown

To run the filter type in the regular expression into the text line editor and press enter. When there are marching lines in the output the regular expression editor and the filter icon turn green

 

otherwise they turn red.

To clear the filter just clear the regular expression editor or choose the Clear filter action from the context menu.

The filter remains active when switching between output files and selecting new nodes.

The actual filter can be saved and then loaded using the filter context menu. To manage the saved filters start up the Text Filter Manager dialog from the context menu.

Tree view

Fix: fixed issue when having two tree views in a tab caused a crash on startup


Installation date 2018-01-24  (version 4.9.0)


Description
Main tab
Improvement: when no views are present in a tab a tree view is automatically added as soon as we load a server into this tab

Tree view

Fix: fixed issue when switching between tree view layouts (Compact and Standard) caused a crash

Updates for version 4.8.0

Installation date 2018-01-16  (version 4.8.0)


Description
CommandsImprovement: added warning message to the confirmation dialog of the Requeue command
VariablesFix: fixed issue when ECF_DATE and ECF_TIME were not updated automatically in the Variables panel

Installation date 2018-01-08  (version 4.8.0)


DescriptionNotes
Output log
New feature: added a button to manually refresh the output log file list (it is automatically updated every minute)

Node commands

Improvement: the "Remove" command is now only enabled for aliases when:

we are in oper or admin menu mode

and

the alias is neither active nor submitted


Node commands

Improvement: when running a command requires user confirmation the command to be executed is always displayed in the confirmation popup dialog.
TriggersNew Improvement: in the Triggers info panel the background of the "trigger/triggered items through dependency" was changed to a more distinctive colour (a shade of blue)

Limiters

Fix: fixed issue when the tokens were not shown for limiters


Variables

Fix: fixed issue when the tree view in the variables panel became collapsed after a server update


Output logFix: fixed issue when did not refresh the output log file list after the log file was reloaded in the text viewer
Output logFix: fixed issue when the output log file list was not sorted correctly according to time
Tree view
Fix: fixed issue when labels showed clipped text after server update
Tree viewFix: fixed issue when two "Remove" commands appeared in alias context menu


Installation date 2017-12-05  (version 4.8.0)


DescriptionNotes
Notifications

New feature: A new option was added to control the notification popup dialog (in Tools → Preferences → Notifications) as:

Switch to parent's virtual desktop from popup dialog

Having this option enabled if we click on a node in the notification popup dialog the window manager automatically switches to the virtual desktop where the main ecFlowUI window is located and moves the popup dialog into this desktop. By default this option is disabled.



Installation date 2017-11-28  (version 4.8.0)


DescriptionNotes
Notifications

Improvement: Colours are available again to decorate the notification interface. The colour selected for a notification type (in Tools → Preferences → Notifications) is used in the following way:

  • the button in the notification statusbar is only coloured when there are notifications available in the given category
  • in the notification popup dialog a coloured label shows the name of the given notification category above the list of tasks

For the "aborted" notifications by default the notification background and text colours are automatically taken from the settings of the aborted status itself. This can be overridden form Tools → Preferences → Notifications → Aborted via the "Use aborted status colour" option. When this option is unticked we can set our own custom colours for the "aborted" notifications.



Installation date 2017-11-23  (version 4.8.0)


DescriptionNotes
Node searchNew feature: added new option to search dialog to find nodes by status modification date/time

Node searchNew feature: added two new options to Flags in the search dialog: id_ecfcmd_failed, is_killed
System clockNew feature: a digital system clock was added to the right corner of the statusbar. To enable and customize this clock go Tools ->  Preferences -> Appearance -> Other. By default the clock is disabled (not visible).

Output logNew feature: a new button was added to the Output info panel to copy the path of the currently viewed output file into the clipboard. Similar buttons were added to the Manual, Job and Script info panels.

Output logImprovement: when the blue "reload file" button is clicked in the Output info panel the file currently loaded in the text viewer will be reloaded. Note: this is a change in behaviour: previously always the current job output log was loaded into the text viewer when we clicked this button.

Output logFix: fixed issue when the output log file list showed fewer files than ecflowview.
Output logFix: fixed issue when a cached version of an output file was not reloaded when we clicked on the "reload file" button
Tree viewFix: fixed issue when looking up a node in the tree view from another window (e.g. from Node search) did not broadcast the selection to other panels


Installation date 2017-11-13 (version 4.8.0)


DescriptionNotes
Context menu

Improvement: the node menu mode (User, Operator or Administrator) can now be customised for each server separately (in the server's Settings panel).


