What's New in CoolSpools Version 6?
If you are running an earlier version of any software licensed from ariadne, please read the upgrade notes carefully before attempting to migrate to Version 6.
Here are just a few of the highlights of the new version...
CoolSpools Base
The CoolSpools Base Option comprises common code and features that are shared by other product options. It is a mandatory product component and you cannot use the other product options without it.
CoolSpools Base is provided at no additional cost where one or more chargeable product options are licensed.
Features include:
- Styles
- Manage user-defined styles allowing easy control over Excel and XML formatting (colors, fonts, patterns, backgrounds etc.)
- Zipping and unzipping
- Zip and unzip files using the ZIPDTA and UNZIPDTA commands
CoolSpools Spool Converter
Previously called "CoolSpools".
New features include:
- Report Definitions and Report Maps
- Define the structure of reports to be converted by creating Report Definitions
- Define the structure of Excel files and XML
documents to be generated by creating Report-to-Excel maps or Report-to-XML
maps
- By using a Report-to-Excel map with the new
CVTSPLXL (Convert Spooled File to Excel) and CVTSPLDLM (Convert Spooled File
to Delimited Text) commands, it is possible to achieve much greater control
over the structure and formatting of Excel and delimited files such as CSVs
than was previously possible.
- By using a
Report-to-XML map with the new CVTSPLXML command, complex XML documents can be
generated from a spooled file.
- XML
- CoolSpools Spool Converter can now generate XML by
means of the new CVTSPLXML command
- A simple schema (or XSD or DTD) can be
automatically generated or the XML can be linked to an existing schema
- A simple stylesheet (XSLT or CSS) can be automatically generated or the XML can be linked
to an existing stylesheet
- Excel 2007 .xlsx (Office Open XML)
format
- CoolSpools Spool Converter’s new CVTSPLXL command
can now optionally generate Excel 2007 Office Open XML format files (.xls)
- This has the advantage of supporting a much larger number of rows and columns in a worksheet
- Styles and formatting options
- When converting to Excel and XML formats, named
styles can be defined on the new DFNSTYLES parameter.
- Style definitions can also be defined and stored
permanently using the WRKSTLDFN, CRTSTLDFN etc, commands and referred to
subsequently on commands such as CVTSPLXL and CVTSPLXML.
- The styles can be associated with particular types of data (details, headings, titles etc.) or,
using the APYSTYLES parameter, with individual fields to control the visual
formatting of the output such as font, text color, background color, numeric
formatting etc.
- Conditional formatting
- When converting to Excel using CVTSPLXL, you can
apply conditional formatting to selected columns or entire rows using the
CNDFMTGRP and CNDFMTRULE parameters.
- For example, you
can set the color of rows based on the value of a specified field: red for high
values, green for low values etc. or make certain fields bold if rules you
specify evaluate to true.
- Digital Signatures
- Authenticate PDFs you produce by using the new
option to apply a digital signature as you create them using the new
SIGNATURE parameter of the CVTSPLPDF command.
- Add digital
signatures to existing PDFs by means of the new ADDPDFSGN (Add PDF Signature)
command.
- New ways of supplying email addresses to which documents should be sent
- When emailing spooled files, it is necessary to
tell CoolSpools the email addresses of the people the spooled file should be
sent to. This information might vary from one spooled file to the next, or
from one section of a spooled file to the next, depending on its content.
For example, you might want to split a spooled file that contains a batch of
invoices up into multiple PDFs, one per invoice, and email each invoice to
the appropriate customer. Until now, this has often required the use of a
user-written exit program to achieve. Three new methods of supplying email
addresses to use are now available in this release.
- The new EMAILTO(*EMAILFILE) option and related
EMAILFILE parameter allow you to tell CoolSpools to look up the emails to be
used in a specified file. CoolSpools variables can be used to extract data
from the spooled file at run time to be used as keys to read the file. For
example, you might take the customer number from the spooled file and use it
to read a customer file to obtain the email address(es) for a particular
invoice.
