Squirrel Release Notes
Version 1.15.10
Hotfix for an issue relating to volatile functions
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- Fixed an issue where formula engine improvements in 1.15 were causing NOW(), TODAY(), RAND() and RANDBETWEEN() function not to calculate on load
- Also fixed a problem with the webi connector was not refreshing properly
- There was an issue with scenarios, only when hidden, that could cause a crash. This has been fixed too.
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Version 1.13.5
Hotfix for a few issues in 1.13
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- Some users reported blinking/wiggly charts after upgrading to 1.13, we’ve fixed this.
- Fixed an issue where double clicking on a squirrel file to open the designer would open the wrong file if you already had the Squirrel designer open
- Sorted a problem where external parameters with missing bindings would cause the designer to crash
- Scorecard and datatable weren’t respecting column widths settings and column alignment was being ignored
- Deleting a sheet could sometimes cause a crash>
- Exporting as .xls where there was a #REF! in the spreadsheet would cause the file to be reported as corrupt.
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Version 1.13
IMPORTANT ! – Sqrl file format change
As part of our spreadsheet engine improvements, the format of .sqrl files has changed between versions 1.12 and 1.13.
This means that a .sqrl file saved from 1.13 cannot be opened in 1.12 or earlier versions.
Before you start using version 1.13 we recommend that you take a copy of your sqrl files in their current format in case you need to revert to them at some point in the future. And if you are collaborating with other people on your Squirrel projects, all collaborators should upgrade to 1.13 at the same time so that everyone can open each other’s files without issue.
Launching locally published projects by double clicking on the index.html file will no longer work
In previous versions of Squirrel, locally exported projects could be run directly by opening their index.html file from disk directly in a browser. From 1.13 onward locally exported projects will only run when accessed from a Web server.
Chart improvements – Big changes under the hood
Charts have been updated. We’ve made some big changes behind the scenes which means that charts now draw or refresh faster. Great news for projects that are heavy on charts and it has also allowed us to add a few much-requested features:
- Grouped bars (or clustering) – grouping series within a category to make charts easier to read
- Overlay chart
- Series re-ordering
- value axis bands
- log scale
- legend reflects the series style
The charts have been given a slightly fresher feel by adjusting some of the default settings too. of course you can always style them however you like.
Smart Guides and snap-to
We’ve added Smart Guides (red lines) to help you line things up. Guidelines appear which show you when an object or group is aligned to the centre, top, middle, bottom, left or right of another object. The object will snap to edges and centres too.
Selection box and resizing
The selection box has been cleaned up a little to reduce clutter. When you select an object on the canvas just the corners of the object will have the resize handles but you can hover grab any part of the box (vertical or horizontal) to resize. When doing so a new size info box will appear to show you the dimensions making it easier to precisely size your components.
You might also notice that the components follow the cursor in full now when you drag them instead of only the outline box coming with you.
Groups get dynamic visibility
You can now set dynamic visibility on groups.
Multiple designer instances
We have added support for multiple instances of the designer (windows only).
We squished more bugs including:
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- COUNTIF() fixed to not treat blank as zero
- Designer crashing in some cases when data insertion source bound to single cell
- and 80 bugs relating to charts
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Known Issue – zoom level reset
If you work with the canvas at a zoom level other than 100% then, when you come back to design mode from debug, you will find that while the canvas remains zoomed but the selection box reverts to a zoom level of 100%. This means that when you select an item its selection rectangle will not be in the correct place.
This can be fixed by reselecting the zoom level (tip: press Ctrl+ then Ctrl- to increase and immediately decrease the zoom level)
Version 1.12.9
Hotfix for an issue with number formatting (issue only present in v1.12.8)
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- Changing the number formatting option to Number, Percentage or Currency with 0 dp’s caused the decimal point to appear
- Turning on the thousand separator option with 0 dp’s caused the value to disappear altogether.
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Version 1.12.8
Hotfix for a few issues in 1.12
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- Fixed an issue with webi connector usage properties disappearing
- Some people experienced issues changing the source on a webi connector
- Bar charts had lost their tooltips. We’ve sorted that
- Tooltips weren’t respecting number formatting with decimal places set to 0
- Radio buttons were wrapping labels incorrectly in some cases.
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Version 1.12
Quick Setup Properties – We’ve simplified setting up components
The new ‘Quick Setup’ panel is a curated set of properties that help you configure, and style, your component quickly and easily. No more wading through sections and subsections to complete the basic setup. Don’t worry though, all the fine control over how a component looks and behaves is still there under the ‘All Properties’ tab
The quick setup properties also include help on each section, accent colours (pick a colour and we take care of the rest including text colour contrast) and text styles.
More font choice and recent colours
We’ve extended the list of fonts available by adding popular google fonts such as Roboto, Montserrat and Ubunto. And the colour picker has been updated to include a list of recently used colours, making it easier to style your projects.
Object Browser – New and improved
When dealing with large numbers of components and groups, it could be hard to find the one you are looking for. We’ve added a search bar to make this easier. While we were at it we flipped the order of the component list so it now works like other tools where objects at the top are the topmost layer. And a new right-click menu gives you access to perform common actions on one or more selected objects.
Chart enhancements – Abbreviate large numbers
Our new single tooltip cleans up your charts so that you don’t need a separate tooltip for every series. And we’ve added vertical gridlines too, giving you more control over how you style your charts.
We also squashed a bunch of bugs including:
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- Issues with some currency symbols in charts causing a crash
- Fixed the border on/off property not working for label based menu
- Up/down arrows not always working on border-width property
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Learn more about the changes in 1.12 here.
