What's New in Transana 2.22?

Release 2.22 adds two major functions, several minor features, and a number of important bug fixes.

• Episode Transcript Change Propagation -- If you edit an episode transcript, you can reflect that change in all clips derived from that portion of that transcript.
  
  
  • Just place your transcript cursor within the changed section and press the "Propagate Changes" button in the Transcript Toolbar.
    
    
• Clip Change Propagation -- If you edit a clip's transcript, keywords, or clip ID, you can reflect those changes in all exact copies of the clip.
  
  
  • If you edit a clip's Properties, press the "Propagate Changes" button on the Clip Properties form and Clip ID, transcript, and keyword changes will be pushed to all clips with the same (original) Clip ID taken from the same transcript and with the same start and end points.
    
    
  • If you load a clip in Transana's main interface and edit its keywords or transcript, pressing the "Propagate Changes" button in the Transcript Toolbar will push the changes out to copies of that clip.
    
    
• A toolbar button has been added to the Transcript Toolbar that allows the display of Time Code Data in human readable form within the transcript.
  
  Please note that this feature is implemented by simply adding text to the transcript. You should NOT create clips with this feature enabled. However, because of the way clip creation works, it is not practical to disable it automatically during the clip creation process. Clips accidentally created with time code data showing will require manual editing to remove the time code data.
  
  If time code data is shown when you save a transcript to RTF, the time code data will be visible in the same format in your exported transcript. However, you should be aware that it will not be possible to remove that time code data automatically if you re-import the transcript. (Thanks to the DICA-lab team and the multi-LEARN project at the University of Luxembourg for supporting this project.)
  
  
• The color of Transana's Transcript Highlight has been altered from white text on a dark blue background to black text on a cyan background. This should be more legible, especially when a data projector is being used.
  
  
• Collection IDs now show the full nested collection path in most locations.
  
  
• Episode and Collection Reports that include Clip Keywords now show cumulative time for each keyword in addition to keyword count in the summary section of the report.
  
  
• Episode and Collection Reports that include Clip Transcripts now show an indicator of what transcript the clip was created from. (This is helpful when there are multiple transcripts for a given episode.)
  
  
• When you are creating Quick Clips, Transana no longer automatically expands the database tree to show the new quick clip, as this would often move your keywords out of the visible portion of the Data Window. Users found that this slowed down the Quick Clip process. If you like to see the clips as they are created, have your Quick Clips collection expanded. If you find this disruptive, leave the Quick Clips collection node collapsed.
  
  
• Time Codes are now displayed within the transcript on the Clip Properties form.
  
  
• The maximum size of a Note has been increased from 64KB to a bit over 4 MB.
  
  
• On Windows, release 2.20 added media formats but lost the ability to alter playback speed for formats that used to be supported, due to a bug in the new media control I switched to. For this release, a new parameter has been added to the Transcriber Settings tab for Windows only that allows users to select between supporting more media formats (using the new media control) and having support for playback speed control (using the old media control.)
  
  If you need speed control, use the old control. If you need WMV or WMA formats, use the new control. If you need speed control with WMV or WMA, you'll need to convert your media files to a format that supports speed control.
  
  
• If you delete a transcript from which clips have been made, those clips are orphaned. You can no longer use the "Locate Clip in Episode" function to discover the clip's context. If you delete the episode record as well as the trancript, the orphaned clips cannot be displayed in episode-based reports, maps, or graphs. Transana now asks if you really want to delete transcripts from which clips have been created. As a general rule, this should be avoided.
  
  
• Clip Data Export now handles Unicode characters that don't fit into the default encoding scheme differently. It used to fail, now it attempts to do character translation.
  
  
• Unfortunately, there is a new bug in wxPython that breaks Print Preview functionality on the Mac. As a result, all Print Preview capability has been temporarily removed from Transana on the Mac. While program flow is a little different in a couple of spots, the overall impact of these changes should be minimal. These changes will be removed when the wxPython bug is fixed.
  
  
• The single-user version of Transana for Mac did not allow non-English characters in the media filenames or paths. This restriction has been removed as obsolete.
  
  
• Note Time Stamps in Transana-MU now automatically show the username of the person who adds the time stamp.
  
  
• The Chat feature in Transana-MU now optionally plays a sound when new messages come in.
  
  
• A Buffer Size parameter has been added for SRB connections. This allows manual selection of a parameter that may affect file transfer speeds depending on internet connection speeds.
  
  
• Bug fixes in this release include:
  
  
  • If you choose to delete a collection but then interrupt the process because of the presence of a keyword example, the interruption of the deletion was not handled properly. This left the database in an unstable condition, preventing it from loading correctly and rendering it unusable. (Fortunately, this is a rare sequence in real usage of Transana.)
    