- The new EMAILTO(*EMAILSQL) option and related
EMAILSQL parameter allow you to tell CoolSpools to look up the email
address(es) to be used by running an SQL statement. CoolSpools variables can
be used to extract data from the spooled file at run time and replace
parameter markers in the SQL statement. For example, you might take the
invoice number from the spooled file and run a piece of SQL to join the
invoice file to the customer file to obtain the email address(es) for a
particular invoice.
- The new
EMAILTO(*USRDFNDTA) option lets you tell CoolSpools that the USRDFNDTA
attribute of the spooled file contains one or more email addresses to be used.
- User-defined names for CoolSpools variables
- Support for
CoolSpools variables was added by PTF to Version 5. Use of the <:EXITPGMPOSn:>
and <:EXITPGMKEYn:> CoolSpools variables lets you extract items of data from the
spooled file at run time and reference them on text parameters that support
CoolSpools variables.
- In this release, it is now possible to assign your own names to these variables.
For example, the item of data referred to by the first element of the EXITPGMPOS
parameter can be referenced as <:EXITPGMPOS1:>. However, if you use the new
option to assign it you own name to that item of data, perhaps “Customer_number”,
you can also refer to it as <:Customer_number:>.
- Secure FTP (FTPs)
- Support for FTP over SSL when using TOSTMF(*FTP) to send the output to a remote system using FTP
- Encrypted passwords
- Where a password
can be specified on a command parameter (e.g. FTP connection, zip file), the
password can be supplied as an encrypted hex string to avoid the need to hold
passwords in plain text form in source code DSPENCPWD (Display Encrypted Password) command generates the encrypted form of a
password to be used
- Split to new worksheet
- When converting to Excel format with CVTSPLXL, you
can use the SPLIT() options to split the input spooled file into multiple
workbooks and/or multiple worksheets within each workbook. For example,
create a new workbook for each region in your report and a new worksheet in
the region’s workbook for each store in the region.
- New exit points *SHEETSTR and *SHEETEND related to this functionality.
- Conversion to HTML now supports most images and graphics
- When converting to HTML format, most types of
images from overlays and page segments can now be automatically converted to
JPEGs and referenced from within the HTML.
- Line and box graphics are also now reproduced in
HTML.
- Generated HTML documents can be used as the text of an email message, complete with embedded
images and graphics
- New exit program parameter type *TYPE4
- The new *TYPE4
option streamlines exit program parameters. All information is passed as a
single program parameter in the form of a data structure
CoolSpools Email
Previously called "Communiqué".
New features include:
- SNDCMNMSG command enhancements
- New SAVE parameter allows the messages to be saved
for re-sending at a later time. Saved messages can be encrypted and/or
compressed.
- New LOG parameter lets you control whether a
message is logged and whether the logged information is encrypted.
- N.B. CoolSpools Email does not
currently provide support for encrypted messages. This encryption relates to
information stored in the message log and saved messages. Attachments can be
encrypted using the ZIPDTA command or by taking the equivalent option within
CoolSpools Spool Converter or CoolSpools Database.
- New PWD parameter allows you to supply an
encryption password which needs to be supplied before a previously saved,
encrypted password can be retrieved.
- New EMAILID
parameter allows you to retrieve a previously saved email message and send a new
message based on the previous message. Attachments are re-attached and email
parameters can be modified.
- New CRTCMNMSG command
- This new command
provides a more user-friendly interface for sending emails than the SNDCMNMSG
command line interface.
- New DLTCMNMSG command
- This new command
provides a way of deleting saved messages and message log contents based on the
age of the message.
- New RSNCMNMSG command
- This new command
lets you re-send a saved message exactly as it was originally saved (with the
original attachments intact).
- New SNDCMNVCAL and SNDCMNICAL commands
- These new
commands let you send calendar entries (appointments, meeting invitations etc.)
which can be received by any calendar application such as Outlook which supports
vCalendar and iCalendar format messages.
- New API options (some of these options were
added to V1 by PTF since the original release).
- Message texts greater than 4096 bytes (no practical
imposed maximum length).
- Up to 1024 attachments and recipients possible
(original maximum 32)
- Message text supplied in a stream file or database
file member
- Confirmation of delivery sent to a different email
address or addresses from the sender’s email address
- Specification of options for saving email messages
- Specification of options for logging email messages
- Passwords for saved and/or logged email messages when these are encrypted
CoolSpools Spool Admin
Previously called "CoolTools".
