Scythebill 10.1.2 - IOC 4.1 support!

Scythebill 10.1.2 is now available!  Download it here, and please follow Scythebill on Google+ or Facebook for updates.

IOC 4.1!

Scythebill 10.1.2 includes the IOC 4.1 list.  This list was released only two days ago!  So not only are taxonomy upgrades always free (of course), but they're also released faster than any other program.

IOC ranges should be much better in this release, especially for species with large ranges - whereas earlier versions might merely say "Widespread", Scythebill now says "Widespread Africa" or "Widespread Pacific Oceans" (to give two examples).    

Of course, since Scythebill now includes checklists, this also means that all the country and state checklists have been upgraded to IOC 4.1 and ranges adjusted for the new splits.  So I'll take this as another opportunity to plug "Verify against checklists..." in the File menu:  please, try this against your life list and send me the results!  Users' submissions have been invaluable in improving the quality of the checklists, so please keep them coming.

Other changes

• When exporting reports as spreadsheets, you can now get a column containing counts.  Thanks to Sharon W. for the feature request.
• Location entry now includes a (hopefully) more informative and intuitive display of the location hierarchy.
• Dragging "sp." sightings to species resulted in weird UI glitches and the potential for error dialogs;  this has been fixed.  Thanks to Ben N. for the report.

As always, please let me know if you have any problems, either on Google+, Facebook, or by email.

Scythebill 10.1.1 - bug fixes

Scythebill 10.1.1 is now available!  Download it here, and please follow Scythebill on Google+ or Facebook for updates.

Scythebill 10.1.1 almost entirely consists of bug fixes, some of which are significant.

The most noticeable change only affects MacOS users, where a long-standing and painful issue with the "Open..." dialog is finally fixed.  It now opens and shows results instantly.

There's a few fixes that affect custom checklists:

• Custom checklists could not be imported for built-in locations.  You got an error stating the file was corrupt, even though it wasn't.
• The combination of custom checklists and deleted locations could produce files Scythebill wouldn't load.  They'll load now.  (Thanks to Jonathan B. for the report)
• The "auto-magic copy-and-paste" feature is better at finding species.

There's also a few fixes in importing data from eBird:

• eBird imports were not always properly finding states (for example, you'd get a location named "MT" in Brazil instead of having records put in "Mato Grosso").
• If you took the Scythebill eBird export, and reimported, it would drop the first record, and not always re-find locations correctly. Thanks to Keith M. for reporting.

One small feature was added: when you're choosing dates in "Show reports", you can choose "is today" or "is this year".

Other changes include:

• Scythebill now generates much better default names for exported .csv and .xls files.
• New Zealand, Kiribati, Malta, and the Maldives all now have built-in states.
• When saving files, Scythebill will warn you if you're saving over an existing file.
• Another 50 checklist fixes have been made.  In particular, the Washington state checklist has been overhauled, and the Pygmy-Owls of the New World should now have accurate ranges (especially those in the "gnoma" complex).

What's coming next?

The next release (barring any urgent bug fixes) should incorporate the IOC 4.1 list.  This will be a lengthier process than my usual rapid IOC uptake, as this will be the first time I've had to reconcile the IOC update with the worldwide checklists.  Stay tuned!