 

Node searchFix: fixed issue when the node status change time column in the results view was not sorted correctly
Table filterFix: fixed issue when the root node option was ignored in the table filter


Installation date 2017-10-25 (version 4.8.0)


DescriptionNotes
Context menu

New featureit is now possible to run shell commands from the node context menu or the User command editor. A shell command must have the following syntax:

sh my_command_with_arguments

In the command the following tags are automatically resolved:

<node_name>

<full_name>

%VARIABLE_NAME%

If the shell command generates output or error the Shell command output dialog automatically pops up showing the output/error of the last 20 shell command we ran. This dialog can otherwise be started up from Tools -> Shell command output ...


User commands

Improvement: the Custom command editor was renamed as User command editor


Limits

New feature: in the limit editor the nodes consuming the limit can be looked up in the tree by

  • double-click on the path in the list
  • using the "Lookup node in tree" action from the context menu of the list


Updates for version 4.7.1

Installation date 2017-11-07 (version 4.7.1)


Description
LimitsFix: fixed issue where crash happened when a limit was edited
LimitsFix: fixed issue when limit editor maximum value was automatically reset to 99
Attribute editorFix: fixes issue when crashed with assert when attribute editor was open while server was being reset

Updates for version 4.7.0

Installation date 2017-10-09 (version 4.7.0)

AreaDescription
Context MenuImprovement: added configuration options to disable certain confirmation dialogs
Tree viewImprovement: added the ability to edit a user variable directly from the tree context menu
VariablesFix: fixed issue where deleting or editing a variable could cause a crash
Info PanelFix: fixed issue where changes to a trigger were not reflected in the Why? panel
Info PanelFix: fixed issue where in the Why? tab, the links to user and generated variables did not work
Info PanelFix: fixed issue where enumerated repeat is incorrectly displayed in the Info Panel

Installation date 2017-09-11 (version 4.7.0)

AreaDescription
Tree viewNew feature: the expand all children action in the tree view now defines a state rather than a one-off action. When new children appear for the given node they always get expanded automatically. This state is cleared when the collapse all children action is run on the node.
Tree viewNew feature: variables can now be edited directly in the tree view
Tree viewNew feature: the middle mouse button in the 'Compact' tree layout only expands the tree and does not cause the node to be selected
Custom commands

Improvement: when a command sent through the Custom Command Editor returns a message, the message is shown in a popup dialog

Info PanelImprovement: the contents of the variables panel are now sorted in ascending order by default
MenusImprovement: the Views menu has been renamed to Panels
StartupFix: fixed issue when the minimised state of the windows was stored between sessions resulting in windows kept hidden on startup
Variables

Fix: fixed issue where a crash happened during the editing of variables

Repeats
Fix: fixed issue where the repeat editor could not show values larger than 99
Output
Fix: fixed issue where custom output files ending with ".0" were not shown in the Output panel

Installation date 2017-08-16 (version 4.7.0)

AreaDescriptionNotes
Triggers

New feature: the Triggers panel was completely redesigned to display a table-based representation of triggers.

See Viewing dependencies

Refresh

New feature: the refresh server button in the left hand side of the toolbar was turned into a more advanced widget providing better interaction with and more details of the refresh process of the selected server. The new interface comprises the following components (from left to right):

  • refresh button
  • label with the server name
  • progress bar showing the countdown to the next automatic refresh. It also displays the total length of the current refresh period, and the current length of the drift if it is active for this server
  • label showing the time (in local time) of the last server refresh (hidden by default in automatic refresh mode)

The properties of this widget  (e.g. the visibility of the last refresh time) can be controlled from the dialog in  Tools → Preferences → Appearance → Toolbar




Context menu

New feature: a menu mode was added to control which commands are actually shown in the node context menu. The menu mode has these three categories:

  • User (default)
  • Operator
  • Administrator

The User mode allows most operations, but for safety prevents certain actions on suites and servers.

The Operator and Administrator modes allow suites to be begun, nodes to be removed and servers to be unlocked. Administrator mode additionally enables the Force and Order menus.

The current menu mode is displayed in the window title bar of ecFlowUI.

To change the menu mode use: Tools → Preferences → Menus → Toolbar                 


Suite filter

New feature: the Filter only this suite action was added to the Special menu of the node context menu in the Tree view. This action automatically redefines the suite filter on the current server to filter only the suite of the selected node. To view other suites again, edit the suite filter.


