New version 4.41 which fixes this will be on website probably tomorrow.

Existing users, note that you are eligible for 60% discount if you need to renew the license. Just check your inbox for reminders you got from me, or contact me directly.

And new users get 20% discount simply by following me on Twitter and checking my twits for coupon code. I’ll post it there several times today and tomorrow. Coupon code will stay valid till end of the week.

Enjoy

New features and improvements

• Toolbar item to switch on/off comments both in designer and slideshow views.
• Filter input in the tree screen which allows to filter by screen name.
• Panels with scrollbars can be scrolled both horizontally and vertically using the mouse wheel/trackpad. When both scrollbars are enabled, horizontal scrolling can be done pressing the shift key while using the mouse wheel/trackpad.
• Labels (‘Text’ widget) now have transparent background as default.
• Form now has an option (accessed on Advanced property panel) not to be shown, ie. only widgets will be displayed, without the main window.
• Background color (on Advanced property panel) for Field, Dropdown, List and Text widgets.
• Vertical alignment (on Advanced property panel) for Fields and Text Widgets.
• Option to choose between horizontal and vertical layout in Radio widgets.
• You can set default form size in Options, under Editor tab.
• Usability improvements to widgets’ property fields appearance.
• Added command to reset zoom level to default (choose ‘Reset editor zoom’ on View main application menu).
• Mac: Installer and binaries are now smaller.
• Windows: Default menu item is now MockupScreens 4 regardless the minor version number.
• Windows: Installer will try to uninstall previous version before upgrading MockupScreens.
• Improved startup time.
• Minor improvements to comments appearance.
• Moved Transform and Change Multiple Widgets menu items to Edit menu
• Added a Change Multiple Widgets contextual (right-click) menu entry.
• Improved new columns naming in tables: now new columns are always named with capital letter.
• Items in ‘Select Screen to Jump to’ dialog now can be selected by double clicking them.
• Updated Image widget placeholder

Fixes

• Focus borders now work properly during scrolling.
• The application window sometimes could not be restored after closing the application in minimized state.
• The application could crash when using project files from a network drive in rare circumstances.
• The application couldn’t start if it couldn’t load a specific font.
• Some links didn’t work in the slideshow view.
• After opening a read only project, the application stayed in read only mode for newly created projects.
• File overwrite dialog popping up twice.
• Selecting widgets while zoom is on now works properly (although a little bit slower than when zoom is default ie. without zoom)
• Installer now registers properly MockupScreens as an installed program in Windows.
• Mac: Properties panel’s vertical scrollbar was not shown.
• Mac: Main application window was losing focus after startup.
• Windows: Uninstaller now removes icons in desktop and in the Start menu.
• Fixed menu bar borders and window name location in Windows 7 skin.
• Save dialog was shown once again when canceled.
• Several scrollbar issues fixed.
• Widgets panel width could not be increased after reducing it.
• When deleting a column in a table, the column names after it were reset.
• Removed an invalid item in ‘Select Screen to Jump to’ dialog.
• When copying and pasting a Text widget, some widget options could not be properly copied.
• Window title in Mac OS X skin was not properly horizontally aligned.

However you call this on your project (Management summary, Vision, you name it) those few paragraphs or a single page are developed with single goal in mind: to explicitly agree with customer’s boss on which exact problem (or problems) is being solved and how. You don’t want to get into situation where everybody seems to expect from you to solve each related problem along the way! Keep it short and to the point. Be sure to say what is NOT being solved by the project. For example you can say “Reporting won’t be done as part of this project”.

Once you have high quality draft, go to the customer’s boss and promise her you won’t need her to read anything ever again if she helps you to agree on those several paragraphs (it works every single time). What you will get is the short statement developed in fact by the boss (this is crucial!) of the people you are going to work with. Thus nobody will manipulate you in another direction: you can simply say “It’s a great idea, but let’s check what your boss wanted us to do…”.

Simple, isn’t it? And it gets even better.

You or (even better) your project manager should read this word by word on a kick-off meeting. And explicitly say the magical sentence: “This project won’t solve all the problems you may have, but it WILL solve those particular problems: …”. The point is that at this particular moment your customer and probably even his boss are standing there right beside you and nodding their heads meaningfully!

What you get is magically agreed upon scope project-wide – almost out of the box

Just recently I stumbled upon the blog I never knew existed: www.softwareprototyping.net and got into conversation with John Clark, the guy who writes the most of the posts there. Check the site, there is decent stuff there. And from my side, I have decided to add links to such sites on the blogroll. There are not too many of those on this topic.

At least I have to make it public now that Pro edition is near the release

And now back to my e-mails. River of those started pouring in immediately after yesterday’s 4.31 and ‘Windows 7′ skin announcement via newsletter. It’s good to know so many people use MockupScreens to create better software – each and every day!

Just to wet your appetite, here is the same screen mock-up in different skins. Skin on the top is Windows 7, of course:

Problems are recently resolved (at last!) and things are already getting back to normal. Which means new releases VERY soon

If you don’t take time to get (and write down) the big picture first, you are bound to get sidetracked more often than not. Which spells rework, rework, rework. What you need is the bird’s view of what needs to be done and for god’s sake WHY. So you will have the context and crucial guidelines for any later work. As project progresses, you will often have to choose among several legitimate but very different options. In such situations simply ask yourself “Which option brings us closest to original target in the big picture?”.

The caveat is that you as a humble operative can’t do this all by yourself. You need to be precise and to the point in aggressively getting your project manager to obtain what feedback is needed to solve the puzzle. Nothing good will come from “I’m doing my job and other people should do theirs”.

But still you need to know how to moderate interviews and workshops with wildly different personalities. So… the trick here is to be the top communicator! Always improve on this: not only you’ll get meaningful requirements faster but hey – good communication skills are groundwork for more success in almost all areas in life

New version 4.26 is also available for Windows, which includes some bug fixes and several small improvements but nothing spectacular.

And now, finally, full focus is on finishing the PRO edition and after that – new feature release. I must say I’m very eager to start with this new major release because the list of needed and thought-out improvements is already as long as my arm

Enjoy!

ps. Here is a summer picture of MockupScreens racing towards the new release on full sails!