Version 1.11.4
Hotfix for a few issues in 1.11
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- Problems with Auto Recover on mac after a crash
- Deletion of original (dummy data) series in chart could cause Squirrel to crash
- Scenarios sometimes do not load properly when inserted into a range referenced by a data mover.
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Version 1.11
Scenarios – Save and retrieve snapshots of your published model
The new scenario component lets you define ranges in the spreadsheet that can be saved and restored by the end-user. Choose whether this should be saved locally (on the end-users machine) or in the cloud for all viewers of the published project to access.
New Help Centre – In product help…
Get access to help articles, tutorials and guides from within the Squirrel designer. Complete with a nifty search feature that lets you find the help you need.
Installer improvements – non-admin install and notarized mac installer
The Mac version is now fully notarized (great news for all the mac users out there!) and we’ve made it possible to install on windows without needing admin privileges.
Chart enhancements – Messy tooltips are a thing of the past
Our new single tooltip cleans up your charts so that you don’t need a separate tooltip for every series. And we’ve added vertical gridlines too, giving you more control over how you style your charts.
70+ bugs fixed including:
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- Delete and duplicate items went missing from the right-click menu after a datasheet was added
- Spreadsheet export fails with an off-screen error when functions have the wrong number of arguments
- Chart alerting colours not updating properly when bound to the spreadsheet
- Date picker rendering issues
- INT function does not treat Boolean values like Excel
- Crash when data mover is bound to a single cell
- Default setting not always working on Toggle switch
- Value input does not display its value when selected and text colour bound to a cell.
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Version 1.10
Datasheets – A better way to load data from Excel Online and Google Sheets.
We’ve been working on a new way to load data from your connectors. Datasheets are a new type of sheet that grow with your data — you no longer need to guess the size of your destination range. Making it quicker and easier to design and build projects. The datasheet option has been added to the Google Sheets and Excel Online connectors.
Load data at design time – Sync datasheets
Connectors that use Datasheets can be synced with their data source at design time. The sync option will grab the latest data and allow you to use it when designing your project. So there is no need to enter dummy/mock data when Datasheets are used.
Drop shadow
Get ‘arty’ with drop shadows.
Project Manager improvements
When working with large numbers of published projects you could find yourself waiting for the page to load. No one ikes to wait so we’ve sorted this out. Your project manager should now load superfast!!
70+ bugs fixed including:
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- Sliders not working on touch devices
- Added a missing property for the background colour of the date picker input box
- Backgrounds colours set at publish time were not extending to the full browser window size
- Fixed an issue where the web view was not always loading properly if it was hidden initially.
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Version 1.9
Account-based licensing and improved billing/subscription management
We’ve been hard at work improving some of our back end systems to bring you a better experience. After updating to 1.9, when you launch Squirrel you will be prompted to complete your account registration. Follow the steps on-screen and log in to Squirrel to carry on as normal.
All new account management area
We’ve added a new account management portal that allows you to:
- Easily manage your payment card details
- Access to billing history to download invoices
- Manage your profile online
In-app help and resources
We’ve added the ability to make help available from right there in the Squirrel Designer. Look out for in-app guides for new features and functionality.
‘Click to follow’ property bindings
The binding tooltip has been enhanced to jump you to the cell/range in your spreadsheet that the property is bound to. This should make it a lot easier to navigate around your projects and work out what is linked to what.
Version 1.8
Deprecation of support for Internet Explorer
Squirrel 1.8 will be the last version that supports Internet Explorer (IE). From 1.9 the output from Squirrel will only be viewable in a modern browser such as Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge (chromium version) and Apple Safari.
This is in line with Microsoft’s own policy which dropped Teams support for IE late in 2020 and plans to drop IE support for 365 Apps (including Excel, Outlook and OneDrive) from 17th August 2021. You can read more about Microsofts plans to end support for apps and services here
Deprecation of experimental xlf migration utility
Some customers have tried out an experimental feature added to Squirrel for Migrating XLF’s. This migration wizard has been deprecated and will be unavailable from builds 1.9 and beyond.
New Components
We’ve added a bumper crop of new components to Squirrel to make building apps even easier:
- Date Picker
- Toggle Switch
- Progress Bar
- Icon
- Metric Tile
New connections
Ninox
Read data from and create, update records in this popular no-code database.
Zapier trigger
You can now use Squirrel to trigger workflows in Zapier meaning you can send data from Squirrel to over 3,700 other systems.
Component Enhancements
Scorecard
We’ve added a property to let you fix the height of rows in the body of the scorecard. You’ll find it under BODY ROW STYLING. Turning on the option to ‘Enable fixed row height’ allows you to enter the row height in pixels.
This is useful if you want to display more rows in a set table size or to ensure that the scorecard rows line up exactly up with other components consistently across browsers.
Image
Unsplash integration
The image component has a new option to search for and add images from Unsplash. No more trawling the internet to find a suitable image you can do it directly from within Squirrel.
Maintain aspect ratio
The aspect ratio of an image is now locked by default. You can override this by disabling this setting in the properties panel for the image.
Designer workflow improvements
Binding Tooltips
A tooltip now displays the full cell reference when the mouse hovers over a bound property.
New spreadsheet number format
It is now possible to select a number format that shows a comma as the thousand separator in the spreadsheet
Publishing workflow enhancements
We now carry forward the project name from the canvas properties meaning you don’t have to keep entering the name for your project each time you publish.
NB: for older projects, you will need to go and set the name in the canvas properties before publishing as it will override the name you specify in the project name field during the publish dialog.
44+ bugs fixed including:
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- Open recent file does not always work if the current project has unsaved changes
- Some range references get wrongly stripped of quotes if sheet names have spaces in them
- Clearing the undo/redo stack on re-import of spreadsheet
- Data mover getting stuck in a loop under certain circumstances and causing Squirrel to crash.
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