SearchNew feature: a new column called Status changed, showing the date and time of the last status change of the nodes, was added to the search results view
ZombiesNew feature: if we double click on an item or select the Look up in tree action from the context menu in the Zombies panel the node in question becomes selected in the tree view
PreferencesNew feature: the Preferences dialog was moved form the Edit menu to Tools. At the same time the Edit menu itself was removed.
Node logNew feature: log entries can now be copied into the clipboard using the context menu
Edit panelImprovement: the Submit as alias option in the Edit info panel was converted into a checkbox (previously it was a push button)

WindowsFix: fixed issue when closing one of multiple windows caused a crash
Why panelFix: fixed issue when clicking on generated variables in the Why panel did not make them selected in the Tree view

Updates for version 4.6.1

Installation date 2017-05-12 (version 4.6.1)

AreaDescriptionNotes
Info panelNew feature: all attributes of the selected node are now displayed in the 'Info' info panel
StartupImprovement: when the server list file is ill-formatted a dialog pops up with the list of errors on startup. When closing this dialog ecFlowUI exits and users are asked to resolve the problems in the server list file manually then start ecFlowUI again.
Startup

Fix: fixed issue where a crash happened during startup on ecgate


Tree viewFix: fixed issue where a crash happened when clicking on a server in the tree view
Tree viewFix: fixed issue where multiline labels overlapped other attributes in tree view

 

Updates for version 4.6.0

Installation date 2017-05-05 (version 4.6.0)

AreaDescriptionNotes
Tree viewNew feature: a new tree view layout called 'Compact' is now available. This 'Compact' layout works exactly in the same way as the tree view in ecflowview and saves some vertical space. To switch between the original layout, now called 'Standard' layout, and the new one use Edit → Preferences → Appearance → Tree view → Tree layout style.

PanelsNew feature: to help with smaller displays, a new button was added to the panel headers (tree view, table view and info panel) to maximise the panel area. When this button is pressed the panel occupies all the available space in the given tab and the other panels become hidden. At the same time a warning message appears in the header saying "Panel maximised". By pressing the button again the original panel layout in the tab is restored.

BreadcrumbsNew feature: the breadcrumbs are now located in the panel header, saving some vertical space (previously they had their own area just below the panel header). When "Breadcrumbs" is on (toggle via the cogwheel icon) the breadcrumbs are visible in the header, otherwise the node path is simply shown as text.


Why panelNew feature: the top-down Why (through the children) is now displayed in the Why info panel alongside with the bottom-up Why (through the parents). As an additional improvement the node statuses are now colour-coded and the parts of the expression which are false are highlighted (with a darker background). Also, the attribute notation became clearer and both the nodes and attributes are now hyper-linked.

LimitsNew feature: the limit editor now shows the list of nodes consuming the given limit. With the provided buttons the selected node paths can be removed ('Remove' button) or the whole list can be cleared ('Reset' button).



Limits

New feature: it is now possible to choose between circular and rectangular limit shapes (see Edit → Preferences → Appearance → Attributes → Limit shape). The default limit shape is "circle". The rectangular shape allows for a more compact view.

TriggersNew feature: the colours used for trigger and complete rendering can now be controlled from Edit → Preferences → Appearance → Attributes.

Info panelNew feature: the 'Info', 'Manual', 'Script' and 'Job' Info panels can now be manually refreshed with the provided button

Info panelNew feature: the "detached" state in the popup (i.e. dialog) info panel is now represented with a separate "chain" button just like in the docked info panel. As a further improvement the "detached" option is saved for the popup info panel.

Info PanelNew feature: flags of the selected node are now displayed in the 'Info' info panel

Tree viewNew feature: the last selected node per tree view is saved on exit and restored on startup
Icons

Change: some of the node icons were improved, the changes are summarised below:

PreviousCurrentDescription
Node has had a user action since its last requeue (see the Node Log for details)
Complete by default status or by complete expression
Has been restarted
Slow server write

Table viewChange: when a selection is broadcast to the table view (e.g. from a tree view, search result view etc) it will only be visible there if it matches the filter set on the table view. The previous behaviour was that the broadcast selection was always shown in the table view even if it did not match the filter.
Output logChange: line numbers are no longer shown in the output log ('Output' panel) to save space. Line numbers are still shown for the Script and Job.

