What's new?

Two updates for the Comic Connect software and the CLZ Cloud viewer today. One a big step forward in usability, the other a nice cosmetic improvement:

Comic Details now integrated in main screen

Up till now, when you clicked a comic entry to see its’ full details, you were taken to the comic details page, that is, a new page in your browser. One had to click “Back” to get back to the comic list again. Often resulting in an annoying back and forth clicking, each time causing you to lose your position in the list.

But not anymore! Starting with today’s update, the comic details are now integrated in a panel within the main collection view:

No more back and forth clicking. Just click a comic entry to see its’ details, click another one to see that comic’s details. Nice and easy, never lose your spot again.

Choose from two Layouts:

• Horizontal Split: folders on the left, list on the top right, details on bottom right
• Vertical Split: 3 panels side by side, folder, list and details

In either layout, the 3 panels are fully resizable by dragging the black “splitter bars” between the panels, so that you can customize the layout to your own liking.

The comic details panel comes with its’ own “action bar”, with the main actions you may want to take on the selected comic (Edit, Share, Delete, Duplicate, Loan and Link with Core).

Improved Cover View and Card View

At the same time, we made some small tweaks to both the Card View and Cover View, so that they’re making better use of your specific screen width. Both now use a “fully justified” layout, with the Cards auto-resizing to fit your screen width and the Covers distributing over the width, both resulting in a cleaner, less “jagged” view.

Up until today, the quick search box in Comic Connect (and the CLZ Cloud viewer for comic) only searched in the Series title, Issue title, Barcode and Tags fields. Pretty limited, but necessary for performance reasons.

However, with the new search engine we created last year, it became possible to search more fields while keeping the search super-fast. So lets use that capability!

From now on, if you use the search box, it will also search in many more fields. The complete lists of fields that are now searched:

• Series Title
• Issue Title
• Barcode
• Crossover
• Story Arc
• Series Group
• Plot
• Tags
• Notes

Example: searching for the crossover “Crisis On Infinite Earths” will return all issues that are part of that crossover:

We fixed an issue in two panel mode where, on start-up, the items in your database sometimes wouldn’t show up correctly. We also addressed a problem with cover prices not syncing up correctly.

Fixed:

• Main Screen: The width of the columns wasn’t remembered correctly sometimes.

A couple of weeks ago, our CLZ Cloud (and Comic Connect) has been updated with 7 more fields and loan information. Today’s version 18.3 now supports the syncing of all these new fields and your loan information to the CLZ Cloud and your CLZ Comics mobile app!

Added for syncing:

• Edition
• Crossover
• Story Arc
• Imprint
• Age
• Cover Price
• Release Date
• Loans

Heads up: after updating to version 18.3, the software will automatically mark most of your comics as “changed”, to force the upload of your data for the new fields to the CLZ Cloud.

These fields also all sync to the latest iOS and Android mobile apps (version 4.11 needed)!

Fixes:

• Several Access Violation errors in the main screen.
• List View: Double clicking on checks would make list unresponsive.
• Edit Screen: Using Next/Prev would cause strange effects with checkboxes in main screen.

Fixed:

• Main comic list wouldn’t load completely in certain situations.

By popular demand, we have added 7 more editable fields to CLZ Comics. These fields were already available as automatic Core fields but are now fully editable:

Fields that are now fully editable:

• Edition
• Crossover
• Story Arc
• Imprint
• Age
• Cover Price
• Release Date

But wait, that’s not all: All the above fields now also sync to and from the CLZ Cloud!

Secure HTTPS connections, for your security and privacy

As indicated in our recent GDPR email, we are updating our software and services, to be more secure and to better protect your privacy.

Starting with version 4.11 CLZ Comics now uses secure HTTPS connections for all communications with our servers:

• for logging in with your username and password
• for syncing your data with CLZ Cloud
• for sending your searches to Core.

To make this possible, we have created new secure “entry points” on our servers, that are only allowing secure HTTPS connections. The new CLZ Movies app only communicates with those secure entry points.