    If you have a database that was corrupted in this way, please contact me. I can repair it for you quite easily.
    
    
  • If, during the process of converting search results to a collection, you ended up with a nested collection that matched your Quick Clips collection name, you could no longer create Quick Clips.
    
    
  • If you used "Undo" following deleting a time code, the time code was improperly restored. This could cause a variety of serious problems with the transcript. If you have any transcripts that are not working properly as a result of this problem, please contact me.
    
    
  • The Series Keyword Maps and Graphs can get quite large and complex quite quickly. Unfortunately, the capacity to save filter configurations for these maps and graphs was limited by the size of one of the fields in the database. This was reflected in an odd error when trying to load filter configurations where the number of clips exceeded this limit, followed by the failure of the configuration data to load. The size of this database field has been increased.
    
    
  • If you selected text that included one or more time codes, then applied formatting using the Transcript toolbar or the formatting shortcut keys, the time code was formatted and the hidden time code data was exposed, sometimes spoiling the time code in the process. This problem has been corrected.
    
    
  • If the only change you made to a transcript involved formatting using the toolbar or shortcut keys, transcript changes were not "noticed" by Transana and would be lost if you left Edit mode without explicitly saving.
    
    
  • Ctrl-U, the shortcut key for underlining text in the transcript, would change upper case letters in a selection to lower case and remove all formatting from them. This behavior (which comes from the underlying control and not from Transana's code) is now avoided in Transana.
    
    
  • If you used "Paste" to create clips following having used "Add Clips," the Add Clip form was given incorrect data. The "Paste" method has been eliminated as a clip creation method.
    
    
  • If your transcript requires the use of Word Wrap, typing speeds could become painfully slow. This problem was expecially evident on PowerPC Macs. Several changes were made to reduce typing lag. While the results are not perfect, the problem is largely resolved.
    
    
  • If you were editing a keyword label in the data tree to initiate merging of keywords and exited by clicking on another item in the data tree, an odd error message occurred.
    
    
  • Unicode did not interact with the Clipboard properly on the Mac.
    
    
  • The ".mov" and ".mp4" file extensions were case-sensitive on Windows.
    
    
  • The Transcript Window help page was missing a graphic on Windows only.
    
    
  • When using Transana-MU in English, trying to change object IDs would cause a Unicode error.
    
    
  • The cursor could become trapped inside a time code, between the time code symbol and the time code data, on the Mac. This caused time code data to appear in some clip transcripts and may have caused other problems.
    
    
  • One user produced a transcript with one mal-formed time code. I'm still not quite sure how. Transana now scans for mal-formed time codes upon loading transcripts and corrects them if possible.
    
    
  • Quick Clip creation got very slow as large numbers of Quick Clips were created. It was quite evident with about 1,500 Quick Clips. This process was optimized to reduce speed problems.
    
    
  • On the Keyword Map (and possibly other reports, maps, and graphs,) if you printed, then used the Filter Dialog, then tried to print again, Transana would crash. The cause of this crash has been remedied.
    
    
    

What's New in Transana 2.21?

• Transana's text-based report infrastructure has been completely revamped.
  
  
  • The Series Keyword Usage Report has been renamed the Series Report. It has been made filterable (ie. it now has a filter dialog which allows you to select which data objects to include.)
    
    
  • The Episode Keyword Usage Report has been renamed the Episode Report. It has been made filterable and the report contents are configurable.
    
    
  • The Collection Keyword Usage Report and the Collection Summary Report have been collaped into a single Collection Report, where the report contents are filterable and the report contents are configurable. Both the Keyword Usage Report and the Collection Summary Report can be created using the Collection Report, but they can also be combined, and a variety of new report structures can be specified.
    
    
  • The Episode and Collection Reports configuration options include:
    
    
    • Clip Times, Length, Media Filename are now optional.
      
      
    • Clip Transcripts and Clip Keywords are independently selectable, so that they can both be included in the same report if desired.
      
      
    • Collection and Clip Comments can now be included in the report.
      
      
    • Collection and Clip Notes can now be included in the report.
      
      
  • Reports for a specific collection can now include clips from nested collections as well. The inclusion of data from nested collections is optional, but the data is included by default.
    
    
  • The Collection Report can now be run from the Root Collection node, allowing a report to include all clips in all collections in the entire database.
    
    
  • Collections now show the full nested collection path rather than only showing the collection name of the deepest level.
    