RepeatsImprovement: in the repeat editor the current value for date repeats can be selected from the list at the bottom of the editor
CommandImprovement: when a command sent to the server fails, a dialog pops up showing the error message
Context menuImprovement: the 'Cancel' command was renamed 'Remove' and was made available for suites, tasks and families
Context menuImprovement: the context menu now better handles the situation where multiple nodes and attributes are selected
LimitsFix: fixed issue when the limit text was incorrectly turned red when the limit reached, but did not exceed, its maximum
LimitsFix: fixed issue when the limit maximum could not be set to zero
Context menuFix: fixed issue when stray context menu appeared in panel headers
UpdateFix: fixed issue when setting the server update frequency did not always make effect immediately
Server list fileFix: fixed issue when a malformed server list file caused a crash
ZombiesFix: fixed issue when commands did not work for multiple zombie selection in the Zombies info panel
VariablesFix: fixed issue when deleting a variable caused a crash
StabilityFix: fixed additional crashes


Updates for version 4.5.0

Installation date 2017-01-10

AreaDescriptionIssue
NodesImprovement: tree and table views will now always show the selected node, even if it does not match the filtering criteria. For example, if a tree view has a status filter which does not display completed nodes, and the user clicks on a completed node from a search result or a notification, then it will appear in any tree or table view that is in the linked state.ECFLOW-813
Tree viewImprovement: when the result of a search is an attribute and it is clicked on, it  becomes selected in any linked tree viewsECFLOW-839
Variables panelImprovement: the variables panel now has a horizontal scrollbar, allowing the easy viewing of long variablesECFLOW-830
ShutdownFix: fixed occasional crash on shutdownECFLOW-832

 

Installation date 2016-11-24

AreaDescriptionIssue
LimitsImprovement: increased the maximum limit size in the limit editor to 10,000ECFLOW-811
ResourcesFix: fixed issue where ecFlowUI did not clean up its server filter handle on exitECFLOW-812


Installation date 2016-11-16

AreaDescriptionNotes
Main Window

New feature: new command-line option to change the window title:

ecflow_ui -title MyTitle

TriggersFix: fixed issue where a complete refresh from the server could cause the Triggers tab to not show the by triggers

Installation date 2016-11-13

AreaDescriptionNotes
SessionsFix: fixed issue where cloning a session sometimes failed
UpdateFix: fixed issue where the user interface stopped showing node changes and sending commands to the server

Installation date 2016-11-11

AreaDescriptionNotes
Output logNew feature: added a button to export the output log to a local file

Table ViewNew feature: added a column to display the status change time of each node; this allows the sorting of rows by this attribute

Node actionsNew feature: added context menu options to allow the moving of nodes from one server to another (or indeed within the same server). See Moving and re-ordering nodes.
Node actionsImprovement: the Migrate and Restore commands have been renamed to the more accurately descriptive Hide children and Show children

Node actionsImprovement: the Delete context menu has been renamed to the more accurately descriptive Free Deps
Node actionsImprovement:the Kill command is now available for suspended nodes
TreeFix: fixed issue where a complete refresh from the server when an attribute was selected caused a crash


Updates for version 4.4.0


Installation date 2016-10-09 

AreaDescriptionNotes
Triggers

Fix: fixed issue where clicking on a date, time or event in the Triggers panel caused a crash


VariablesFix: fixed issue where the "Add variable" button was disabled in the Variables panel
TreeFix: fixed issue where the "Order top/bottom" command did not work for suites in the tree view

Installation date 2016-09-26

AreaDescriptionNotes
Trigger view

New feature: a new tab called "Triggers" was added to the Info panel. It displays a list-based trigger dependency  view.

See Viewing dependencies - 2016


TriggersNew feature: triggers can now be edited by either double-click on them or selecting "Edit ..." from their context menu.

Server List

New feature: ecFlowUI now updates its local server list with the centrally maintained system server list on every startup.

See Server management


Migrate/restoreNew feature: The Migrate and Restore commands are now available for suites and families from the Special context menu. Besides, a new icon representing the "Migrated" flag was added to the tree and table views. This is ON by default. This can be set from the Icons menu from the header of the tree view panel. Please note that this feature will only work with servers running ecFlow version 4.4 or above.

Why panelNew feature: Node paths appearing in the Why panel are now hyperlinked. Clicking a hyperlink results in broadcasting the selection to the other views (tree/table).

Info panelNew feature: If an "aborted reason" is available for a node its full text is displayed in the "Info" tab in the info panel.

LimitsImprovement: if a limit exceeds its maximum value the values beyond the maximum are rendered with a different colour (blue by default). This colour can be customised in  Preferences → Appearance →  Attributes → Limit exceed colour. As a warning, when the value exceeds the maximum the numbers for the limit value and maximum value are rendered in red.

Table viewImprovement: the table view now remembers the width and the visibility of the table columns.
Table view
Fix: fixed issue when the node status was always rendered with gradient shading in the table view. It now respects the setting in Preferences → Appearance →  Status → Status rendering option.
Node searchNew feature: a "Clear options" button was added to the Node search dialog to clear the query options set for the nodes and attributes.