For your privacy and security, we strongly recommend updating your app to v4.11.

By popular demand, we have added 7 more editable fields to CLZ Comics. These fields were already available as automatic Core fields but are now fully editable:

Fields that are now fully editable:

• Edition
• Crossover
• Story Arc
• Imprint
• Age
• Cover Price
• Release Date

But wait, that’s not all: All the above fields now also sync to and from the CLZ Cloud!

Note: Because of the new fields the app needs to perform a database optimization. If you have a very big database (over 10.000 items) and/or a slower device, this optimization can take a while to complete. If you’re having troubles with this, please contact us for a solution.

Secure HTTPS connections, for your security and privacy

As indicated in our recent GDPR email, we are updating our software and services, to be more secure and to better protect your privacy.

Starting with version 4.11 CLZ Comics now uses secure HTTPS connections for all communications with our servers:

• for logging in with your username and password
• for syncing your data with CLZ Cloud
• for sending your searches to Core.

To make this possible, we have created new secure “entry points” on our servers, that are only allowing secure HTTPS connections. The new CLZ Movies app only communicates with those secure entry points.

For your privacy and security, we strongly recommend updating your app to v4.11.

Fixed:

• Last update made some settings disappear in the settings screen. They are back now.
• Added bottom margin to the add auto screen on iPhone X to make the add button more reachable
• The sync screen wasn’t logging local deletes.

Over the last week Joël from team Connect worked on splitting the settings into more logical places, and added new tooltips to explain what all the buttons do. The full what’s new:

Added tooltips

Hovering your mouse over the various buttons will now show tooltips to explain what the buttons do! Hover your mouse over the buttons to see what they do.

Split the settings

All settings used to be together in one screen, but they weren’t easy to find so we decided to split the settings up into their own logical pages. You can now find them by opening the menu (top left), and look for:

• Field Defaults: to set up default field values for new items
• CLZ Cloud Sharing: to set up all your CLZ Cloud sharing options
• Settings: with just the behaviour and display settings

A cool user interface update for your Comic Connect software today, in which we makes it easier to select comics and easier to perform batch actions on the selected comics.

Select using checkboxes

To select comics, just click the checkboxes on the left of each comic entry in the list. Checkboxes are also available in Card View and Images View, just hover your mouse over an item.

No more need to go into “Select Mode” first. The Select Mode is automatically activated as soon as you checkbox the first comic, clearly indicated by the blue Batch Action Bar that replace the regular toolbar.

Batch Action Bar

While in Select Mode, the blue Batch Action Bar is visible, always showing you the number of selected comics. Also:

• Use the “Select all” checkbox to select all comics in the current list in one go
• Use the “x Cancel” button on the right to leave Select Mode
• And of course, use any of the action buttons (Edit, Delete, Print, Export, Duplicate and Loan) to perform an action on the selection comics

Comic Collector offers powerful batch commands, for performing actions on multiple comics in one go, e.g. editing, removing or updating from Core.
However, we are finding that many users have never use these these batch actions, either because they are not aware of their existence or because they don’t know how to actually select multiple comics (by Shift or Ctrl-clicking).

In today’s update we addressed these issues:

New Selection Checkboxes in the List View, for easy selection of multiple comics

The List View now features checkboxes on the left. Use the checkboxes to easily select multiple comics, no Shift or Ctrl-clicking needed. Of course the classic Shift/Ctrl-clicking still works too, this is just an extra method.

Don’t need the checkboxes? You can hide them using Tools / Options / Customization.

A new Action Bar with batch actions

As soon as multiple comics are selected (that is, more than 1), a new Action Bar appears above the list. It shows how many are selected, plus offers buttons for the most popular batch actions.

Also new: Action Bar above Details Panel

At the same time, we also added a new Action Bar above the details panel, for quick access to commands operating on the selected comic.

TIP: The commands in this new Action Bar have been removed from the main toolbar, to make that one a bit cleaner. However, if you are upgrading from an older version, it will remember your toolbar. To get the new clean main toolbar, choose View / Toolbars / Reset.