New features include:
CoolSpools Database
Previously called "Slipstream".
New features include:
- XML
- CoolSpools Database can now generate XML by means
of the new CVTDBFXML command
- A simple schema (or XSD or DTD) can be
automatically generated or the XML can be linked to an existing schema
- A simple stylesheet (XSLT or CSS) can be automatically
generated or the XML can be linked to an existing stylesheet
- Office Open XML
- CoolSpools Database can now optionally generate
Excel 2007 Office Open XML format files (.xlsx)
- This has the advantage of supporting a much larger
number of rows and columns in a worksheet
- BIFF 8 (Excel 97+) .xls files is still the default
Excel format
- Support for BIFF 5 (Excel 95) files is now withdrawn.
- New format-specific commands
- CVTDBFXL, CVTDBFXML, CVTDBFHTML, CVTDBFTXT and
CVTDBFCSV generate Excel, XML, HTML, fixed-width text and delimited text
respectively
- Introducing these new commands has allowed
parameter definitions to be reorganized and rationalized to improve ease of
use without impacting existing applications.
- CVTDBFSTMF is still supported but its use is now
discouraged. Most new features are available only through the new
format-specific commands and CVTDBFSTMF will not be further enhanced.
- Database maps
- You can now define Database Maps which allow
greater control over the structure and formatting of Excel and XML output.
- Using a database-to-Excel map, you can define
multiple row groups so that the resultant Excel file can have several
different types of detail lines, headings, sub-headings, sub-totals etc.
- Using a database-to-XML map, you can define the element
and attribute structure of the XML file you create, including nested elements.
- User-defined named styles
- When converting to Excel, XML and HTML formats,
named styles can be defined on the new DFNSTYLES parameter.
- Style definitions can also be defined and stored
permanently using the WRKSTLDFN, CRTSTLDFN etc, commands and referred to
subsequently on commands such as CVTDBFXL and CVTDBFXML.
- The styles can be associated with particular types of
data (details, headings, titles etc.) or, using the APYSTYLES parameter, with
individual fields to control the visual formatting of the output such as font,
text color, background color, numeric formatting etc.
- Conditional formatting
- When converting to Excel, you can apply conditional
formatting to selected columns or entire rows using the CNDFMTGRP and
CNDFMTRULE parameters.
- For example, set the color of rows based on the value of
a specified field: red for high values, green for low values etc. or make
certain fields bold if rules you specify evaluate to true.
- User-defined column headings and widths
- As well as letting you define field-level styling,
the APYSTYLES parameter lets you specify field-level attributes such as:
column headings and date formats. Column widths can be specified on the
COLWIDTHS parameter.
- Improved support for dates and times in numeric and
character fields
- APYSTYLES also lets you identify character and numeric
fields as containing dates and times so that CoolSpools Database knows to
convert them accordingly.
- CoolSpools Database variables and CoolSpools Database functions
- Use CoolSpools Database variables and CoolSpools
Database functions to generate file names, email addresses etc at run time from
database file attributes, job attributes etc.
- Secure FTP (FTPs)
- Support for FTP over SSL when using TOSTMF(*FTP) to send
the output to a remote system using FTP
- Excel export to database format
- By means of the CVTXLDBF (Convert Excel to Database
File) command, CoolSpools Database can now extract cell data from an Excel
spreadsheet (BIFF8 or Office Open XML) and write that data to a database
“outfile”.
- Your applications can then process the outfile to import the data into your database or do other work.
- Encrypted passwords
- Where a password can be specified on a command
parameter (e.g. FTP connection, zip file), the password can be supplied as
an encrypted hex string to avoid the need to hold passwords in plain text
form in source code
- DSPENCPWD (Display Encrypted Password) command generates
the encrypted form of a password to be used
CoolSpools NetServer Toolkit
- Included as a no-charge option to assist with
managing access to stream files created by CoolSpools Spool Converter and
CoolSpools Database
- Configure and Manage File and Printer Shares
- Configure and Manage NetServer jobs
- Identify and resolve disabled user issues
Version 6 Memo To Users