IconsImprovement: the icon pixmaps are now displayed in the Show icon menu (in the header of tree view panel).

ConfigurationFix: fixed issue when window geometry and layout was incorrectly saved

Updates for version 4.3.0


Installation date 2016-08-25

AreaDescriptionNotes
ecFlowUIImprovement: the way in which node selections are propagated between different panels has been clarified. Now, there is a 'link' icon at the top-right of every panel. When this is solid, it means that this panel will respond to node selections in the other panels. For example, if an Info Panel is linked, selecting a node in any Tree View or Table View in that tab will cause the contents of the Info Panel to be updated for that node. If it is 'unlinked', then its contents will not change when nodes are clicked in different panels. This latter state is what used to be called 'detached'.

Tree viewImprovement: the status filter has been redesigned to avoid confusion. A status' visibility is always clearly shown in the filter (highlighted with shading), with "Show all" and "Hide all" buttons
Info panelImprovement: it is now possible to view the output for queued and submitted jobs, but with a message to warn that they may not be current
Suite filterImprovement: the suites in the suite filter are now listed alphabetically
Suite filterImprovement: ecFlowUI now allows an empty suite filter
Info panelImprovement: if it is not possible to retrieve a directory listing for the job output files, a warning message is displayed with the reason why
Custom commands

Fix: fixed crash when a custom command required further input from the user; a pop-up message will now appear


Table viewFix: fixed issue in the Table View where navigating the nodes with the keyboard did not update the node displayed in the Info Panel
Info panelFix: fixed an inefficiency in retrieving the job output files and scripts when the log server does not return anything

Installation date 2016-07-27

AreaDescriptionNotes
Tree View

Fix: fixed issue where changes in node order were not reflected in the tree


Installation date 2016-07-26

AreaDescriptionNotes
Version

Note that you need to load the 'dev' module of ecflow to get the 4.3.0 test version:

module swap ecflow/dev
ecflow_ui

Startup

New feature: Added new command-line option to start up a temporary session showing the given server. Usage:

 ecflow_ui -ts <host> <port>

On closure, the session can be optionally saved or discarded. To see the list of saved sessions, start ecFlowUI with the session manager:

ecflow_ui -s

Suite filterImprovement: the interface to the suite filter has been redesigned for greater clarity.
Suite filterFix: Fixed issue where clicking 'Unselect All' broke the suite filter if it contained unloaded suites.


Output logNew feature: the initial search conducted on an output log is now configurable from the Preferences dialog in the Edit menu.
Output logFix: fixed issue where output from the wrong output log file could sometimes be displayed if the logs are larger than 1MB and are retrieved from the server rather than being read from local disk.
Output logFix: fixed issue where a regexp search on large output log files did not work
Output logFix: fixed issue where clicking inside the scrollbar area of the output log viewer could scroll more lines than one page, meaning that lines could be missed if using this mechanism to scan through a log file
Node actionsFix: fixed issue where clicking on the context menu's title (showing the node selection) caused the first action in the menu to be executed on the selected nodes. Clicking here now performs no action.
Node actionsImprovement: ecFlowUI syncs with the server immediately after issuing a command to it. Previously there was a delay.
Edit panelFix: fixed issue where an error in a script was not shown to the user, for example when an ecFlow variable is used but not defined. Now a panel is displayed in this case, showing the message from the server.
RefreshImprovement: reduced the number of duplicated Refresh buttons in the user interface, as they could cause confusion. To refresh/sync with a server, use the green refresh button at the top-left of the window (shortcut: F5). The Refresh menu offers more options.
Testing

New feature: a new script has been added in order to allow installers to quickly check that ecFlowUI is working. It will start a local ecFlow server, load a suite and launch ecFlowUI in a temporary session to view the test server. The script is installed with ecFlow, and is run like this:

ecflow_test_ui.sh

Installation date 2016-06-30

AreaDescriptionNotes
Attribute search

New feature: the search dialog was extended and is now also capable of finding attributes.

See Searching for nodes.

Tabs

Improvement: the title of the tabs in the main interface is now automatically adjusted to the available space. When a lot of tabs are open it makes the navigation easier. The way the tab title is drawn has also been changed and the close button was removed from the current tab. To close a tab right-click on a tab and select "Close tab" from the menu. 

Tabs

New feature: to improve the tab navigation a new button () was added to the right edge of the main tab bar. By pressing it the list of the open tabs appears in a drop down menu with the current tab being highlighted in bold.

IconsNew feature: a new icon representing the "Killed" flag was added to the tree and table views.  This is OFF by default. This can be set from the Icons menu from the header of the tree view panel.
          