Don’t need or want this new bar? You can hide it using Tools / Options / Customization.

A BIG update for your Comic Collector software today, with two important changes:

1. Secure HTTPS connections, for your security and privacy

As indicated in last week’s GDPR email, we are updating our software and services, to be more secure and to better protect your privacy.

Starting with version 18.2, Comic Collector now uses secure HTTPS connections for all communications with our servers:

• for logging in with your username and password
• for syncing your data with CLZ Cloud
• for sending your searches to Core.

To make this possible, we have created new secure “entry points” on our servers, that are only allowing secure HTTPS connections. The new Comic Collector software only communicates with those secure entry points.

For your privacy and security, we strongly recommend updating to version 18.2.

2. More sync fields

Last week, our CLZ Cloud (and Comic Connect) has been updated with 9 more fields and loan information. Today’s version 18.2 now supports the syncing of all these new fields and your loan information to and from the CLZ Cloud!

Added for syncing:

• Crossover
• Imprint
• Story Arc
• Age
• Edition
• Cover Price
• Cover Date
• Release Date
• Loans

Heads up: after updating to version 18.2, the software will automatically mark most of your comics as “changed”, to force the upload of your data for the new fields to the CLZ Cloud.

BTW: Updates for the CLZ Comics mobile apps are coming up soon, so that you can fully sync the above new fields from desktop to mobile and vice versa.

Fixed:

• A crash could occur in the “Frequency” manage pick list field.
• Grouping on “Series First Letter” would sometimes not show all series.

You can now loan comics in Comic Connect: just find and select a comic (or select multiple with the Select tool), and click the “Loan” button at the top!

Loan Manager

Click the menu top left, and then Loan Manager to access the new Loan Manager where you can see all your loaned out items, and directly return them. Alternatively you can also use CLZ Barry to scan a barcode of a comic, find it in your outstanding loans, and return it.

In the Loan Manager, you can click on a loaned item to modify the loan date, due date, return date, loaner and notes about the loan.

Print current loans to PDF

You can print out all your current loans to a PDF file by clicking the Print to PDF button in the Loan Manager screen.

Alternatively, you can select a loaner from the dropdown menu there, and only print out his/her current loans to a PDF file!

New:

• Loan comics by selecting a couple in your list, or by viewing the details of a comic, and then click “Loan” at the top.
• Return comics straight from the loan manager or by scanning their barcodes with CLZ Barry.
• Check outstanding loans and loan history in the Loan Manager.
• Edit outstanding or returned loans by clicking on them.
• Print out current loans to a PDF file

Coming up:

We will be adding the syncing of loan information to Comic Collector for Windows and macOS, and CLZ Comics for iOS and Android.

With super hi-res 4K (or even 5K) screens becoming quite common, more and more people are running Windows with the Font Size (DPI scaling) set to 125% or 150%, to keep text readable. So earlier this year, we released maintenance builds for all Windows editions to fix various layout problems when running Windows with “large fonts”.

Today, with version 18.1 we’re taking the next step: Comic Collector is now fully “DPI Aware”. Starting with this version, if you have increased your font size in Windows, all screen texts will look sharper, less fuzzy, making full use of your hi-res screen.

To give you an idea, here are 2 close-up screenshots of what it looked like in the old version versus the new version:

Old version:

New version:

New collection status icons

We added new collection status icons to the main screen’s list view and card view to make the screen less clogged up and easier on the eye.