    
  • Filter Dialogs have been added to most text-based reports, making them much more flexible and customizable.
    
    
  • The content of all text-based reports can now be edited manually.
    
    
  • The content of all text-based reports can now be exported to Rich Text Format files.
    
    
• Clip Data Export is available in more places.
  
  
  • When requested from a Series Node, all clips from all episodes in that series are included.
    
    
  • When requested from the Root Collections Node, all clips in all collections can be included.
    
    
  • Clips in nested collections can be (optionally) included.
    
    
  • Full collection path data is included, instead of listing only the most deeply nested collection's name.
    
    
• Play All Clips has been improved.
  
  
  • "Next" and "Previous" buttons have been added, making it easier to skip and repeat clips during Play All Clips.
    
    
  • Clips from Nested Collections are now included, following the final clip from the root collection. (Press "Cancel" to stop these clips from being played.)
    
    
  • Full Collection path information is displayed during Play All Clips.
    
    
• The Notes Editor has been improved.
  
  
  • You can insert a date/time stamp into a Note by pressing the Timestamp button in the Note Editor toolbar or by pressing Ctrl-T.
    
    
  • Notes can be exported to Plain Text files.
    
    
  • Notes can be printed individually.
    
    
  • You can search for text within a note.
    
    
• A new tool, the Notes Browser, has been added. (Tools > Notes Browser) The Notes Browser is designed to allow you to review your analytic notes (analytic memos) easily. (One model for using Notes, the Notes Browser, and the associated Notes Report is described briefly here.)
  
  
  • You can review and edit all existing notes in a single interface.
    
    
  • You can easily locate a note in the full Database Tree by right-clicking on the Note in the Notes Browser tree and selecting "Locate Note."
    
    
  • You can load the Clip that a Clip Note is attached to by right-clicking the Clip Note in the Notes Browser tree and selecting "Load the Associated Clip."
    
    
  • You can create a filterable, editable, exportable, printable report containing all (or selected) Series Notes, Episode Notes, Transcript Notes, Collection Notes, Clip Notes or all Notes in the entire database by right-clicking a root node in the Notes Browser tree. That is, right-click "Series," "Episode," Transcript," "Collection," "Clip," or the root Database node in the Notes Browser tree and select "Notes Report."
    
    
  • You can search for a word or phrase across all notes in your database using the Note Search tab of the Notes Browser tree.
    
    
• Saved Configurations from Filter Dialogs now save more data. Almost all Report Settings and Options data is saved as part of a Filter Configuration now.
  
  
• Full Collection Path data is now shown on the Keywords tab in the Data Window.
  
  
• You can now import Transcripts that are in Plain Text format in addition to importing RTF files. At present, this only works for files in English, or at least for files that do not include characters outside the English (latin-1 encoding) character set. Users who require import of non-English files should continue to use RTF import instead of plain text.
  
  
• Transana-XML files are now exported with the "*.tra" file extension instead of the "*.xml" file extension. (It will be possible to import these files directly into QDA Data Miner's August 2007 release.)
  
  
• On the Mac, Transana Program Settings are now accessible via Transana > Preferences, rather than through the Options menu. (This is more consistent with the standard Mac interface.)
  
  
• Several bugs have been found and fixed:
  
  
  • A variety of problems were discovered regarding the interaction between time codes in the transcript and the clipboard. On the Mac, copying text that included a time code from a transcript to the Mac clipboard caused Transana to crash. On Windows, pasting text with time codes did not work correctly, leading to display problems. Also, this could lead to problems with time code sequencing.
    
    To prevent these problems, the cut/copy operation now removes time code data on the Mac before text is placed in the clipboard. On Windows, cut/copy allows time code data (so it can be transfered to an external application) but paste removes time code data.
    
    
  • Starting with release 2.11, you could not move or change the Sort Order of a Clip that had Clip Notes attached.
    
    
  • If your Visualization seletion started at 0.0 seconds, you could not zoom in on a selection in the Visualization Window.
    
    
  • If you changed the Starting Point on one of the Maps or Graphs and had Vertical Grid Lines enabled, the initial grid line was being drawn at 0.0 rather than at the specified starting point.
    
    
  • If you turned off Color Output on one of the Maps or Graphs, then closed it, the next Map or Graph you created would not receive proper color assigments then the Color Output option was re-enabled.
    
    
  • Video Playback could get very rough and choppy if too complex a Keyword or Hybrid Visualization was displayed.
    
    
  • If you had a blank note, one without any text in it, this caused problems for database export.
    
    
  • A some obscure problem with color during RTF Export was fixed.
    