Tree viewFix: fixed issue where the tree was not expanded on node lookup
Tree viewFix: fixed issue where the default node status was incorrectly displayed in the node tooltip

Breadcrumbs

Fix: fixed issue where the server status was not updated in the breadcrumbs
Output panelImprovement: the column-width of the list of available output files are automatically adjusted to their contents when the output panel is first loaded.
Output panelImprovement: a failed text search will no longer put the cursor to the top of the output file
DocumentationNew page: Viewing and editing variables

Updates for version 4.1.0


Installation date 2016-05-11

AreaDescriptionNotes
StartupNew feature: ecFlowUI now supports the notion of multiple sessions so that different configurations can be stored. See Session management for more information.
Variables panel

New feature: The Variables panel can now distinguish and filter the shadowed variables. A variable is called 'shadowed' if it is redefined later in the node hierarchy. For example, it could be defined at the family level, and then again in a task within that family; in this case, the variable defined in the family is 'shadowed' by the one in the task and will not be used. Shadowed variables are displayed in grey. They can be shown/hidden with the 'VV' button in the Variables panel. By default shadowed variables are visible in the panel.

 
Variables panelImprovement: the add, edit and delete variable actions are always applied to the node selected in the Info Panel (i.e. the topmost node in the Variables panel), even if they are inherited from an ancestor node.
Info panelFix: fixed issue where selecting a node in the breadcrumbs of a non-detached Info panel did not result in selecting the same node in the tree view
Output panelImprovement: the list of available output files is now refreshed when the Reload button in the Output panel is clicked.
Tree viewImprovement: improved rendering for limits
Tree view

Improvement: improved rendering for number of children displayed next to servers and nodes


Tree viewNew feature: the tooltip shown in the tree view can now be enabled/disabled through the configuration dialog  (Edit -> Preferences -> Appearance -> Tree view). By default the tooltip is enabled for servers, nodes and attributes.
ExitNew feature: no confirmation dialog pops up on exit. However, a confirmation dialog is still shown if there are multiple windows open and a window with multiple tabs are to close.

Installation date 2016-05-04

AreaDescriptionNotes
Tree viewFix: fixed an occasional crash when selecting items from the context menu
Variables panelFix: fixed a crash in the Variables panel during an update from the server
Tree ViewFix: attribute edit dialogs now show the correct type in the title bar

Installation date 2016-04-28

AreaDescriptionNotes
Attributes

New feature: labels, events, meters, limits and repeats appearing in the tree view can now be edited. Usage:

  • Events can be changed using the "Set" and "Clear" context menu actions
  • Labels, meters, limits and repeats have their own editor that can be started up by either double-click or using the Edit action from the context menu.

AttributesNew feature: a tooltip is available for all the attributes displayed in the tree view
AttributesNew feature: some graphical features of the attributes can be configured from the attributes setting dialog (Edit -> Preferences -> Appearance -> Attribute).
 
MetersNew feature: the threshold of a meter is now displayed in the meter progress bar. Normally the meter progress bar is drawn only with one colour but if the meter value exceeds its threshold the progress bar changes colour from that value onwards. Both the meter colour and the meter threshold colour can be defined in the configuration dialog mentioned above.
CompletesNew feature: the complete attribute now appears in the tree view when "Triggers" are selected in the Show attributes menu. The visual representation of completes is the same as for triggers but the text colour is blue instead of black.
NotificationsNew feature: clicking on a node in the Notifications result dialog will automatically select the same node in the first tree view where it is available
SearchFix: fixed issue where the Info panel dialogs could not be started up from node search list context menu
Tree viewFix: fixed issue where removing and adding back a server to the tree view caused random crashes
Info panelFix: fixed issue where cancelling a suite caused crash in the Info panel
BreadcrumbsFix: fixed issue where the breadcrumbs displayed invalid contents after cancelling a suite

Installation date 2016-04-20

AreaDescriptionNotes
Output logsFix: fixed issue where the list of output log files was not visible
Custom commandImprovement: removed commands from the command builder which are not relevant for use from ecFlowUI

Installation date 2016-04-19

AreaDescriptionNotes
Custom commandImprovement: added the ability to save and manage custom commands
Zombies
Improvement: added multiple selection to the Zombies panel
Tree view

Fix: fixed issue where updating a tree view caused random crashes


VariablesFix: fixed issue where editing variables in the Variables panel caused a crash
Output logs

Fix: fixed issue where the output directory listing did not appear for certain nodes in the Output panel


Output logsFix: fixed issue where the output directory listing did not show the current selection after a refresh of the log