Fixed:

• Edit Comic:
  • Index field didn’t have localized or custom caption
  • Clicking next or previous could create a second + button in the User Defined Fields tab
• Templates:
  • Fixed an issue where the template could become “white” if arrow keys were used on the keyboard.
  • Clicking an image would show a drag/drop menu. The image now opens properly.
• Quick Search: Fixed normalization for quick searches so words with umlauts/accents etc. are now easier to be found.
• Fixed a problem with folder paths for users that have their Documents folder rooted to an external drive (program wouldn’t install properly).
• Link Screen could show “Link Selected” button even if there were no matches.
• Manage Column presets:
  • Clicking in certain parts of the screen could cause Access Violations.
  • Clicking the Edit menu could break the focus in the screen.
• Light Skin: Better visibility for selected items in your lists.
• User Defined Fields: It was possible to create invisible User Defined Fields which would then never show up in the edit screen.
• Add Screen: Scrollbar position wouldn’t update sometimes.

By popular demand, we have added 7 more fields to Comic Connect that used to be automatic Core fields but are now fully editable:

• Edition. Previously set automatically, now fully editable.
• Crossover. Previously set automatically, now fully editable. Also available as a folder option.
• Story Arc. Previously set automatically, now fully editable. Also available as a folder option.
• Imprint. Previously set automatically, now fully editable. Also available as a folder option.
• Age. Previously set automatically, now fully editable. Also available as a folder option.
• Cover Price. Previously set automatically, now fully editable.
• Cover Date. Previously set automatically, now fully editable.

New for the Add Comics screen:

• Add button is now bigger and easier to spot (some new users missed the little round “+”).
• Add button now “remembers” your collection vs. wish list selection. No need to pick from the Collection/Wish List popup menu every time you add anymore.
• Remove from queue button is now bigger and easier to spot. Tap and hold on a barcode in the queue to select barcodes you want to remove.

Fixed:

• The main comic list scrolled to top after editing a comic while the ‘series’-folder mode was active.
• Accented characters in sortnames/titles were sorted incorrectly.
• Main screen: the over-sensitive quickscroll bar in the thumbnail view has been fixed.
• Edit: ‘Done’- button doest not scroll from screen on manual scroll.
• Edit: New ‘Unsaved changes’ dialog.
• Cloud sync: Sync reporting ‘invalid xml’ in rare cases.

New for the Add Comics screen:

• Add button is now bigger and easier to spot (some new users missed the little round “+”).
• Add button now “remembers” your collection vs. wish list selection. No need to pick from the Collection/Wish List popup menu every time you add anymore.

Fixed:

• Adding a comic would clear the collection status filter in the main screen.
• The sorting option screen would sometimes not fully show the chosen sort option when opened.
• iPad: Main screen: the details view did not refresh after changing the details template.
• iPad: Main screen: the ‘edit my rating’ pop up was rotated when in landscape mode.

Fixed:

• Add Comics: Blue highlighting of comics already in collection did not always work.
• A crash could happen on iPhone when changing from ‘All Comics’ to ‘On Wish List’ while the series thumbnail view was open.
• Display issue in main screen of iPad: Details view lost its contents after a canceled sync.

Never a dull moment at the CLZ HQ… Here we were, working on nice improvements for our software, when suddenly… the guys at Apple had a brainwave: In their ultimate wisdom, they decided to start phasing out 32-bit applications.

Since April 12, users of macOS High Sierra are getting a “not optimized for your Mac” warning when they start a 32-bit application. Which includes the Comic Collector software for macOS 🙁

On top of that, Apple have already stopped allowing 32-bit applications in their App Store and rumours are that they may even stop supporting 32-bit applications in a future version of macOS, requiring every application to be 64-bit!

Of course, we were already aware that Apple would be going this route some day; the rumours have been around for quite a while. So we had already been working on a 64-bit version of our software, as a “back-burner project”.

But the introduction of last week’s “not optimized” warnings suddenly made this a high-priority project. So… we dropped everything we were doing and finalized our 64-bit project. And I am happy to report:

A fully 64-bit v18.1 version of Comic Collector is available now!

Not exactly what we were planning to do this month, but hey, this is what the Update Plans are for: your guarantee that we deal with everything the world throws at us 🙂

Fixed:

• App could crash when the thumbnail view was active in the series folder.
• After adding a new comic it wasn’t selected your list.
• Illegible series names in the series list when the dark skin was enabled.
  