    
  • There were some character encoding issues with the various Maps and Graphs, particularly mouse-overs and filter dialogs, when non-English characters were used in keywords, collection ids, or clip ids. These encoding problems have been resolved.
    
    
  • Some difficulties with renaming and deleting object containing non-English characters in the object IDs were fixed.
    
    
  • In the multi-user version of Transana, deleting a Keyword in the Keyword Manager did not properly trigger the update of the Keyword Visualization on other computers.
    
    
  • On the Mac, File > Printer Setup and Transcript > Printer Setup did not function. These menu items have been fixed.
    
    
  • On the Mac, if you tried to search Help, the Help system crashed. This has been fixed.
    
    
  • The Mac-Intel version of Transana had problems with non-English prompts and non-English database names. These Unicode problems have been resolved.
    
    
• We were unable to get updates for the Dutch and Russian translations in time for this release. The Dutch translation has been dropped until we can get an update. The Russian translation, while incomplete, has been retained in the single-user version of Transana on Windows, as removing it would make it impossible for people who used it in previous versions of single-user Transana on Windows to access their data properly.
  
  If you would be interested in volunteering to update either of these translations, or to do a translation for another language, please contact David Woods by e-mail.
  
  

What's New in Transana 2.20?

• The "copy and paste" (non-"drag and drop") method of clip creation has been streamlined. The "Select Clip Text" button in the transcript toolbar (which triggered a "Copy" action) has been eliminated. You no longer use "Paste" to create the clip, but instead use the "Add Clip" right-click menu option for collections or clips in the data window.
  
  You can see a demonstration of the revised methods for creating clips in the Clip Creation ScreenCast.
  
  
  • On Windows:
    
    • You can highlight text in the transcript, then right-click a collection and select "Add Clip" to add a clip to the end of the clip list. (This replaces "Select Clip Text" and "Paste".)
      
      
    • You can highlight text in the transcript, then right-click a clip and select "Add Clip" to add a clip in that position in the clip list. (This replaces "Select Clip Text" and "Paste".)
      
      
    • You can highlight text in the transcript and drag it onto a collection to add a clip to the end of the clip list. (This is unchanged.)
      
      
    • You can highlight text in the transcript and drag it onto a clip to add a clip in that position in the clip list. (This is unchanged.)
      
      
  • On OS X:
    
    • You can highlight text in the transcript, then right-click a collection and select "Add Clip" to add a clip to the end of the clip list. (This replaces "Select Clip Text" and "Paste".)
      
      
    • You can highlight text in the transcript, then right-click a clip and select "Add Clip" to add a clip in that position in the clip list. (This replaces "Select Clip Text" and "Paste".)
      
      
• Quick Clip creation has been refined. The "Quick Clips Mode" option has been eliminated on OS X and has a more limited scope of influence on Windows than in previous Transana releases.
  
  
  • On Windows:
    
    • You can highlight text in the transcript and drag it onto a keyword to create a Quick Clip. This option is similar to the creation of regular clips. "Quick Clips Mode" does not affect this method of Quick Clip creation. (This is new.)
      
      
    • If "Quick Clips Mode" in the "Options" menu is checked, you can highlight text in the transcript, then drag a keyword from the data window onto the transcript. (If "Quick Clips Mode" is not checked, this action will assign the keyword to the transcript's parent episode or clip.) Some have argued that this is a more ergonomic action than the option above. (This is unchanged.)
      
      
    • You can highlight text in the transcript, then right-click a Keyword in the Data Window and select "Create Quick Clip" from the menu. "Quick Clips Mode" does not affect this method of Quick Clip creation. (This is changed only in that you do not need to select "Quick Clips Mode" any more for this option to be available.)
      
      
  • On OS X:
    
    
    • You can highlight text in the transcript, then right-click a Keyword in the Data Window and select "Create Quick Clip" from the menu. (This is changed only in that you do not need to select "Quick Clips Mode" any more for this option to be available.)
      
      
• Transana's Audio Extraction code has been replaced with all new code. Therefore, the Mac release of Transana is now a full release, not an Alpha Test release.
  
• Transana's Media Player code has been significantly upgraded. As a result, we now support a number of additional media formats:
  
  
  • QuickTime *.mov video and *.mp4 video now work with Transana on both Windows and Mac.
    
    
  • Windows Media *.wmv video and *.wma audio now work with Transana on Windows.
    
    
  • Additional audio and video formats MAY work, depending upon format, platform, codecs, and individual installations. Just give it a try. If it works, please report the details (format, platform, etc.) to me via e-mail.

• New Visualizations have been added. Visualizations are selected by going to the Options menu and choosing a Visualization Style.
  