Installation date 2016-04-07

AreaDescriptionNotes
Tree viewNew feature: added an option to draw the branch lines between the nodes in the tree view. This feature can be controlled from the configuration dialog (Edit -> Preferences -> Appearance -> Tree view). By default this feature is disabled.
Tree view

Fix: fixed issue where updating a tree view with a node status filter enabled caused random crashes


ConfigurationFix: fixed issue where setting font sizes in the configuration menu caused a crash.
Logging

Improvement: Log messages are no longer sent to standard output by default, but are written to a log file under $TMPDIR. In the event of an unexpected exit, the last part of this file, along with a backtrace if available, will be sent to the developers. To bypass this behaviour and to see the log messages as they are generated, start ecflow_ui with the -log option. Note that the startup script ecflow_ui_bt is deprecated, as the backtrace functionality is now built into the main startup script.


Installation date 2016-03-15

AreaDescriptionNotes
Context menu

Fix: fixed issue where context menu option to restart a server did not work


Output logsFix: fixed issue where refreshing the current job output file in the Output panel caused a crash
Output logs
Fix: fixed issue where the remote output logs were read from local disk when they should have been fetched from the logserver

Installation date 2016-03-11

AreaDescriptionNotes
Output logs
Fix: fixed issue where the search mode description label occupied half of the text view area in the Output panel

Installation date 2016-03-10

AreaDescriptionNotes
Update

New feature: added options to gradually increase server update period when the user does not ask for updates manually. It can help to avoid overloading busy servers. This feature can be controlled from the server setting dialog (Edit -> Preferences -> Server options). Usage:

  • When option Increase server update period when inactive is enabled the server update period is increased at every automatic update until the maximum period is reached. If the user in the meantime updates the server manually the update period is set back to its original value and whole process starts again.
  • Option Server update period increment defines the update period increment in seconds
  • Option Do not increase server update period over defines the maximum update period in minutes.        

By default this feature is enabled.

Output logsNew feature: a new button was added to the Output panel. By clicking on it a popup window shows detailed information about the output log file shown in the panel.

Generated variablesNew feature: generated variables are now clearly distinguishable from user variables in the Variables panel. They have a green colour and an icon decoration (with letter 'G' in it).
Update/reset
Fix: fixed issue where server update/reset caused a random crash
Update/resetFix: fixed issue where closing a tab while a server in it was being updated/reset caused a random crash
Tree viewFix: fixed issue where adding or removing servers caused a random crash
Tree viewFix: fixed issue where Repeat and Late attributes were repeated many times
Output logsFix: fixed issue where the current output log was shown for nodes with submitted status

Output logsFix: fixed issue where output that was accessible from disk was instead read through the logserver or server
Output logsFix: fixed issue where the directory listing in the Output panel showed files belonging to other nodes
Context menuFix: removed duplicate of the 'Special' submenu

Installation date 2016-03-03

AreaDescriptionNotes
Output logs
Fix: fixed issue where output directory listing did not show the current selection after a refresh of the log

Installation date 2016-03-02

AreaDescriptionNotes
Update/resetFix: fixed issue where server update/reset caused a random crash.
Generated variablesFix: fixed issue where generated variables in the Variables panel could not be changed.
Search dialog
Fix: fixed issue where double-click on the "Search" button in the node Search dialog caused a crash.

Installation date 2016-02-18

AreaDescriptionNotes
Managing large output files

New feature: large output files are now displayed much faster requiring far less memory than before. Although the output text viewer looks and behaves the same for all file sizes internally ecFlowUI uses a newly developed text editor for files larger than 5 MB.


New feature: when an output file is transferred from the logserver a progress bar is shown indicating the current status of the file transfer.

New feature: output files transferred from the logserver are cached. The cache holds a file for two minutes starting from the moment the file is unloaded from the viewer (we select another output file or click on another node). If we view the output file within these two minutes ecFlowUI will use the cache and will not transfer the file again from the logserver. However if we click on the Refresh button the cache is bypassed and the latest version of the current output file is fetched from the logserver.


New feature: for improved efficiency, when viewing output files larger than 5 MB the text search works in "confirm" mode where the search is only initiated when Enter is hit or one of the search arrows is pressed. For files smaller than this size the search is still instantaneous (it is initiated as we type in the text). The "confirm" mode is clearly indicated by a message bar above the text search panel.
 
Display node type in the tree view

New feature: the type of the nodes can now be displayed in the tree view. Each type is represented by its first character as follows:

  • S: suite
  • F: family
  • T: task
  • A: alias

A different visual representation is used for the "Classic view" and the "Modern View". In "Classic view" the node type is drawn to the left of the node rectangle into a separate box, while in "Modern view" the node type is drawn straight into the status box.