A small user interface tweak today:
The Add Comics screen is now a pop-up screen that lays over your comic list.
(previously it was a separate full screen page)

Looks cooler, feels more “snappy” and while adding comics, you can actually see the new additions appear in your comic list in the background!

We’ve added new fields to sort on to change the order in which your comic issues are displayed in your list. Your issue list will adapt to sort and show the field you’re sorting on. On top of that we’ve redesigned the Select Sort Order screen to make it more clear what you’re choosing.

Open the Select Sort Order screen by tapping the menu top right, then tap “Sort order”.

All available sort fields:

• Series A-Z, then issue
• Series Z-A , then issue
• Cover Date
• Release Date (New!)
• Order of Entry (New!)
• Read Date (New!)
• My Rating (New!)
• Purchase Date (New!)
• Purchase Price (New!)
• Current Value (New!)
• Quantity (New!)

All fields can be sorted either ascending or descending. Tap the field you wish to sort on, then tap “Apply” to confirm.

Fixed:

• Sync with CLZ Cloud:
  • Sometimes the “Local changes to be uploaded” counter didn’t show the correct number.
  • When a cover could not be downloaded during down syncing it would stop and not continue. Now it will continue and show a report of any possible errors that have occurred.
  • Sometimes covers weren’t uploaded when they should have.
  • The error: “This database is different from the one in CLZ Cloud” would show up in rare cases when it shouldn’t.
• Main Screen:
  • There were still some cases where “follow edited item” option was not working.
  • Folder grouping on a credit role would show folders for all credit roles instead of just the one selected.

Persistent barcode queue

Barcodes scanned on the add page are now remembered! This means you can scan your barcodes into the add queue, leave the page, return later and still add the barcodes you scanned.

If you wish to remove barcodes from your queue, use the Edit button top right of the list of barcodes!

Version 18 is finally here! And it not only bring the promised Auto-Cloud-Syncing, but also many improvements to the main screen, making it both faster and more stable.

NEW: Fully Automatic CLZ Cloud Syncing!

The free CLZ Cloud service is at the center of all our cataloging solutions (desktop, mobile and web), the glue that binds them all together.
Tens of thousands of users are using the CLZ Cloud syncing every day, to transfer data between their desktop, Connect and mobile software, to update their online collection list, or simply for keeping an online backup of their precious database.

Now, it is time to take the CLZ Cloud to the next level, with automatic syncing:
Add or edit comics in Comic Collector and these changes will auto-upload to the CLZ Cloud instantly. Did you make changes using the CLZ Comics mobile app or directly in Comic Connect? Just start your software and changes will download automatically.
No more need to go to the Sync with CLZ Cloud screen, ever.

With “Sync Automatically” switched on…

1. Your online cloud backup is always up-to-date.
2. Your cloud viewer always shows the current state of your collection.
3. All your CLZ tools (desktop, mobile and Connect) will always be in-sync.

Automatic Cloud Syncing is an optional feature, switched OFF by default. If you don’t want to auto-sync, or don’t want to sync with the CLZ Cloud at all, just leave it switched OFF.

Main screen now faster and more stable

In the past few months, we have spent a lot of time rewriting important parts of the main screen. For instance, the code that refreshes the folder panel (which was slow, especially with the “counters” switched on) and also the part that restores your selection in the list after editing. At the same time, we reduced the program’s “memory footprint”, making it more stable overall.

The result is that the program is now a lot more enjoyable to use. It starts quicker, it refreshes much faster (after adding or editing) and switching between folder types is quicker.

The speed-up will be most noticeable on large collections, with thousands of comics. Especially when having LOTS of folders in the folder panel (e.g. Character folders).

Fixes

• Cloud syncing:
  • After duplicating a comic, the duplicate would not be marked for syncing to cloud.
  • In some situations, a down-sync could update empty fields with data from Core.
  • In some situations, cover images would not upload automatically.
• Main screen:
  • After editing, the edited items would not be selected after refresh.