  
  • The Keyword Visualization shows how an Episode or Clip has been coded.
    
    
  • The Hybrid Visualization shows both the waveform and keyword placement information.
    
    
  • A Filter Dialog has been added to the Visualization Window, allowing customization of the information included in the Keyword Visualization.
    
    
• Series Keyword Graphs have been added, allowing you to look for change over time in the distribution of coding across Episodes in a Series.
  
  
  • The Sequence Graph shows keyword usage across Episodes in a Series.
    
    
  • The Bar Graph shows total keyword usage across Episodes in a Series.
    
    
  • The Percentage Graph shows the same data as the Bar Graph, but in a normalized form.
    
    
• You can now export select data from Transana to a tab-delimited text file suitable for import into SPSS, Excel, and other programs. See the"Clip Data Export" page in the Transana Manual for more information.
  
  
• A Text Search box is now included in the Transcript Toolbar. This allows you to search for text in the currently-loaded transcript.
  
  
• You can now merge Keywords. If you conclude that two of your keywords really represent the same concept, simply rename one to match the other.
  
  
• The Batch Waveform Generator has been improved to make it easier to select multiple video files from the same folder.
  
  
• Several configuration options have been added to the Keyword Map. You can now configure the height of the bars and the amount of whitespace between items, and you can choose to have grid lines displayed. The "Time Range" tab on the Filter Dialog was changed to "Options" when these additional options were added.
  
  
• You can now print the Keyword Map in Landscape format on the Mac. There used to be no way to specify this, but now you can. (We replaced Printer Setup with Page Setup on the Keyword Map report screen.)
  
  
• The Clip Properties dialog and the Keyword List Edit dialog now retain size changes within a given Transana session. This was requested by several users with very long keywords.
  
  
• Deleting a Keyword or a Keyword Group no longer clears the Transcript or Clip you are working on from the Transana main display.
  
  
• If you are running Transana-MU on the same computer where you host your MySQL database, you can now see the work of others working on the same database. Transana-MU will see that you are connecting to"localhost" and will prompt you for the name for your computer used by others.
  
  
• Several bugs have been fixed and other problems resolved.
  
  
  • You can now select text in a Transcript from right to left or from bottom to top. In the previous release, Transana cleared selections that were not made in a left to right, top to bottom manner.
    
    
  • When creating a clip from another clip, if no time code preceded the transcript selection, the new clip was given the incorrect start time of 0:00 rather than the correct start time of the original clip's start time.
    
    
  • If you have a time-coded Transcript that exceeds your video file, you could still create clips without valid media in previous Transana releases. The clip start and stop times would be invalid, and such clips could not of course be loaded and played. This caused a host of problems. Such clips can no longer be created. If you currently have such clips in your database, please delete them.
    
    
  • If you loaded a Clip and put its transcript into Edit mode, then pressed the Edit Keywords button in the Transcript Toolbar, errors occurred and you could lose your edits. The underlying conflicts that caused this have been fixed.
    
    
  • If you tried to add a Transcript Note while you had a transcript in Edit Mode, you would see a strange error message when trying to save your transcript, and the changes would not be saved. (If you immediately re-entered Edit Mode and saved, no data would be lost.) This bug has been fixed.
    
    
  • Sporadic character encoding issues during XML Import have been resolved.
    
    
  • If an Episode or Transcript is deleted, Clips that have been created from it will be orphaned. In previous Transana releases, you could not edit the properties of these orphaned Clips.
    
    
  • Transana-MU's Record Lock Report now automatically clears the Transana Main Screen, preventing the current user from retaining legitimate record locks, which if cleared by the Record Lock Report could present problems with saving.
    
    
  • If you left Transana-MU idle too long, you could lose your connection to the database. Recovery was not smooth, and people sometimes lost edits to transcripts. Transana now more aggressively tries to retain its connection to the database.
    
    
  • A change in Transana 2.12 caused problems reporting errors connecting to the Transana database in Transana-MU. Database connection error messages are reported correctly during program startup again.
    
    
  • In Transana Message Server version 2.12 and earlier, the Database Host/DNS field was case-sensitive. This meant that two Transana-MU instances could connect to the same host and database but not be able to see each other due to case differences. This has been corrected with Message Server 2.20.
    
    
  • Microsoft has apparently changed the way they encode their RTF documents in the latest version of Word, particularly on the Mac, rendering them incompatible with Transana's RTF Import code. Some adjustments have been made. However, I doubt that our updates are comprehensive, and some problems may persist. If you have difficulty importing RTF documents into Transana, please contact me.