0.44
Released June 30., 2008Measurements
SeqZap 0.44 supports the notion of measurements, data values usually read from the target that you wish to save in the log and report for posterity.
These values can be very useful when comparing two revisions of the product, both for bug-finding and to trace the quality or other trait of a device under test.
Measurements are also saved in comma separated files for easy inclusion into excel and we expect to extend this feature greatly in the coming release as well providing an interface for customers to write their own measurement saving plugins.
Live-updating panels
In this release, panels can now update themselves live while a test script is executing, this gives a great overview of the current state of the target device while a test is executing, and it is a good way to find potential values to measure.
All the complex details of how a tool can both execute in a script while several panels are also using that tool are hidden from the zap tool implementor. So all zap tools automatically support this way of working without the having to write complex threading code.
Various enhancements
File element copy/paste
File elements can now also be copied and pasted, this simplifies test case and test suite creation a bit, since the customer can just use an already existing test case or suite as the basis for the new one.
Alt Up+Down with more than one step selected
Several steps can now be moved by using the Alt + Up/Down keyboard combination.
Jump to target in progress overview
In our continuing efforts to create as many convenient shortcuts in SeqZap as possible, you can now double-click a test case in the process overview and jump directly to the specific test case.
Report files automatically given datetime names
Report files are given a unique name for each test run, this should make it easier to avoid overwriting previous test reports.
Save As
Because saving/renaming/copying a file is not always a simple operation we have added a process that sorts out all the dependencies and book-keeping needed.
Tools
This release of SeqZap adds two new tools, a CommandLine tool for running command line/prompt/interpreter commands from inside SeqZap
CommandLine
The CommandLine tool can be used to automate copying the generated report to a backup'ed network drive or similar tasks that are easiest to solve using a simple command script.
ZapMail
The ZapMail tool provides a simple way for your scripts to send email to notify someone of something, as an example you can set it up to send the newest report to a project leader, or just to notify yourself when a long running test has completed.
Hex values in Modus registers panel
As seen in the section about live-updating panels the modbus registers panel now has support for showing the values of registers in hexadecimal notation, this can all be configured by right clicking the panel.
Log Window
As in version 0.43, the log window was improved in this release.
First and foremost the log window can now be cleared, but the log window has also been enhanced to better handle logging when script really log a lot of data. Previously the log window tried to keep up with the script when writing the log, but now, it will cache the log messages and process the messages at its own pace. This has the effect that the log window can lag behind the script, but no log messages will be lost during execution.
You can force the log window to process all the cached messages in one big swoop by clicking the "Process Queue", but this will lead to the the user interface freezing until the queue has been processed.