This feature can be switched on/off in the Configure dialog (Edit -> Preferences -> Appearance ->Tree view -> Display node type), the default setting is on.


 Classic viewModern view
Output tab preserves its contentImprovement: the Output tab now preserves its content: if we click on another tab in the Info panel and click back to the Output tab it does not need to reload the file.
Custom commandImprovement: the node context menu shows the last 10 custom commands that were run. See Creating and running custom commands for more details.
Context menuImprovement:the 'Special' submenu has been re-added to the node context menu

Installation date 2016-01-20

AreaDescriptionNotes
Expand/collapse nodes in treeNew feature: the node context menu in the tree view now contains the "Expand all children" and "Collapse all children" actions to expand/collapse the sub-tree below the given node.
Abort text

New feature: ecflow allows an abort to pass a string (possibly containing instructions on how to fix the abort etc.). This string is displayed now next to an aborted node in the tree view using the same text colour as the aborted status. The abort string might be clipped if it is too long, but the node tooltip always shows the whole string.

Copy node path
New feature: the node context menu now has an action to copy the node path (or a list of paths for multiple selection) to the clipboard.
Icons

New feature: Some of the icon names and icon pixmaps were changed.

Changes in the node icons:

    • The icon previously named "Messages" was renamed as "Has node log entry" and its pixmap was changed to:

Changes in the Info panel tab icons:

    • The Manual tab's icon was changed to:
    • The Output tab's icon was changed to:
    • The Server log tab's icon was changed to:
    • The tab previously called "Messages" was renamed "Node log" and its icon was changed to:

Custom commandImprovement: it is possible to run your own custom commands on nodes - select a set of nodes, then choose Custom... from the context menu. The improved custom command editor now presents a list of the available ecflow client commands, along with the help pages for each. Remember to put the <full_name> tag at the end of the command - this will be replaced with the list of selected nodes. The ability to save and load custom commands, and to add them to the context menu will be available in a later version.
Node tooltip
Improvement: the node tooltip in the tree view now contains the description of the icons of the node. The tooltip also shows the abort text if it is available.

 

ManualFix: fixed issue where the manual was not shown.
Info panelFix: fixed issue where the info panel dialog always stayed on top of the main window and could not be be properly minimised.
Server logFix: fixed issue where the server log crashed for local log files.
Context menuFix: fixed issue where certain menu options depending on the server state did not work.


Installation date 2015-12-09

AreaDescriptionNotes
Text searchNew feature: all found occurrences of the search term can be highlighted. This option is OFF by default as it can be expensive with very large log files. Activate from the search options control, or press ALT-A to toggle.
Output logsImprovement: logs served by a log server are now transferred asynchronously, allowing the user interface to respond during that time. Note that there can still be a delay in displaying large log files (say > 30MB) - solutions to this are being evaluated, but some improvement has already been made.
WindowsImprovement: the current configuration of tabs and windows, along with their loaded servers, is now saved whenever the set of loaded servers is modified.
Node searchFix: fixed issue where constructing a search with both a node name and a node path caused a crash.
Info PanelFix: fixed issue where the info panel could not be reduced to a small horizontal size due to the length of the file info panel at the top.


Installation date 2015-12-03

AreaDescriptionNotes
Font

New feature: fonts are now customisable for the tree view, the table view and for the text browsers/editors in the Info Panel tabs.The font family and size can be changed through the Edit -> Preferences -> Fonts dialog. For the text browsers/editors in the Info panel tabs the text size can be changed directly by either using Ctrl+wheel or the Increase/Decrease font size buttons in the tabs. 

                                                                                                                               
Tree and table view backgroundNew feature: These background colours can now be customised via Edit -> Preferences -> Appearance ->Tree view and Table View.
List of attributes shown in a tree view.

New feature: By default all the attributes except the variables and generated variables are shown in a newly created tree view. This default list can be changed in Edit -> Preferences -> Tree view.

Installation date 2015-11-27

AreaDescriptionNotes
Node searchNew feature: click the magnifying glass icon in the toolbar, or choose "Search" from the node context menu, to bring up the node search dialog.
The found nodes can be directly interacted with from the results table.
Text search
New feature: The search facility within the text of output logs, jobs and scripts has been enhanced with the addition of regular expression and wildcard matches.
Tree ViewImprovement: Created separate panel header buttons to filter nodes by status and to control the display of attributes
ZombiesFix: Fixed issue where deleting a zombie did not work